The posts in this category are thoughts and reflections from a sustainable development course delivered to MBA and other graduate business students at the University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business. I traveled with the group to video the trip (although I’m not at all a videographer, which might explain why nothing to date has become of the footage).
A main story vein is connected to the sustainable development, creative capitalism, and aid-for-Africa discussions occurring in business, social responsibility, TED/Gates Foundation, and other such circles. So-called emerging economies are—thanks to the way the current economic crises has redefined risk—rising to a more prominent place in our investment considerations.
The course’s international travel component is very different from the approach other universities take with international travel courses in two important ways:
- The travel component is not the focal point of the course: sustainable development in emerging markets is. On-the-ground experiences of the cultural and business landscape are simply a necessity for effective learning outcomes.
- Unlike most University travel courses (where students do things like visit expats in a boardroom then climb on a tour bus for sightseeing), Daniels’ visits are tied to actual projects the students deliver for the partnering enterprise. Like sustainable development itself, there are multiple value-added outcomes with such an innovative approach.
