The "heroic journey": managing the pedagogy and development of Business Studies teachers

This paper examines the use of the "Heroic Journey" framework from Joseph Campbell as a conceptual approach to manage the process of developing the teaching skills of academic teachers in Business Education, through the teaching of tutorials in the Management Development Programme (MDP) of the University of Strathclyde. Tutors' development during their time spent in the MDP, their learning and their evolution into academic teachers is presented through the monomyth structure of the "Hero’s Journey", as introduced by Campbell (2008). This paper offers constructive and valuable insights, based on practitioner's perspective, with the focus of the discussion and the recommendations being on the pedagogy of academic tutors in business schools. Through the author's reflections, based on his experiences as Director of MDP during 2017-20, it is suggested that tutor development is a continuous process of learning, and a journey of discovery for anyone involved in it. The implementation of this approach to manage the development of skills and knowledge-based competencies of teams can also be extended to other fields, making this approach a potential managerial tool with a larger scope for applications.