UCT school flies the flag for Africa-based executive education

The University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business (GSB) has retained its place among the global elite in the latest Financial Times (FT) ranking for executive education, published this week.

GSB is ranked 44th for customised programmes – those that are tailor-made for individual corporate clients.

It’s the 13th consecutive year that GSB has made the FT top 100. To qualify, schools must be internationally accredited and earn at least $1m annually from their programmes.

Schools are ranked according to a wide range of criteria, including client satisfaction, programme design, revenue growth, faculty diversity, international activities, collaboration with other schools, teaching quality and value for money.

GSB was one of only two Africa-based schools to make the customised ranking. The other was Lagos Business School, in 51st place. However, two international schools with Joburg campuses also featured. Duke Corporate Education, whose global CEO is SA-born Sharmla Chetty, was second, and Henley Business School 28th. Henley was also placed 18th in the ranking for open programmes, for which anyone may enrol.

HEC Paris topped both the customised and the open ranking. Duke was second on the customised list, followed by Spain-based school IESE. In the open table, IMD Switzerland was second and IESE third.