The B-School hierarchy is also examining its second-year program. "It could be a 'new-look MBA,'" Heskett says. "There's some exciting course development and we're talking about some major restructuring." Specifically, Heskett says, the second-year program will be redesigned to allow a smoother transition from the academic to the business atmosphere.

Perhaps the most dramatic changes to be made across the river next year will be those in the doctoral program. A study of the program, under the leadership of Louis T. Wells Jr., professor of Business Administration, began before Bok released his report. And the recommendation of Wells' study, which the faculty adopted in December, will be enacted by Wells when he replaces Charles J. Christenson as chairman of the doctoral program next year.

Among the changes Wells will enact are a drastic reduction in the number of students admitted to the program, which would allow closer student-faculty relationships and the lowering of certain financial barriers to program entrance.

The principal goal of the doctoral program will remain to train students in the skills necessary to pursue academic careers in business education. The reforms, Wells's report says, are designed to help better the chances of Harvard graduates to get teaching jobs in high-level business schools including Harvard itself. They are also a response to the declining number of applicants to the doctoral program, which, the report states, may be due in part to "a decline in the reputation of the program at H.B.S."

Yet in the midst of some reform and a great deal of controversial discussion, the B-School stays as stable as it was before Bok's critical report. Perhaps one reason is that above all these reforms, taking active interest in the doctoral program, the MBA program, and the research division of the school alike, is the dean of the Business School, McArthur. He is almost universally liked and respected. "He's very approachable," says Viebranz, "Everybody is very, very high on the guy."

"He's certainly stirred the pot a great deal," Heskett says. "Of course, some of that sort of energy is to be expected from any new dean. But his interest is personal and informal. His only problem is that sometimes he gets so interested in what people are doing that he runs behind schedule. But it's for a good cause."

The cause, few will deny, is maintaining the reputation of the Harvard Business School--it comes up in conversation with school officials again and again. With MBA applications and numbers of businesses recruiting on campus both at an all-time high, the maintenance of a stellar reputation is all-important to the B-School administration.

Curriculum changes, program reforms, changes in emphasis and style are all aimed toward the same goal. And, certainly, President Bok's report was not the first or the most important stimulus toward the attainment of that goal. Instead, the Bok report merely lent an unusual and perhaps an uncomfortable volume to the B-School's quiet obsession with being the best.

Says Heskett: "It's our greatest challenge.