ROUNDTABLE REVIEW
A cross the world, AI and large language models (LLMs) are shaping new approaches to higher education and changing the way we think about the student experience. To explore how institutions are charting a course through this evolving terrain, AMBA & BGA used the Asia Pacific conference in Bali as an opportunity to team up with Brussels-based UBI Business School. Together, they convened a group of business school leaders from institutions across Africa, Asia and Europe, with panellists discussing a variety of themes around the technology’s potential impact on school communities in relation to programme delivery, personalisation, tutoring, career planning and more. How can AI enhance, rather than replace, the uniquely human elements of teaching, mentoring and community building in business education? James Njuguna: “AI will expand the horizons for us as educators; instead of treating it with a culture of suspicion, we should be embedding it as a culture of curiosity for our students. A lot of MBA programmes, including ours, already have courses on technology and I think we need to ensure that AI is embedded within these courses by discussing and enlightening students about its role.” Kenji Yokoyama: “In Japan, businesspeople and students often spend a lot of time trying to improve their English, but they don’t tend to reach the level needed to, for example, attend lectures in English. And if you have to separate classes for international and Japanese students, you cannot maximise the global education environment at all. Moreover, most of the interpretation tools currently available can only translate spoken language into written
language and there is also a time lag involved. A better form of interpretation using AI could change the international education scene completely.” Xu Yong: “My university started as a foreign language training school and even now approximately half the students major in foreign language study. We started by looking at language barriers and how AI tools can help us overcome language difficulty. This is a very important and practical application of AI and the university’s Language Sciences Institute has been co-operating with Chinese companies to produce translating machines.” Himanshu Rai: “In India, a policy stipulates that we reserve certain seats for candidates coming from different segments of society. These students might, for example, be economically or socially disadvantaged and our challenge is to ensure they are classroom-ready once they come into the programme. We also have a lot of students with backgrounds in engineering, many of whom need to further their understanding of economics before they start the programme. For these reasons, we currently have a tutorial system, particularly in the area of quantitative skills, that uses doctoral students. However, I think this is where AI could help, in becoming the tutor that makes students classroom-ready before they start their programme of study.” Hassan Abu Bakar: “We used to get lots of engineers enrolling on our MBA programme and now we have lots of doctors and pharmacists coming in. They tend to have the same problem of being classroom-ready, with finance often presenting a big challenge. I believe that [the use of AI in] business simulations is the way to go. We have been working with Harvard Business Impact’s simulation package and students like it very much, especially those without a prior background in industry, because it helps bring real business perspectives into teaching and learning.” Pumela Msweli: “Can you imagine a world where to get a job you don’t use a transcript, but some form of digital evidence or assessment that shows how you have changed society at a local, national, regional or even global level? In South Africa, there are about 100 million students in higher education and, as a country, we have been battling levels of unemployment of approximately 32 per cent. I think this is where AI and blockchain technology can assist us, by changing assessment for students and placing more focus on societal transformation.” Desmond Yap: “There is always a particular lens through which each institution tries to solve the problems they observe within their sphere of influence, whether those relate to language learning, helping students become classroom-ready or career decision-making. We take these experiences on board as we seek to further develop our use of the technology; that’s why platforms like this play such an important part in establishing norms and standards regarding the use of AI.”
Ambition • ISSUE 1 • 2026 29
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