Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A.): A Viable Credential for Faculty in Programmatically Accredited Business Degree Programs?

Abstract

Is the Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A) a viable degree option for those wishing a career in academe? The D.B.A. degree is often considered to be a professional degree, intended for business practitioners, while the Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree is portrayed as the degree for preparing college or university faculty. Conversely, many academic programs market their D.B.A. programs to future academicians. In this study, we investigated whether the D.B.A. is, in fact, a viable faculty credential by gathering data from university catalogs and doctoral program websites and handbooks from 427 graduate business and management programs to analyze the terminal degrees held by 6159 faculty. The analysis indicated that 173 institutions (just over 40% of the total) employed 372 faculty whose terminal degree was the D.B.A. This constituted just over 6% of the total number of faculty. Additionally, the program and faculty qualification standards of the six regional accrediting agencies and the three programmatic accrediting agencies for business programs (AACSB, IACBE, and ACBSP) were analyzed. Results indicated that all these accrediting agencies treated the D.B.A. and Ph.D. in business identically and that the D.B.A. was universally considered to be a valid credential for teaching business at the university level. Suggestions for future research are also offered.

A Comparative Analysis of the Employment of Business Faculty With Ph.D.s and Those With D.B.A.s at Colleges and Universities in the University System of Georgia

“…The D.B.A. was developed by Harvard Business School in 1953 as a more scholarly option than the Doctor of Commercial Science degree (MacLennan et al, 2016). The Ph.D. in business has been available in the United States since the early 1920s and as such is a more well-known and traditional doctoral approach (MacLennan et al, 2016).…”

“…was developed by Harvard Business School in 1953 as a more scholarly option than the Doctor of Commercial Science degree (MacLennan et al, 2016). The Ph.D. in business has been available in the United States since the early 1920s and as such is a more well-known and traditional doctoral approach (MacLennan et al, 2016). A significant difference between the two programs in the United States is that traditional Ph.D. programs often require full-time study while D.B.A.…”

“…While conventional wisdom would suggest that D.B.A. graduates would be practitioners who would apply their skills in the field of business and Ph.D. graduates would be prepared to research and fill faculty positions at colleges and universities, MacLennan et al (2016) found that the vast majority of institutions that offer D.B.A.s market themselves as programs preparing graduates for academic careers and requiring rigorous research requirements. In a comparison of Ph.D.…”

Accounting Teaching, Research and Accreditation

“…However, the IACBE accreditation is neither as well recognized nor has the volume of accredited institutions compared to AACSB accreditation, Fox and Finney (2007). MacLennan et al (2016) include International Assembly for Collegiate Business Education (IACBE) in their research and find no difference between DBAs and PhDs.…”