March 22, 2011 (http://www.frogheart.ca/?p=3151)  I posted about a  interview with Roger Martin, Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, about Canadian business schools, innovation and research that was published in the March 16, 2011, Globe & Mail newspaper. (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/managing/business-education/canada-will-shrivel-under-business-school-neglect-dean-says/article1942997/page2/). In response to this interview question, Martin made the claim the Canada Foundation for Innovation funded a greater numbers of arts funding requests and humanities funding requests over business funding requests,

Wouldn’t some people argue leadership comes as much from the liberal arts and other social sciences?

We’re getting liberal arts education, but the arts are getting an incredibly rich allocation of the money at all levels. It is only business that is not.

Of all the money given out by the Canada Foundation for Innovation [CFI], a big federal grants program, nine times more has gone to arts and literature than to business. I am not even talking social and human sciences – that is 41 times.

The view is that having educated managers is not relevant to economic success. We assume we need educated lawyers to have good law firms; we need educated scientists to have good science; you need educated engineers to have good engineering, but in business it is assumed you do not need education.

There was a response from the president and CEO (chief executive officer) of the CFI in the March 18, 2011 issue of the Globe & Mail. The paper published an excerpt, this is the full text of the response (received by request from the CFI media relations coordinator, Yves Melanson),

I read with interest the report of your interview with Roger Martin in Wednesday’s edition of the Globe and Mail on the “Lack of government research funding for business education”. As President and CEO of the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI), I was particularly interested by the reference made to the CFI.

Your readers might be interested to know that the Canada Foundation for Innovation was created by the Government of Canada to support state-of-the-art infrastructure (facilities and equipment), in universities, colleges, research hospitals and non-profit research institutions, allowing them to: a) attract/retain the world’s top talent; b) conduct world-class research and technology development that leads to social, economic and environmental benefits to Canada; c) train the next generation of highly qualified personnel; and d) support private-sector innovation that strengthens Canada’s position in today’s knowledge economy.

The CFI is called upon to invest in equipment, laboratories, information databases and computing systems required by all researchers, including those in our business schools. The CFI does not allocate funding to any specific discipline or area of research. Applications are submitted by the institutions to the CFI and funding is awarded through highly competitive programs. All applications, whether they are in health, science or business administration are judged according to the same criteria – excellence and the benefits to Canada. Moreover, the CFI requires that applications be well aligned with the university’s overall Strategic Research Plan.

While the success rate of applications from business schools compares favourably to the overall CFI success rate, the number of applications from business schools is surprisingly low. Of the more than 900 applications in the humanities and social sciences that have been submitted to the CFI to date, only 50 came from business schools (with a 70% success rate). [emphasis mine] Researchers in our business schools have received CFI research infrastructure funding, and, given the high quality of their research, will no doubt receive more in the future. The CFI’s doors are open to business school researchers, and will remain so, but they must apply!

Gilles G. Patry
President and CEO
Canada Foundation for Innovation

I haven’t seen responses from the other funding agencies but based on this one from the CFI, it would seem that the business schools are not pursuing the grants available to them for research.