The Global Definition of Excellence.
The AACSB Global Standards for Business Education™ define what high-quality business education looks like in a dynamic world—one that demands innovation, ethical judgment, global perspective, and meaningful impact.
Explore the 2026 AACSB Global Standards for Business Education™
One set of standards, two purposes:
Quality Improvement For All Business Schools
To present the Global Standards for Business Education, applicable to all schools seeking to enhance quality improvement, relevance, and societal impact.
Quality Assurance For AACSB Accreditation
To define AACSB accreditation, which describes the evidence, processes, and outcomes required to achieve and maintain AACSB accreditation.
Individual Impact. Collective Change.
Each section contains standards that, when met, lead a school to make a positive individual impact. The combined impact across all schools of business, and AACSB-accredited schools in particular, moves AACSB toward realizing its vision of achieving positive societal impact through business schools and its belief that business education is a force for good in society.
Strategic Management
A cohesive framework for how a school defines its direction, aligns its operations, and sustains the capacity necessary to fulfill its mission.
1 Strategic Planning
2 Physical, Digital, and Financial Resources
3 Faculty and Professional Staff Resources
1 Strategic Planning
2 Physical, Digital, and Financial Resources
3 Faculty and Professional Staff Resources
Learner Success
Ensure that learners are fully prepared to thrive in a rapidly changing global environment. Curriculum quality, learning assurance, and learner progression are not separate processes but interdependent elements that collectively shape the learner experience and outcomes.
4 Curriculum
5 Assurance of Learning
6 Learner Progression
4 Curriculum
5 Assurance of Learning
6 Learner Progression
Pathways to Impact
A unified framework that views teaching, scholarship, and societal engagement not as distinct functions but as complementary dimensions of an integrated impact ecosystem. Each standard focuses on one dimension while reinforcing the interdependence of all three:
7 Teaching Effectiveness and Impact
8 Impact of Scholarship
9 Societal Impact and Engagement
7 Teaching Effectiveness and Impact
8 Impact of Scholarship
9 Societal Impact and Engagement
Principles-Based and Outcomes-Focused
Align
The Global Standards give schools a structured way to self-assess, set goals, and align mission with global benchmarks, while adapting to local and cultural contexts.
Evaluate
Nine standards, organized into three sections, give schools a clear, outcomes-focused way to assess where they stand today.
Advance
Principles-based standards allow each school to innovate, experiment, and grow. Advancing not just the institution, but the communities it serves.
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Events Featuring the Global Standards
The Global Standards come to life at facilitated in-person and virtual events.
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