President Conant called it an "endorsement of a great educational enterprise," and Dean Donald K. David termed it an "expression of confidence" when John D. Rockefeller, Jr. last June presented the School of Business Administration with a $5,000,000 pledge and, along with it, one of the best testimonials the School has ever received.

"I am convinced," the noted business man declared at the time, "that the Harvard Business School is making the most significant contribution of which I know toward the strengthening and perpetuation of...enterprise based on individual initiative."

Actually the School didn't require any such endorsement. For 41 years it two-year program "to develop administrative abilities" has been turning out distinguished, prosperous business leaders to such an extent that there aren't many persons today who won't unhesitatingly grant the School first place in its line.

Despite all this, the Rockefeller pledge has forced the Business School today to show real evidence for its reputation. Under terms of the donation, the $5,000,000 must on July 1, 1950 be matched by an equal amount in gifts or pledges toward the School's $20,000,000 expansion program. "It's a real test for us," one official put it recently. "We feel we've got something that helps American business, and now in our drive for funds we'll see if business really thinks we're worth while."

"Learn to Do by Doing

The key to Harvard's view of business education is the notion that "one must learn to do by doing." Years ago in 1908, when the School first opened, its leaders decided to minimize the study of facts, rules, and routines, and that's the way things have stayed ever since. Meanwhile, what started as a modest, small-scale "problem method of instruction" has evolved through the years into the School's famous "case system."

Under this system, which has its roots in the Law School's case method as well as medicine's clinical method, each of today's 1,350 Business School students is probing into 500 cases a year. Material is drawn from a Baker Library stock of over 5,000 "active" studies of situations that have actually occurred in business, and before coming to class on each assignment, every student must put himself into the situation and come up with an appropriate decision. There is no right or wrong; it's the business thinking that counts, for after two years of this intensive diet, making executive decisions should become second nature to a Business School man.

This is the reason why the School's graduates are so popular in the job market, and it's also the reason why the expensive Harvard education (tuition is $800 a year) can meet the increasing competition of be-paid-as-you-learn corporation training programs.

Disadvantage at the Start

The corporation programs usually emphasize better preparation for a man's first job. After all, Business School education, intensive as it may be, is developing the "able business administrator," not the salesman or assistant buyer. But while the corporation training programs can and do give non-Business School graduates a bit of a boost at the start, Harvard education can pay off at promotion time. Surveys have shown that the Business School man, even without the training in routines, isn't at all slow in adjusting himself to his first job, thanks to his indirect study of business as a whole.

Of course this Business School education logic sometimes goes astray, because teaching a young man to be an executive before his time can occasionally lead to trouble. "We often find a good bright boy, say from Middle-bury, more satisfactory," a company personnel man once reported. "These Harvard men walk in here and expect a desk twice as long as mine and with half a dozen push buttons."

The "push button" case, happily for Harvard, is the exception and not the rule. Placement figures have always been high, and if anyone regrets the existence of the Business School it's probably the firms that can't offer high enough salaries to attract the Harvard men into their organizations. Most banks and accounting firms can't afford starting salaries much over $250 per month, while the average company operating through the School's Placement Office these days is offering from $250 up to $350 a month as a starter.

Eight-nine percent of the Class of 1949 has already landed jobs, although only about a third of the positions were secured through the Placement Office. A total of 215 firms sought Business School men through the office last year, but placement directors claim that "things look a bit tougher for this year."

They Still Like Harvard

Nevertheless, the fact remains that most company "ivory-hunters" consider a Harvard Business School man a better prospect than a graduate of any of the nation's 139 undergraduate business schools or five other graduate business schools (Stanford, Chicago, New York University, Dartmouth, and Columbia.)