Everyone’s Guessing. Especially the People Hiring

Turns out the “real world” is figuring it out too

For once, I’m going to defend business schools. I know, I know. Don’t get used to it.

I was on a flight back from teaching, sitting next to two senior guys. Different worlds. One in big corporate. One in a massive European family business. Complex industries. Long value chains. Layers everywhere. Plenty of room for young talent to plug in and grow.

We start talking about what I do. Then I ask a simple question.

“If you had a magic wand, who would you hire right now?”

Silence. Then vague answers. Then… nothing.

And here’s what struck me. It wasn’t just that they didn’t know. It’s that they were embarrassed not to know. You could feel it. These are people used to having answers, used to leading teams, used to making decisions. And suddenly, they were exposed.

Not because they’re incompetent. Because they’re uncomfortable.

They don’t know where their own organizations are heading. And if you don’t know where you’re going, how do you define who you need?

We love blaming schools for “not preparing students for the real world.” Fine. I do it all the time. But what happens when the real world can’t define itself?

That’s the gap.

So I’ve been doing something different. I bring companies into the course, not as decoration, but as participants. They step into the mess, conduct mid-course check-ins, and multiple managers even mentor teams. They challenge, they react, they judge.

And then something shifts.

They start seeing clearer. Through the structure, the students, and the friction. They bump into ideas they didn’t expect, rediscover problems they’d stopped questioning, and get exposed to ways of thinking their own systems quietly filter out.

The best moment for me is always after. A drink, a lunch, something informal, and one of them admits it: “We learned a lot too, about our blind spots, about what we’re not doing well enough, and where we need to double down, including the kind of people we actually need, not the ones we’ve been hiring.”

That’s the part we don’t talk about enough.

Maybe business schools aren’t just here to prepare students.

Maybe they’re one of the last places where companies can figure themselves out too.