SOCIETAL IMPACT
• Fostering interdisciplinary collaboration The current, multi-dimensional challenges cannot be addressed by a single discipline. Therefore, business schools should become inter-disciplinary laboratories of innovation. This means breaking down traditional academic silos and creating structures that encourage multi-disciplinary degrees, including business, technology, social science and environmental studies, along with research centres that deliberately mix perspectives and methodological approaches. Funding and recognition for projects that demonstrate genuine cross-disciplinary collaboration should also be taken into consideration, as well as curriculum design that emphasises systems thinking and holistic problem-solving. At Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the interdisciplinary master’s in science, business and innovation focuses on how science and entrepreneurship can reinforce each other, plus how companies with different technological, economic and organisational challenges can collaborate. Sustainability is incorporated into several of the specialisations that students can select, one of them being developing and implementing sustainable solutions. This programme is delivered in partnership with the School of Business and Economics and the faculties of Science and Social Sciences. The transformative potential of direct impact Following these principles of direct impact, business schools can alter the perception of their role in society. We are not just educational institutions, but real-life social and economic platforms for innovation. Students can gain not only knowledge but skills, systems thinking, purpose in life and the passion to bring about changes in society. To truly embrace direct impact, business schools must revise their curricula to include practical and problem-solving components; establish impact assessment and development units to monitor and support the same; and strengthen strategic partnerships between and among local and international organisations. In addition, faculty must be persuaded to undertake research with a focus on its application in society and alumni must be involved as permanent partners for impact creation. From impact as strategy to strategy based on impact The role of business education will not be to subsume the concept of impact as a strategic option, but to make it influence the very core of business education. We must shift from asking, “How can we incorporate impact into our strategy?” to “How can our entire existence be defined by the positive change that we create?” This is not an academic exercise – it is a recognition that we need to transform the nature of business education and what it is trying to achieve in the world. It is high time that business schools changed their focus from the number of articles published, the ranking of journals and other such measures to the real effect that they are having on the world. For business schools, the message is clear: evolve, engage and impact – directly.
BIOGRAPHY Vasu Srivibha is the chief impact officer at Sasin School of Management and chair of the UN’s PRME ASEAN+, where he leads impact initiatives focused on transforming business education’s approach to societal impact
By way of example, there is The BRIDGE (BRilliant Innovation through DiGital Engagement) programme, a European Union- funded project that creates a conceptual framework for collaborative problem-solving at Mittuniversitetet in Sweden, Tampere University of Applied Sciences, Finland and Munich University of Applied Sciences in Germany. The programme hosts digital impact days where students work with companies and organisations to solve real-life challenges with the help of digital platforms and other technologies. By providing a community platform as well as a digital handbook, BRIDGE aims to create an ecosystem to improve students’ entrepreneurial skills, minimise geographic barriers, support sustainable development goals and foster transnational co-operation in higher education. This is all about supporting more effective knowledge transfer and innovation generation in European higher education institutions.
Ambition • ISSUE 2 • 2025 35
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