20 YEARS IN PERSPECTIVE:
Success is a balanced life, I'm not sure I'm there yet, but that's an aspiration.
I don't think I was fully aware of the challenge for international couples of moving around and managing two careers.
Sometimes he's followed me and sometimes I've followed him and it's worked out pretty well, but it hasn't been easy.
I feel very lucky because I love the work that I do, I love the fact that I get to work with candidates who are all over the world, who have that wonderful diversity of background that is so familiar.
I loved working at INSEAD, I have to say that it's not quite as much fun working there, as it was being a student.
We had four kids while we were living in Paris, so I inflicted 4 maternity leaves on INSEAD.
Unfortunately I've had to cut back on the champagne which is very sad, but we still do a lot of socializing and host a lot of parties.
I actually always had an entrepreneurial itch and I think partly that was that I am the daughter of an entrepreneur.
I also am very grateful to have wonderful business partners who are friends who I would trust my life with
Kids keep me up at night.
I feel a little bit depressed about the political environment right now and we know what we've got coming in the future years.
ON TOPIC: MBA in perspective, 20 year MBA evolution, education
One big change that I've seen as regards [MBA] candidates and what they talk about, and what they're looking for is the desire to really have a positive impact and their interest in sustainability.
Candidates these days really want to use the degree and use their education to have a positive impact in the world and that's much more widespread than it was fifteen years ago. INSEAD has invested a lot in weaving sustainability into the curriculum.
Another big change of course is the increase of the percentage of women.
A big question right now is how AI will play out in education. Schools are somewhat cagey right now about their policies on this.
ON TOPIC: the kids growing up: thoughts on undergraduate education
I think it's important for our generation to keep in mind that it is more competitive now to get into the top schools than it was when we went through the system.
There's a lot of pressure on kids these days to succeed and to prove themselves and I think the role of parents should be to actually help kids find the right fit, rather than push them towards necessarily the very top schools.
It's important to really focus on that fit and helping kids to find academic passions and an environment for them where they will flourish rather than get too bogged down and focusing on getting into the highest ranked school.
This generation, they've been through the pandemic. My kids did not enter a classroom for over twelve months and all of those things have had a mental health impact and so my concern with at least getting my kids towards undergraduate is really helping them to find an environment where they feel happy and they're going to flourish rather than focusing on what's the highest ranked school that you can get into.
There are big issues at the top schools with kids coming in, who are not well prepared for life.
ON ALL THINGS INSEAD: insead's formula is incredibly powerful.
I see every day how transformative INSEAD is and I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to continue to help people access an education like INSEAD.
If everybody makes a little effort. It has a huge impact.
References, mentions:
International Finance Corporation, IFC, Fortuna Admissions, MBA coach, INSEAD, INSEAD admissions, Blue Ocean strategy (Renée Mauborgne and Chan Kim), Wharton, Harvard, Judith Hodara, Matt Symonds