Business Impact covers the big challenges facing global management education as the world asks more of its future business leaders.
ISSUE 5 2025 VOLUME 27
THE MAGAZINE OF THE BUSINESS GRADUATES ASSOCIATION (BGA)
LEADERS NEVER STOP LEARNING
The power of partnerships How to cultivate effective collaboration
• BRANCHING OUT: AUDENCIA DEAN ON ESTABLISHING INTERNATIONAL CAMPUSES • LOOKING AHEAD: THE LEGACY OF A LONGSTANDING, CROSS-CONTINENTAL PARTNERSHIP • DOORS TO DIPLOMACY: BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS WITH GOVERNMENT STAKEHOLDERS
INSIDE
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Contents ISSUE 5 • 2025 • VOLUME 27
05 EDITOR’S LETTER
30 THE IMPORTANCE OF IMPACT
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Analysing the essential aspects of forging effective partnerships at home and overseas 06 BUSINESS BRIEFING The latest selection of news and research from institutions across BGA’s global network 10 COVER STORY A BROADER PERSPECTIVE Audencia dean Sébastien Tran reveals the strategy behind establishing “collaborative campuses” around the world
A framework for widening the reach of academic research 34 IN FOCUS A profile of Mexico City’s Anáhuac Graduate School of Business 36 GUEST COLUMN Building successful relationships with counterparts in China 38 DIRECTOR’S DESPATCH
How to form international partnerships of substance
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18 THE BRAVE NEW WORLD OF NET ZERO How business schools can prepare their graduates to lead the energy transition that is reshaping the future of work 22 A NEW CHAPTER AI offers a chance to get clear on purpose and strategic direction, says ESPM’s Rodrigo Cintra 26 COVER STORY CORPORATE DIPLOMACY 101 Equipping students to manage government stakeholders in an increasingly fragmented world
14 COVER STORY GOING IT ALONE Joep Konings, dean of Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Business, reflects on the legacy of an alliance with Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business and looks ahead to charting new waters
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Join BGA’s in-person workshop in Bucharest to discover how business schools can break down academic silos, integrate multiple disciplines and respond to today’s most pressing challenges in business and society. The event’s interactive, hands-on format is designed to equip attendees with the tools needed to enhance their institution’s relevance, innovation capacity and ability to prepare future-ready graduates. Scan the QR code to register for your free place or visit our website: www.amba-bga.com/events CAPACITY-BUILDING WORKSHOP 30 OCTOBER 2025 | 09:30-16:30 INTERCONTINENTAL ATHÉNÉE PALACE, BUCHAREST, ROMANIA ADVANCING INTERDISCIPLINARY EDUCATION
HOST SCHOOL
EDITOR’S LETTER
EDITORIAL
Content editor Tim Banerjee Dhoul t.dhoul@amba-bga.com Head of editorial Colette Doyle c.doyle@amba-bga.com
CAREFUL COLLABORATION A considered and intentional approach is the bedrock of effective partnerships and relationship-building both at home and overseas, as a series of insights in this issue demonstrates
Art editor Sam Price
Sub-editor Heather Ford
T he practice of partnerships is as old as business itself and there are numerous ways in which they can add value to a business school, when done right. A trio of features in this issue of Business Impact explores some of the benefits available and crucially, delves into the details of what’s required to ensure a collaboration’s enduring success. In our interview with Audencia dean Sébastien Tran, we learn about the benefits of the school’s series of “collaborative campuses”, formed from partnerships with local providers. Perhaps the most crucial ingredient is that these locations use a mix of operational models to suit the individual country context. Tran emphasises the importance of agility in its strategic approach here, arguing that it gives Audencia “the ability to modify and to change” in an uncertain geopolitical climate. Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Business dean Joep Konings, meanwhile, looks at the recipe for a successful collaboration between schools, in a case study of its relationship with the US-based Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. Konings highlights the relationship’s “deliberate design around clarity, trust and adaptability, with both institutions agreeing on a defined objective and timeline from the outset.” He adds how “regular engagement and transparent dialogue allowed the partnership to grow stronger over time.”
Insight, content & PR manager Ellen Buchan e.buchan@amba-bga.com CORPORATE Membership director Victor Hedenberg v.hedenberg@amba-bga.com Head of membership Debbie Kemp d.kemp@amba-bga.com
We then take a look at things from a careers perspective to explore the importance of building and maintaining effective relationships with government stakeholders, given the centrality of geopolitics in today’s business world. In our article from ESSEC Business School, Srividya Jandhyala runs through the skills needed for an increasingly vital aspect of management, as she advocates for teaching corporate diplomacy at business school. “It is a strategic, financial and operational imperative,” she states. Elsewhere, the necessary ingredients for cross-cultural collaboration between East and West are revealed by LSE’s Catherine Hua Xiang, with a particular focus on China. Xiang’s guest column underlines the importance of “understanding how people in other cultures communicate” when seeking to establish lasting links. Rounding off the issue, AMBA & BGA membership director Victor Hedenberg implores schools to focus on the substance of partnerships, rather than to be lured into them purely for the sake of prestige. For Hedenberg, this entails engaging in a process of due diligence around potential partners and examining exactly how they will contribute to a school’s offerings and student experience.
BGA accreditation manager Richard Turner r.turner@amba-bga.com Senior marketing executive – digital lead Shareen Pennington s.pennington@amba-bga.com Membership administrator Georgia Herbert g.herbert@amba-bga.com Commercial relations director Max Braithwaite m.braithwaite@amba-bga.com
Head of marketing & communications Leonora Clement l.clement@amba-bga.com Finance & commercial director Catherine Walke r
Director of accreditation & director of BGA services Mark Stoddard
Tim Banerjee Dhoul Editor , Business Impact
Chief executive officer Andrew Main Wilson GENERAL ENQUIRIES bga-membership@amba-bga.com
Copyright 2025 by The Association of MBAs and Business Graduates Association . All rights reserved. Material may not be reproduced without the permission of the publisher. While we take care to ensure that editorial is independent, accurate, objective and relevant for our readers, BGA accepts no responsibility for reader dissatisfaction rising from the content of this publication. The opinions expressed and advice given are the views of individual commentators and do not necessarily represent the views of BGA. Whenever an article in this publication is placed with the financial support of an advertiser, partner or sponsor, it will be marked as such. BGA makes every opportunity to credit photographers but we cannot guarantee every published use of an image will have the contributor’s name. If you believe we have omitted a credit for your image, please email the editor.
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BRIEFING New notions about ideal employees, energy enhancements for disaster‑monitoring drones and the impact of age on career optimism all feature in this round-up of news and research from BGA schools. Tim Banerjee Dhoul , Ellen Buchan and Colette Doyle report THE LATEST NEWS FROM ACROSS BGA’S NETWORK Business
STUDY ELUCIDATES EVOLUTION IN EMPLOYER EXPECTATIONS
“Our findings show that employers are revising their attitudes about who they consider an ‘ideal worker’. This has real implications for pay, wellbeing and inclusion,” remarked Heejung Chung, study co-author and director of the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership at King’s Business School. The evolving picture of preferences was gleaned from an analysis of job advertisements in Switzerland, covering 47 occupations between 2001 and 2023. Machine learning was used to scan for terms and phrases about employer expectations, such as those related to long hours or work-life balance. The results suggest the need to reassess a notion of the ideal worker long perceived as being “masculine- coded” and a contributing factor
towards gender inequality, burnout and limited access to flexible working arrangements. “Understanding that workers have diverse demands in their lives and supporting them to meet those demands rather than forcing them to solely devote to their jobs is not only good for workers, but also good for productivity,” Chung continued. The study, co-authored with the University of Zurich and published in Gender, Work & Organisation , proposes a new concept, termed the “inclusive worker norm”, to reflect this emerging shift. While there is an awareness that job ads may not fully reflect workplace realities, Chung underlined the need for “organisations to reflect on how their job adverts and cultural signals might reinforce outdated expectations”. TBD
SCHOOL King’s Business School King’s College London COUNTRY UK
mployer expectations around the archetypal recruit no longer centre solely on a candidate’s
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willingness to put in long hours and prioritise work above all other aspects of life, according to a new study involving King’s Business School. Instead, employers frequently refer to flexibility, gender equity and work-life balance when placing ads for new roles and opportunities.
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NEWS DIGEST
possibility of UAVs repeatedly scanning the same areas, leading to unnecessary energy expenditure. For professionals in supply chain and operations management, the research offers a range of potential benefits, including greater operational efficiency, as well as reductions in required flight numbers, battery usage and overall costs. On this last point, the study notes that while using larger-battery UAVs can reduce the total number of drones needed, decision makers must balance this against potential increases in energy consumption per drone. To assist in deployment, the study’s proposed method has been designed to adapt to changing environmental conditions and to offer full compatibility with existing UAV sensors, removing the need for expensive upgrades. By ensuring UAVs don’t run out of power mid-mission, the system’s aim is to enhance the reliability of disaster monitoring, which is crucial for emergency response teams. CD “The research offers a range of potential benefits, including greater operational efficiency, as well as reductions in required flight numbers, battery usage and overall costs”
INNOVATIVE AERIAL VEHICLE SYSTEM AIMS TO BOOST DISASTER MONITORING EFFICIENCY
addresses challenges relating to limited battery life and camera range to help mitigate the effects of extreme weather events, such as landslides and floods. The core of the study lies in its focus on energy consumption. The researchers developed a novel method that analyses energy use during different flight modes: straight flight, turning and hovering. By breaking down large, hazardous zones into smaller grid units, the system ensures complete coverage without wasting battery power, as evidenced by tests based on real-world data from Shaanxi Province, China. In particular, its use of a hybrid algorithm to calculate the most efficient flight paths tackles the inefficiency of traditional methods. It also removes the
SCHOOL International Business School Suzhou (IBSS) Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University COUNTRY China
new study co-authored by Jianyu Xu from Xi’an Jiaotong- Liverpool University (XJTLU) has
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proposed an intelligent routing system for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that is said to significantly improve the efficiency of geological hazard monitoring. Published in Computers and Operations Research , the study
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SCHOOL Suliman S Olayan School of Business, American University of Beirut (AUB) MEASURES TO CURB MATERNITY LEAVERS
COUNTRY Lebanon
nstances of injustice and inaction around maternity leave continue to drive high‑potential
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female professionals away from their careers, according to a new study led by Camille Desjardins, an assistant professor at AUB’s Suliman S Olayan School of Business. Drawing on interviews with 35 highly educated women in France, the study found several factors influencing women’s experience of work in and around the time of maternity leave that ‘push’ them away from their roles and prior ambitions. These include missed promotions, negative comments and being sidelined. At the same time, the study noted ‘pull’ factors that centre on a shift in women’s priorities as they reconsider their careers and work–life balance in light of their growing family. The findings offer insights to any organisation or government trying to lessen the impact of maternity leave on women returning to work. The study recommends that organisations are more proactive in managing fairness around maternity leave, that they equip managers with the ability to be more empathetic with the processes involved and create smoother back-to-work transitions. The study was co-authored with Toulouse Capitole University’s Marion Fortin and published in the Journal of Organisational Behaviour . EB
RAMPING UP THE REACH OF AFRICAN BUSINESS CASES
other organisations face in Africa are not only immensely interesting for business leaders and students across the continent and around the world, but they are also more important than ever,” declared UCT GSB dean Catherine Duggan. “By 2050, estimates are that 25 per cent of the world’s population will be African, so it is critical that the leaders of tomorrow gain familiarity with these markets.” The move marks a step forward for a case centre that was established to bring the realities of business across the African continent to those working there, as the centre’s editor, Sarah Boyd noted: “It’s vital for African students to have learning materials that reflect their local environments.” Aptly named from the perspective of this magazine, Harvard Business Impact is the new identity of HBP’s Corporate Learning and Education market units. It offers educators more than 65,000 learning materials,
SCHOOL University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business COUNTRY South Africa
A frica-focused business cases will be more accessible to management education students around the world, thanks to a new partnership between the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business (UCT GSB) and Harvard Business Impact, a division of Harvard Business Publishing (HBP). A collection of teaching cases from UCT GSB’s Case-Writing Centre is now available through the Harvard platform as a result of the agreement. Together, they cover a range of topics in the context of fast-moving African markets, including South Africa, Ivory Coast, Nigeria and Mozambique. “The opportunities and challenges that executives, companies and
encompassing case studies, simulations, articles and online courses. TBD
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NEWS DIGEST
SCHOOL University of San Andrés Business School CAREER OPTIMISM & RESILIENCE THROUGH THE AGES
COUNTRY Argentina
A new global study involving the University of San Andrés Business School’s Pamela Suzanne seeks to challenge stereotypes linking older age with reduced job adaptability and professional resilience. Drawing on a survey of more than 6,000 professionals from 28 countries, the study found a mixed picture. On the one hand, an increase in age did tend to yield a decrease in a person’s career optimism, defined as having positive expectations about future professional development. On the other hand, as age increased, so too did a person’s sense of career meaning, or the perception of one’s career as personally significant. Moreover, the negative impact of age on career optimism was intensified in countries with high unemployment, while in countries with a strong culture of education, the meaning derived from one’s career was more pronounced with age. “When a country’s educational culture is strong, people find greater meaning and purpose in their careers over time. This leads us to believe that countries that do things well at the macro level have the potential to improve individual aspects related to career resilience,” Suzanne noted. The study recommends raising individuals’ awareness of their weaknesses and strengths to preserve career resilience. For policymakers, it highlights the value of educational investments and initiatives designed to reduce unemployment. EB
APPETITE FOR ENTREPRENEURIAL VENTURES IN CHILE WANES
among women. Although 70 per cent of the population believe they have the capacity to become an entrepreneur, half of those surveyed admitted to having a fear of failure. Fundación Chile president Pablo Zamora noted that, in times of uncertainty, people prefer not to take risks. “I’m not surprised by the decline, especially in those ventures linked to subsistence,” he said. Meanwhile, CIES president Hernán Cheyre warned that entrepreneurship out of necessity, due to the lack of employment, is “problematic” because, in his opinion, the country needs to improve its productivity rate to create innovative companies. Cheyre proposed making progress on several issues, such as “eliminating barriers” to entrepreneurship (both regulatory and competitive), so that new players can challenge incumbents in different industries. He added that it is vital to bring the world of knowledge closer to entrepreneurship, integrating universities and technological developments into the ecosystem. CD
SCHOOL Faculty of Economics and Business Universidad del Desarrollo COUNTRY Chile
he Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM)’s latest national report shows that
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entrepreneurial intent in Chile has fallen to its lowest level since at least 2010, with businesses less innovative compared to 2023 and a high fear of failure in evidence. Recently presented at the Business and Society Research Centre (CIES), part of the Faculty of Economics and Business at the Universidad del Desarrollo (UDD), the Chilean GEM report was led by Maribel Guerrero, an associate professor at the school. It sought to measure the level of entrepreneurial activity, profile the ecosystem and support public policy design. The main motivation for starting a business was cited as a lack of employment options, especially
SHARE YOUR NEWS AND RESEARCH UPDATES by emailing Business Impact editor Tim Banerjee Dhoul at t.dhoul@amba-bga.com
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International campuses and a multidisciplinary approach give students at Audencia Business School a wider view on global business. Dean Sébastien Tran outlines the strategy to Tim Banerjee Dhoul and details the school’s “test-and-learn” approach to AI A broader perspective T he management education landscape is competitive and particularly so in France, where there are more than 30 members of the AMBA & BGA networks. Many of these are members of the prestigious grandes “The key word in our international strategy is ‘agility’,” shares Tran, adding that this translates into a need to “be flexible and adapt the curriculum for each partner.” It’s an approach that has allowed the school to branch out considerably from its Nantes headquarters and the site of its foundation in 1900. Three campuses in China and one in São Paulo,
écoles system of specialised institutions, known for their high selectivity and academic excellence. However, this status isn’t always enough to guarantee a steady stream of the most talented students and high-potential leaders. Candidates can choose from 41 members of the Conférence des Grandes Écoles, a national association that provides a further signal of the quality of programmes on offer. That modern industry standard of identifying and promoting elements in which a school excels and stands out from its competitors is, therefore, essential. Internationalisation: an agile approach At Audencia Business School, internationalisation is a central facet of the strategy in this respect, with overseas “collaborative campuses”, as dean Sébastian Tran describes them, designed to facilitate study abroad requirements and grow the school’s global presence. The result of partnerships with local providers, Audencia’s international locations use a mix of operational models, including shared campus space and jointly established premises, to suit individual circumstances on the ground.
Brazil have been joined by a new location in Sydney, Australia this year. In conjunction with additional domestic locations in Paris and Vendée, this takes Audencia’s total number of campuses to 10. “It is a good way to promote the brand of the school and send our students to different countries as part of the curriculum,” Tran surmises. The collaborative campuses also have much to offer domestic students in these overseas markets. More than 100 students are currently admitted to each of three BSc programmes at Audencia’s campus in Shenzhen, China, for example, where the school has partnered with Shenzhen University since 2016. Alongside these strategic footholds, Audencia has somewhere in the region of 250 agreements with institutions across more than 60 countries, largely for the purposes of student exchanges. “It’s important to keep in mind that while we want to increase the number of our partners, there is always a quality requirement. That’s why, for example, we recently signed an agreement with Stanford University that allows master’s in management
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INTERVIEW WITH THE DEAN
Sébastien Tran is dean of Audencia Business School, France. He holds a doctorate in industrial economics from the University of Paris Dauphine and an HDR (accreditation to supervise research) in management sciences from the University of Rouen. His research focuses on the future of work, entrepreneurship and innovation management.
Established in Nantes, France, Audencia has grown its presence both domestically and internationally, with locations in Brazil, China and Australia
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“When you are at Audencia, you won’t just have courses on marketing strategy or finance, because we don’t want students to have only a narrow perspective on business,” Tran explains. “It’s important that their studies include other fields, such as philosophy, history and sociology.” The logic behind this approach rests on the practicalities of business management in the 21st century, as Tran details: “We are living in a complex world, facing problems that cannot be solved with management or business knowledge alone. For example, if you want to deal with issues relating to sustainability, you must work with scientists, engineers and sociologists. You have to know how they think, understand the tools at their disposal and be able to combine these with your own skills and knowledge.” Covering a mix of disciplines, Tran argues, is critical to understanding “the interdependencies between all the different fields. This is why we want to develop our multidisciplinary approach and extend it to all our programmes.” One useful resource in this respect is Audencia’s robust roster of adjunct faculty, said to number more than 1,200. While their level of involvement might range from a single hour of instruction as a guest expert to co-teaching an entire module with a permanent faculty member, there are always valuable insights into real-world business on offer. “They bring their experience to the classroom, with practical cases from different backgrounds and perspectives,” Tran says succinctly. Navigating AI’s evolving landscape A growing area of interest in both business and higher education is, of course, artificial intelligence (AI) and Tran confirms that Audencia is likely to recruit more faculty members in this area and the wider discipline of information systems in the next few years. Right now, however, the school has a focus on helping its students, staff and faculty to negotiate the evolving abundance of AI tools and technologies. “We believe that the most important skill [for our students] is to know how to combine different AI platforms by understanding the advantages and drawbacks of each,” Tran reasons. “The real question is how to use the relevant tool, depending on the task,” he encapsulates. For Tran, being tied to one tool or tech company could, therefore, prove limiting and this is one reason why the school has not signed an overarching deal with any of the current market leaders in AI. The other
students to spend two or three months there and achieve a certificate,” Tran explains. As the conversation turns to the current geopolitical climate, Tran points to further advantages of taking a flexible approach to international partnerships: “It’s very difficult to anticipate trends in relation to student mobility when, for example, you consider what has happened in the US or in Russia. That’s why it’s not possible for us to use the same model for each country; in fact, it would be dangerous.” The school’s strategy, Tran continues, gives it “the ability to modify and to change” when needed. He gives the hypothetical example of an emerging conflict between the French government and an international counterpart that might require a recalibration or relocation of programmes in that country. A key question for the school’s governance, Tran concludes, is therefore “how you anticipate the geopolitical context and the risk. That’s why we must diversify our strategy and portfolio of international partners.” Some partnerships arise from pointed searches, while others develop organically. “Sometimes it’s the opportunity,” Tran divulges, “because a university or business school might contact us with an interest in developing a programme or some exchanges. Alternatively, we might target specific partners, say, if we want to develop a programme in a specific area. “For example, we just announced an agreement with Shanghai Jiao Tong University to launch a new DBA at its campus in Shenzhen. This is part of our strategy, because we want to develop our DBA portfolio.” Noting the importance of demonstrating academic excellence in this instance, the Audencia dean then highlights how the school will always seek out “the right and the most relevant partner” to meet particular aims. In other cases, partnerships begin with a particular project, before further collaborative opportunities are identified. Tran gives the example of setting up an agreement for Audencia students in France to study abroad at a partner institution in Brazil, before exploring initiatives designed to attract students in Brazil to undertake master’s-level programmes in France, labelling it as “a progressive strategy”. Offering a mix of disciplines Another point of differentiation in Audencia’s strategy is its multidisciplinary approach, with an additional emphasis on encompassing the humanities and cultural studies in its educational offerings.
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INTERVIEW WITH THE DEAN
rather than to establish a single technological partnership. “We use different AI platforms not only in the classroom but also to help people find the right combination inside the curriculum,” Tran highlights. A faculty training programme around AI, meanwhile, was launched in the summer in collaboration with Obea, a specialised consultant agency. “The goal of this training is to learn how to use AI and be sensitive to issues of ethics when using different platforms,” details Tran. While the course will not be mandatory at first, it will be used as part of the onboarding process for all new hires. “We will go step by step, but we want to spread knowledge of the different AI tools among the entire Audencia community, not only faculty members but also staff members, because these tools can be of great use if you are working in marketing and communications, for example.” Speaking more specifically about some of AI’s ethical concerns, Tran highlights the need to raise awareness about the technology’s environmental impact. There is still much to learn about the effects of AI in this respect, but there are already serious concerns about the scale of electricity and water
reason, the Audencia dean shares, is the difficulty in determining the direction of travel in a tempestuous landscape. “Perhaps you decide to invest in ChatGPT today, but then tomorrow it becomes clear that DeepSeek would be the best,” he hypothesises. In France, some business schools, including Neoma, Essec and Emlyon, have joined forces with Mistral AI, a start-up headquartered in Paris. “I would like that to be a good solution, because it’s a European and French solution, but you don’t know if Mistral AI will have the capacity to continue to innovate in 12 to 18 months,” Tran reflects. “It depends on the money raised by the company, because it’s a huge investment to develop artificial intelligence.” With this in mind, Audencia is pursuing a process of continued experimentation around AI. This entails working on a mix of tools for specific purposes, some of which have been developed in-house and some of which are in partnership with external organisations. Personalising the experience One of the school’s tailor-made tools is an AI agent designed to help students discover and better navigate
consumed by data centres housing AI servers, as well as their use of critical minerals and rare elements that are often mined
their options at the school, in terms of pathways, courses and other available activities. The tool also features a personality quiz that aims to offer personalised recommendations based on an individual’s outlook and ambitions,
unsustainably. “We need to sensitise our students to the CO2 emissions,” reflects Tran, “but it’s difficult to educate students [on this topic] because it has become a natural tool for them in their lives.” As with its approach to international partnerships, there is agility in Audencia’s approach to AI and a recognition that the school must continue learning as it delves deeper into the possibilities presented by new technologies. In this, accreditation services such as those provided by AMBA & BGA offer vital points of reflection that assist with continuous improvement. As the Audencia dean notes: “It’s important to have feedback from our peers because we are engaged in a lot of projects and it’s always useful to take the time to pause and think about how we can improve our processes and define the next step of the strategy.”
Students at Audencia’s Atlantic Campus in Nantes (left); the school’s collaborative campus in Shenzhen, China
from programme options, international exchanges and extracurricular activities all the way through to careers with which they might best align. The quiz’s 25 questions draw on a combination of the Big Five model of personality traits and ikigai , the Japanese philosophy of purpose and personal development. “At the end of the survey, you receive some examples of [the paths taken by] alumni. It can be a good way to illustrate different possibilities because students have a lot of different options and sometimes, they can feel lost,” Tran infers. Using AI in this way reinforces the school’s policy of drawing from multiple sources to test and learn more about how AI can enhance the student experience,
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Going alone it
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PARTNERSHIPS
Next year will formally mark the end of Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Business’ founding partnership with Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. Dean Joep Konings looks at the collaboration’s legacy and reflects on the realisation of its ultimate goal of developing a school that stands confidently on its own T he inception of Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Business (NUGSB) dates back to 2009, when the government of Kazakhstan invited US-based Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business to assess the feasibility of creating a research-driven business school in the region. From this initiative grew a vision of establishing a school in Kazakhstan’s capital city of Astana that could stand shoulder to shoulder with the world’s best, while serving as a catalyst for economic and business transformation across Central Asia. A ‘graduate-first’ strategy New business schools often begin by providing undergraduate programmes when they are first established, before gradually adding postgraduate offerings. However, NUGSB deliberately pursued the reverse path. By starting with postgraduate programmes – the EMBA, MBA and master’s in finance – the school cultivated a strong, influential alumni base early on. Its graduates, therefore, now hold leadership positions across industries in Kazakhstan and beyond. This ‘graduate-first’ strategy has given NUGSB’s new undergraduate students the advantage
of stepping into a community already enriched by experienced alumni networks, opening doors to internships, mentorship and career opportunities. In a young business school and a country where networks matter greatly for professional advancement, this sequencing has proven to be a strategic innovation. Beyond degree programmes, NUGSB has also been deeply engaged in executive education and national capacity-building initiatives. In 2011, before the school had officially opened, an executive development programme for SMEs was launched under Kazakhstan’s Business Roadmap 2020, funded by the government and supported by partners such as the Damu Fund, sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna and EY. NUGSB has since built a robust executive education department, delivering both open enrolment and custom programmes for organisations in the region. Today, NUGSB stands as a leading business school in Central Asia, with hundreds of alumni shaping the region’s economic future and a growing faculty body producing internationally recognised research, as well as accreditations from AMBA and BGA to reinforce its global standing. Recently, it was also recognised by UT Dallas business school’s research rankings as one of the world’s top five business schools founded within the last 20 years. The case of NUGSB, therefore, exemplifies how a carefully designed, timebound partnership can transform an ambitious national vision into a globally respected reality.
In 2011, Nazarbayev University and Fuqua jointly developed four strategic frameworks, encompassing governance, academics, infrastructure and human resources, that would form a blueprint for the new institution. To ensure quality and accelerate development, Fuqua initially took primary responsibility for the curriculum committee, admissions committee, quality control and programme management. This structured approach reflected a key principle of the partnership: rather than building dependency, the goal was to internalise world-class standards and gradually transition responsibility to NUGSB itself. Following this roadmap, NUGSB launched its first programmes: an executive MBA in 2013 that was taught entirely by Fuqua faculty at first and a full-time MBA in 2014. Over the next decade, the school expanded rapidly, introducing an MSc in finance in 2017 with support from the National Bank of Kazakhstan, a PhD in business administration in 2023 and a bachelor of business administration (BBA) in 2024. In 2026, NUGSB is set to launch its first joint degree: the Bachelor’s in Eurasian Business Administration will be offered in conjunction with HKUST Business School, Hong Kong University of Science & Technology (HKUST).
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Impact beyond the classroom At the heart of NUGSB’s development lies a strong commitment to research. From the beginning, the partnership with Fuqua was designed not only to transfer teaching practices but also to foster a research culture that meets international standards. Joint projects between faculty at both schools span topics such as artificial intelligence in marketing, supply chain resilience and the challenges of emerging markets. These collaborations help to anchor NUGSB’s identity as a research-driven institution that connects local realities with global business trends. As one NUGSB faculty member, Francesco Rocciolo, reflects: “I’ve seen at first hand how adopting Fuqua’s approach to research has elevated our own standards and how our output finds its way into the classroom, with a focus on its relevance for business at large.” The results are tangible: NUGSB faculty are increasingly publishing in leading international journals, with their work informing policy debates and business practices in Kazakhstan and the wider region. This fusion of global rigour with regional specificity gives NUGSB research its distinctive edge, ensuring that the school contributes not only to international scholarship but also to the transformation of business practice in Central Asia. David Robinson, a Fuqua School of Business professor, has been involved since the start of the cross-continental collaboration and speaks of the continuing attraction of conducting research in the region. “Kazakhstan itself is a fascinating living laboratory, providing opportunities to develop highly relevant case studies and experiment with solutions to complex business problems that matter locally and globally.” By embedding world-class research into its foundation, NUGSB ensures that its impact extends beyond the classroom, helping shape both scholarly knowledge and real-world decision-making. The recipe for successful collaboration The Fuqua–NUGSB partnership has succeeded because of its deliberate design around clarity, trust and adaptability, with both institutions agreeing on a defined objective and timeline from the outset. The ultimate goal was not to create dependency but to build lasting capacity, enabling NUGSB to internalise world-class standards in teaching, research and governance. Plus, having such precise aims for the partnership provided every stage of its development with direction and urgency.
THE STUDENT EXPERIENCE: GLOBAL EXPOSURE IN ASTANA
From the outset, NUGSB has sought to place the student experience at the heart of its mission by combining world-class academic rigour with opportunities for global engagement. Inspired by Fuqua’s distinctive pedagogical model, NUGSB programmes emphasise case-based teaching and team-driven learning. Whether studying for the MBA, EMBA or MSc in finance, students are challenged to apply theory to practice, sharpen their analytical skills and develop the collaborative mindset essential for modern leadership. A cornerstone of this experience is an international residency that is built into all postgraduate programmes at the school. Residencies at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business have been pivotal to the MBA and EMBA, offering immersion in a top US business school environment and direct access to Fuqua’s extensive global networks. MSc in finance students, meanwhile, have travelled to major financial centres, with recent cohorts spending their residency at the London School of Economics (LSE). New residencies at HKUST will add a further dimension, by granting the NUGSB EMBA the benefits of networking opportunities with participants of the renowned joint EMBA offered by HKUST and Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. Equally significant is NUGSB’s commitment to internationalisation at home. With faculty coming from 12 different countries and holding PhDs from institutions such as INSEAD, Stanford and LSE, students encounter global perspectives in the classroom on a daily basis. Faculty members bring not only academic excellence, but also vital international networks that connect NUGSB to leading organisations and businesses worldwide. This means that students do not need to travel abroad to gain international exposure; the world quite literally comes to them in Astana.
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PARTNERSHIPS
Yet, a foundation of mutual trust and commitment was just as important. Shared goals, regular engagement and transparent dialogue allowed the partnership to grow stronger over time and to weather the inevitable challenges of establishing a new institution in a dynamic environment. Adaptability to the local context was another essential ingredient. While drawing inspiration from Fuqua’s global models, faculty localised teaching materials and developed case studies that reflected Central Asian realities, ensuring immediate relevance for the region’s students and businesses. Together, these principles created a blueprint for cross-border collaboration that accelerated NUGSB’s maturity and laid the groundwork for its long-term sustainability. While next year marks the conclusion of NUGSB’s formal partnership with Fuqua, collaboration with the US institution will continue through joint research to sustain intellectual momentum. At the same time, the school is moving confidently into its next chapter and forging new global alliances, most notably with HKUST and the aforementioned joint degree initiative that is set to offer students cross- regional opportunities. With its strong research base, growing alumni network and expanding portfolio of degree and executive education programmes, NUGSB is now positioned to fulfil its mission of reaching beyond education to prepare leaders, shape businesses and drive Central Asia’s economic and societal transformation. A case study in transformation NUGSB’s partnership with Fuqua is a compelling demonstration of how an intentional and carefully planned collaboration can create lasting impact. In just over a decade, what began as a bold experiment has evolved into a research-driven, internationally accredited business school with its own identity and a growing global reach. From programme design and governance to teaching methods and research culture, the Fuqua influence remains woven into NUGSB’s foundations, yet the school has matured into an institution capable of charting its own course. As NUGSB looks ahead to new partnerships and innovations, its journey offers an instructive lesson for the global AMBA & BGA community: that the true measure of a successful collaboration is not perpetual dependence, but the ability of the new institution to stand confidently on its own and – ultimately – to join the ranks of global partners in its own right.
Jozef (Joep) Konings is dean of Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Business (NUGSB) in Astana, Kazakhstan. Trained at the London School of Economics, Konings has held appointments at universities in Europe and the US and served as adviser to the former president of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, during the global financial crisis. His published research has focused on international finance, firm dynamics and globalisation
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THE BRAVE NEW WORLD OF net zero
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SUSTAINABILITY
With global industries accelerating their push towards decarbonisation, energy transition has become a strategic imperative that cuts across every function of an organisation, from finance and marketing to operations and HR. Hult International Business School’s Matt Gitsham elaborates on what this means for the careers of the future A s the planet moves towards the next chapter in climate action, companies are not only setting ambitious net-zero and sustainability goals, they are also embedding these commitments into core business decisions around product design, supply chains, governance and culture. In its latest sustainability report, Microsoft may find themselves in greater demand, as students increasingly seek out institutions that can prepare them for the emerging roles and opportunities of a low-carbon economy. Energy transition as a priority Globally across sectors, companies are committing to targets on climate, circularity, biodiversity, equity and more. This is now central to competitiveness. The transition to clean energy and more sustainable business models is unlocking entirely new markets and reshaping old ones. With that shift has come a growing demand for new roles and skills into which savvy graduates can progress. Carbon accountants, climate risk analysts and
reaffirmed its aim to be carbon negative by 2030 and to offset all historical emissions by 2050. The company plans to more than halve its 2020 scope 3 emissions (c. 97 per cent of its carbon footprint) and invest in carbon removal technologies such as bioenergy with carbon capture (BECCS) and biochar. In the UK, Tesco has committed to becoming carbon neutral across its own operations by 2035, with this target endorsed by the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi). Its strategy includes electrifying its home delivery fleet by 2030, incorporating electric HGVs and installing solar-powered refrigeration units in its trailers, as well as increasing freight transported by rail. Such measures will collectively help reduce transport emissions by up to 76 per cent. For professionals, this shift is creating a wave of new career opportunities, many of which simply didn’t exist just five years ago. With the right skills and mindset, these roles are well within reach. For business schools, this moment presents both an urgent challenge and a remarkable opportunity: how do we prepare students to thrive in a rapidly evolving economic and environmental landscape? The task is not only to equip students with relevant knowledge, but also to foster the adaptive mindsets and cross-cutting capabilities needed to succeed in roles that may not yet exist. The energy transition is reshaping the future of work, so business schools must ensure their graduates are equipped to lead in this new environment. Those that adapt quickly
energy transition strategists need strong analytical and financial modelling skills, along with a solid understanding of climate science and regulatory frameworks. Success requires attention to detail, strategic thinking and the ability to communicate complex information clearly across teams. Supply chain sustainability leads and circular economy specialists understand lifecycle assessments, ethical sourcing and sustainable product design. They thrive when combining systems thinking with practical problem-solving and must be able to influence stakeholders and drive innovation under constraints. AI-enabled analysts and digital sustainability consultants use data science and emerging technologies to improve efficiency and reduce environmental impact. Success depends on technical fluency, critical thinking and the ability to translate data insights into actionable strategies, all while adapting quickly in a fast-evolving landscape. Organisational development professionals focused on sustainability need expertise in change management, facilitation and culture transformation. These roles demand emotional intelligence, strong communication and the ability to lead with empathy and conviction, while shaping behaviours and mindsets aligned with long-term sustainability goals.
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Relevance in a local context Business schools must also tune in to regional priorities where they are based to capitalise on the wealth of opportunities. For instance, Scotland has committed to recruiting 50,000 people into its clean energy sector by 2050. This opens pathways for business schools to collaborate with local government and industry to shape talent pipelines; offer regionally focused sustainability and energy transition tracks; facilitate placements and capstone projects with firms engaged in offshore wind, hydrogen and smart grid technologies; and serve as conveners of innovation and policy dialogue within their local ecosystems. Given that the UK as a whole has committed to net-zero emissions by 2050, with interim targets of reducing emissions by 68 per cent by 2030, it’s clear to see why regions such as Teesside and Humber are developing into major industrial decarbonisation zones, with investment in carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) and blue/green hydrogen. Business schools in these areas can build local partnerships
These are not niche roles; they cut across every major business discipline. In some sectors, such as agriculture and manufacturing, the need is already outpacing the available talent. According to LinkedIn’s Global Green Skills Report , demand for green talent increased by 11.6 per cent between 2023 and 2024, while supply grew at just 5.6 per cent, making sustainability roles 54.6 per cent more likely to be filled than average roles. The mindset shift on skills As demonstrated by the breadth of skills and qualities needed for the handful of roles described above, it is not just about what successful professionals know, it is also about how they think. Our research among business leaders shows that many sustainability efforts begin with technical planning and target- setting. But those efforts often stall when they hit the cultural barriers that are deeply embedded in norms and behaviours at those organisations that haven’t shifted in step with strategic intent. This is where business schools have a vital role to play – not only in delivering technical knowledge, but also in cultivating what might be called a ‘transition‑ready’ mindset. This means equipping students to lead culture change with emotional intelligence and strategic clarity; work across disciplines and industries to solve complex, systemic challenges; make decisions in uncertainty, considering economic, social and environmental concerns to achieve net positive outcomes; and understand how to use (and question) powerful technologies such as AI and data modelling in service of better, more ethical outcomes. In practical terms, this raises several questions about what business education should be offering, as the boxout on page 21 illustrates.
Matt Gitsham is professor of business and sustainable
development at Hult International Business School and academic director of the Hult Sustainability Impact Lab. As part of his role, Gitsham has led numerous research projects on business and sustainable development
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