Dear alumni,
Our three campuses are buzzing with new students and faculty, new initiatives and new activities, an exciting year ahead of us!
On 12 September, we celebrated our 2nd Global INSEAD Day! All around the world in 81 cities in 49 countries, our community came together to celebrate all things INSEAD. From spectacular conferences, fundraising events, parties with large turnouts to an intimate gathering of three alumni in Dili, East Timor, we can all be immensely proud of our diverse globetrotting family.
This summer, we also lost two giants amongst our alumni and faculty, Yves Carcelle MBA’73, Former Chairman and CEO of Louis Vuitton, and Patrick Turner MBA’78, Professor of Entrepreneurship. Both of these men embodied the INSEAD values and gave their time and energy passionately to the school. They were beacons for our community. We are all richer for having had these two men in our lives, and we will miss them.
In this issue of the alumni magazine, my team was able to catch up with Lars Rohde, an alumnus of the Advanced Management Programme and Governor of Denmark’s Central Bank. Read the article and find out why Lars is hedging his bets in a zero-interest world. The team also delves into the effect of the 2011 tsunami on the oyster industry in Japan and how the collaboration between government, individuals and our alumni resulted in “France O-Kaeshi”—literally “France returns the gift,”.
Now, let me now give you a quick update on where we are in terms of executive development programmes and expansion. The combined efforts of faculty and staff have resulted in a highly successful 2013/14 academic year with more than 11,000 executives participating in our 45 open programmes and 200 custom programmes. While all geographies have performed well, our campus expansion and investment in Asia has resulted in a significant growth of executive education revenue in the APAC region.
We have also been expanding our endeavours in the US with the highly successful launch of our first open programme in New York, Management Skills for International Business. We will be running another of our flagship programmes, Transition to General Management, in San Francisco early in 2015.
We also celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Global EMBA programme and it’s growth! Beginning with a pioneering class of 53 participants, we now have 1200 EMBA alumni. Programmes are starting in Singapore; Fontainebleau; Abu Dhabi and Beijing (joint programme with Tsinghua). This autumn sees the most successful kick-off for GEMBA Asia yet with a record setting 53 students who are finishing up their first module on campus.
In 2013, we graduated 1016 MBAs, 95% of whom had taken up employment by March 2014 in 64 separate countries! Reflecting this success, 2014 is turning out to be a strong year for recruitment with over 123 companies on campus in the first six months. We already have 116 companies signed up for the current autumn campaign and we are supporting students with enhanced treks and job fairs in London, Hong Kong, and Dubai.
To drive this success even further, INSEAD is investing in the careers team. Graham Hastie MBA’95J, is leading the charge focusing on career curriculum, communication, improved student clubs and a pilot alumni mentorship programme. Please give him and his team your support.
We have welcomed the second cohort of Master in Finance students. The Master in Finance, launched in 2013 is a modular programme to develop leaders in the financial sector. The programme is directed by Professor Massimo Massa, one of the world’s most published Finance faculty. The first class is graduating in November this year.
Of course, the ‘magic in the classroom’ in all of the above occurs because of our world class faculty. INSEAD has hired 14 new faculty, from 11 different nationalities, who will join the school this academic year (10 in Europe and 4 in Asia). This will bring the total number of resident faculty to 151. Our faculty continue to receive awards and distinctions. Most recently we were delighted to learn that Professor Andrew Shipilov has received the 2014 Strategic Management Society Emerging Scholar Award – a first for INSEAD faculty. Case awards were garnered as the summer break began, and in October INSEAD will play host to the ICCP (International Community of Case Publishers) Annual Meeting, allowing us to play a leading role in this arena. This follows the successful launch of a new and innovative case platform and our distribution of cases through HBS.
I am also delighted that we were able to connect with you in multiple ways, through our Global INSEAD Day and forum events in Shanghai, San Francisco and Lisbon, engaging more than 100 volunteer organisers. Across the full spectrum of 46 events, including reunions, institution-wide and donor events, there were an estimated 12,500 attendees and 187 speakers! I am equally pleased to share that in terms of fundraising, the number of donors who made gifts of up to €10K has increased by 18%, and 70 new Salamanders were awarded. In addition, the Asia campus expansion campaign is set to exceed the S$20 million target before the opening in January 2015. On behalf of the entire INSEAD community, I want to thank our generous donors for investing in the future of the school!
I look forward to meeting you on campus or at one of the upcoming alumni forums in Sydney, Washington, and Milan. Let me end my note by sharing a wish made by a member of our community at the Global INSEAD Day celebrations in Fontainebleau where people were asked to make a wish for INSEAD. The wish is: INSEAD is here to change the world. I am in INSEAD to bring change. We are all here to change the world.
Best regards,
Ilian Mihov
Dean
INSEAD
