When the Australian Institute of Management founded AIM Business School, it was made with the goal of bringing our many decades of expertise in and commitment to empowering current and future business leaders into the higher education space.

Today, we have the honour of celebrating 10 years of our online Master of Business Administration.

As we have grown our experience as a higher education provider, there is much that we have learnt ourselves. For instance, when we first launched our online MBA a decade ago, we believed its value was as an alternative for those who could not attend on-campus classes. Now we know that online study is actually the preference for many higher education students, especially those juggling work, family, and other commitments in their lives.

To celebrate this anniversary, let us explore some of the lessons that we have learnt as part of the ever-changing higher education and professional development industry.

We are also offering three full-tuition scholarships for our online MBA to the country’s most ambitious and deserving individuals as part of our commitment to empowering current and future business leaders.  

Lesson 1: Online Study Can Be a Preference for Any Student 

AIM Business School was an early adopter and is proud to have led the pack in Australia for the development of a fully online MBA program. But as is common with early adopters, we didn’t fully comprehend all the benefits and advantages of online study when we first began offering it.  

We thought it would be of interest almost exclusively to those who were unable to attend classes on campus; our imagined student lived in regional Australia, or had a profession with an irregular work schedule, or maybe had mobility needs that traditional universities weren’t equipped for. Essentially, we viewed our online MBA as a correspondence course with the Internet replacing mail for its delivery.

But online study does not have the same limitations and drawbacks. Modern presentation software means a lecture watched on your computer can be just as engaging as one attended in a hall. With video calls, you engage with teachers, support staff, and your peers in real-time, the same as being on campus. And learning platform forums and social media groups provide the community and networking options that correspondence courses lack.

Then there are the advantages of online study. For instance, that lecture on your computer can be paused, rewound, played at a faster speed, and has accessibility features such as subtitles.  

Ease of access and flexibility are ultimately the biggest benefits of online study. It allows students to devise their own personally curated study plans that fit perfectly around their unique schedules, rather than adhere to pre-determined class times that they have no influence over, which enables online students to strike a better work-life balance.

With the benefit of hindsight, it now seems so obvious that online study is the preferred mode for many students, even those who would be able to attend traditional on-campus classes. Students who are working full-time jobs at the same time as their studies particularly benefit.

Learning this lesson has convinced us to fully focus on our online delivery mode and further develop and improve our digital capabilities so that our students have a more engaging and rewarding learning experience. 

Lesson 2: Every Student’s Education is a Unique Journey with Unique Goals 

As a business education provider whose students are mostly mid-career working professionals, we can say that the ultimate goal of our students is to gain the skills, knowledge, and recognition to advance their careers. This is certainly true, but as a generalisation, it belies the unique destination that each student wants to arrive at.  

Imagine two people, both in similar middle management roles at comparable organisations. Person A wants to advance to a more senior position within their current company, while Person B is looking to start their own business, and both rightly decide that further education is the ideal way to achieve their goal. Both of these are examples of career advancement, but they are obviously different from one another.

AIM Business School began with three qualifications: the Graduate Certificate in Management, the Graduate Diploma in Management, and the Master of Business Administration. These are generalist qualifications that provide broad knowledge and skills and teach students to be highly adaptable, able to address diverse challenges, and ready for varied work opportunities. Our two imagined people would graduate with full capability to succeed in their new roles, but we knew that we could go further and help our students stand out beyond their peers who studied elsewhere.

Our great advantage was our core business as the country’s foremost provider of professional short course training. By giving free and unlimited access to all of the Australian Institute of Management’s short courses to our students, they can gain specialised skills in whichever vital business area, such as marketing, project management, or finance, is needed for them to achieve their goals. This provides them with the greatest opportunity to succeed in the specific career that they want.

Let’s return to our two hypothetical students. They have similar roles in similar companies, so it’s fair to assume that they have similar talents too. But what if Person A didn’t attain a bachelor degree before entering the workforce like Person B did? Are they any less deserving or capable of completing an MBA? We don’t think so.

Our MBA Pathway was created to support people from all different educational and professional backgrounds. It allows people to enter into a Graduate Certificate program using their work experience alone. Once they have completed this qualification, proving they can meet the academic rigours of postgraduate study, they can progress toward an MBA, with all their completed units counting towards their next qualification.

The lesson we have learnt is that education is a journey, one that is unique to every person, and that it is just as important to understand and cater to where our students have come from as where they want to go. 

Lesson 3: The Best Way to Improve for Our Future Students is By Listening to Our Past Graduates 

AIM Business School ran an extensive survey in 2019 with all our graduates and enrolled students at that time asking them what mattered most to them about studying for their MBA. We wanted to know what aspects of our degree delivery positively supported their learning and which areas could be improved.

Based on their feedback, we redeveloped our entire curriculum for currency and practical application, introduced a standardised assessment model for every unit of study, and redesigned our online learning platform to be more accessible, intuitive, and guided. One specific change we made was dividing each topic into small, achievable tasks, the majority between 5 and 20 minutes, with the estimated time to complete clearly listed. Our graduates had emphasised the importance of being able to plan their studies around their existing schedules, so we designed it to fit their lives and contribute to their work-life balance rather than take away from it.

We are confident that listening to our graduates and incorporating their feedback has improved AIM Business School, as shown by our results in QILT’s Student Experience Surveys, which are publicly available online. Here are some of the results we are most proud of:

• 86.2% of our students had a positive overall experience, compared to a national average of 74.8%
• 89.2% rated our teaching practices positively, compared to a national average of 81%
• 84% rated our support services positively, compared to a national average of 74.4%

The true proof of how learning this lesson has improved the quality of our programs for our students is by listening to our most recent graduates.

• “The way that AIM has structured their modules, it was better to balance doing these modules at a pace that suited me and my learning, as well as conducting a full-time job.” – Jennifer Harrington, AIM Business School Graduate 2023
• “One of the key things I found very interesting with AIM is that it links my assessment to my work, and so there’s always that additional value to what I do at work.” – Brighton Kunaka, AIM Business School Graduate 2023
• “I absolutely felt supported throughout my study. I was able to message facilitators directly, get extensions as needed, I was able to message Success Coaches, I was able to call and speak to the support team without long wait times, it was really easy. Anything that I needed, they were willing to help.” – Brooke Ellis, AIM Business School Graduate 2023
• “It does more than just give you an opportunity and a job; it makes you a better manager, a better leader.” – Bruce Cameron, AIM Business School Graduate 2023
• “I chose AIM because their flexibility really stood out to me and I knew that with my role I would need that flexibility. I’m a mum, I’m a wife, I’m a daughter, I’m a sister, so I’ve got lots of hats that I need to wear, and the flexibility and accessibility was unique. I would recommend AIM Business School to others seeking higher education because there’s a real understanding that people are working in real jobs.” - Carolyn Canavan, AIM Business School Graduate 2023 

Our drive for improvement hasn’t gone away, we know that we can and will continuously improve, and the best way to do that is by going to the source to find out what next steps we need to take.

Full-Tuition Scholarships

To celebrate our 10th anniversary, we are offering three (3) full-tuition scholarships for our industry-leading online MBA so that our nation’s most ambitious individuals can progress their careers without the barrier of cost.  

In today’s competitive environment, a quality postgraduate education is likely to make the difference for your career success.  

Are you driven to continuously expand your knowledge and improve your professional skillset? Do you have a career target you are yet to reach? Is achieving a Master’s degree an important life goal for you?

These are the candidates we are seeking: the ambitious and mindful with an enterprising spirit, people who want to proactively create and lead change rather than adapt to it.  

Applicants will be assessed based on three criteria: