Thousands of Bayer Execs Attend ND

To enhance their management and leadership teams' capabilities, corporations rely on ND's expertise in developing and delivering custom executive education programs. One such corporation is Bayer, which has - for the past 15 years - sent thousands of its senior managers, middle managers and clients to ND to train in such areas as leadership, ethics, e-commerce and managing change.

Three separate customized programs for Bayer Corporation professionals are held on campus. One of these is an intensive two-week management development program, attended by a group of 30 Bayer senior managers - ranging from engineers to marketing professionals to scientists - twice each year. An invitation to attend this customized program at ND is usually a signal to participants that Bayer has important plans for their future with the company.

The other two programs are Financial Management for Non-Financial Managers and a management development program for Bayer's diagnostics divisions - those that distribute and use Bayer's equipment and products. Bayer employees take classes with Mendoza faculty and augment these courses with presentations from Bayer senior VPs, who show participants how to apply what they've learned to their specific jobs.

Despite working for the same corporation, many, if not most, of the Bayer executives attending ND's customized programs have never met one another, as they come from different divisions, locations or even countries. Thus, networking opportunities are an important value-added aspect of the programs.

Mendoza's customized programs are distinguished by the executive education staff's ability to identify and meet a corporation's learning needs. "We build a flexible curriculum that fills a company's 'missing pieces,'" says Barry Van Dyck, director of ND's executive education degree programs. Van Dyck (EMBA '86), was associate director of ND's non-degree programs since January 1995. "We are always changing to stay on the cutting-edge," said Van Dyck. "We go out of our way to meet the needs of each of our corporate clients."