The executive goes global

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Even more than the traditional MBA, the Executive MBA, or EMBA, generally a part-time program taken by older, experienced executives, is a good place to spot the CEOs of the future.

So what lessons can we glean about the outlook for business from the Financial Times's newly-released 2008 EMBA rankings, perhaps the most authoritative global round up of the qualification?

One thing stands out: Despite the current worldwide financial crisis (or perhaps even because of it), the future of business is an increasingly international one.

The newspaper has been compiling its EMBA list since 2001, the first table comprising 50 programs based in 11 locations. And while the 2008 version covers just under twice the number of courses, at 95, these now span almost three times as many campus locations, no fewer than 29.

Four of the top 10 programs are hosted in two or more continents, including the number one-ranked joint EMBA offered by the Columbia and London business schools. In third place is the Trium EMBA, which takes in Paris (the HEC school), London (LSE) and New York (Stern).

Even single-school EMBAs can be global affairs. The program offered by Duke University's Fuqua school, ranked 17th, begins with a fortnight on home turf in Durham, North Carolina, and then has a term involving weeks in two European cities followed by terms in two cities each in Asia and Latin America before a final stint in Durham. The locations are not fixed by vary from year to year according to what is "topical".

The FT survey analysts, who crunched data from almost 4,000 EMBA alumni and more than 100 schools, did find that some things remained constant from 2001 -- for example, the profile of students.

Their average age has remained at about 40, while the proportion of women has never climbed above about a quarter.

Schools, additionally, seem equally bullish in the face of the current credit turmoil as they were during earlier crises, such as the aftermath of September 11.

Ethan Hanabury, associate dean at Columbia, which co-runs the top-rated EMBA, told the FT that he did not believe programs would suffer excessively. "We survived 9/11 when people said everyone would stop traveling," he said.

Another constant is the motivation for many people contemplating an EMBA: a bigger salary. Alumni from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton school, rated fourth in the FT table, earned an average of $235,555 three years after graduation, a whopping 99 percent increase from pre-course levels.

This was the biggest rise of any school in the 2008 study, and seems to be something that US institutions specialize in: Eight of the top 10 US schools also show the best records for salary increases.

But it's not all about money. One individual graduate the paper talked to as part of the roundup was Paul Hackwood, who does manage a lot of people -- as an archdeacon in the Church of England.

"Quite a bit of the work I do is deciding strategy in the church," said Hackwood, who is responsible for 100 clergy and 180 churches, while noting how he differed from many fellow students on Bradford University's EMBA: "Where business doesn't fit in is in the values of the organization."