Hitting the Ground Running: Group Simulations Within Business School Cohorts

Within an ever more marketised Higher Education (HE) landscape, business students are focusing increasingly on the ‘Graduate Premium.’ This involves balancing the costs of their programmes against expected benefits such as facilitated entry into, and progression within, fulfilling and well remunerated business careers. As such, educators are charged with differentiating their programmes from those of other institutions, not only to attract more applicants, but also to give their graduates a competitive advantage in the marketplace. The use of simulations as a learning and assessment strategy within business schools is widespread and growing, affording the dual role of enhancing both programme attractiveness and graduate capabilities, and hence employability. The purpose of this chapter is to analyse, by means of a literature review, the debate surrounding the use of such technology, identifying pedagogical benefits and potential limitations, and to critique how such technology may be harnessed to provide more transparent pathways to professionalism for today’s diverse, demanding students. This review highlights some of the key benefits and challenges experienced by students in using simulations, as they adapt to a different social and learning culture.