Nowadays, floods, droughts, and other devastating natural disasters are becoming more common and severe around the world, as evident by the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events. Over the last few years, the global discourse about climate change and its effects on communities, livelihoods, and enterprises has grown in intensity and urgency.

The fourth roundtable of the AUC Business Forum held on March 15 under the title "Just Transition for Africa: The Role of Business Schools" discussed environmental issues and challenges facing the African continent while analyzing related issues of social justice and energy poverty. The speakers explained key priorities for Africa at the upcoming COP27, including climate mitigation and adaptation strategies, and delved into the meaning of “just transition” emphasizing how climate action in Africa is not only about the transition from an economy based on fossil fuels to the so-called ‘net-zero’ economy or low carbon economy. The session was moderated by Ali Awni, professor of practice and director of the John D. Gerhart Center for Philanthropy, Civic Engagement and Responsible Business at the AUC School of Business, and featured a number of international experts working within the continent.

Resilient Economies

In this regard, Saliem Fakir, chief executive of the United Nations Climate Change Conference, shed light on the factors that must be taken into consideration in order for resilient economies to develop. “To build resilient economies, we have to think of the sectors that rely on natural resources, so that we are able to enhance investment in them”. In making this statement, he was implying that economies should reduce their reliance on fossil fuels and become more flexible in order to decarbonize.

He went on to say that it is our responsibility to improve and establish this vision and to stress this narrative. Spending more money on energy access and infrastructure, as well as a strong focus on global integration rather than just regional integration, can help achieve this. Furthermore, he underlined that “we must determine how to change the architecture from global finance to green and climate goals”. However, none of these energy changes can take place without widespread social approval.

Egypt’s transformation agenda

According to Youssef Nassef, Director of the African Climate Foundation, the future level of funding as of 2025 includes several components and exercises. He stated that currently, “climate and sustainability issues are symptoms of an underlying flaw of how we have been doing business since the industrial revolution.” He added: “This is why I encourage thinking fundamentally of moving the world to a new place.”

For starters, the future level of funding incorporates the adaptation and loss damage agenda. This includes looking into optimization exercises through which disastrous risks can be reduced. There also needs to be a legitimate component of continued support in order for this agenda to work. Nassef emphasized this by stating that “the least developed countries majority are in Africa and need a specific type of support” when dealing with external shocks.

The strongest component of all regarding this agenda is the youth component, Nassef continued, which will be present at the upcoming COP conference. Youths will be expected to make strong advancements as well as identify and seize opportunities that would allow for more prosperity.

Prosperity and wellbeing

Jacqueline McGlade, Professor in international public policy and governance at Strathmore University Business School, Kenya, and professor of sustainable development and resilience, University College London, UK, discussed the matters of prosperity and wellbeing with a strong emphasis on local resilience. According to McGlade, prosperity is to really understand how we feel meaningful lives and is about our hope for the future. She then connected this to local resilience by explaining how there are so many ways in which it has been potentially overlooked, meaning that the central focus was almost always on global resilience.

The main point here was that it is not just about the money but it is also about the creativity and innovation to solve the problem. This sets the stage for the idea of building resilience on an ethical basis. In other words, the idea of the well-being economy is “to really think about how we can pursue human and ecological wellbeing instead of material wealth” declared McGlade.

After grasping these concepts, one would wonder how we might truly develop the information that will help us become more resilient. McGlade responded to this by stating that the answer is not found solely in books or academic research institutions and that we must consider constructing a bridge between theories and measurement frameworks. Essentially, the future of a just transition is about how we employ co-production and co-design terminologies, as well as experiential and hands-on learning.

From net-zero to net-positive

To wrap up the discussion, Roze Phillips, executive director, Gordon Institute of Business Science, touched upon how “just transition is not an end in itself, it is a means to achieve transformed wealth”. The first step in doing so is rethinking what kind of knowledge needs to be infused into this debate on climate change. This involves casting a wider scope on what we call transformative justice: from net-zero to net-positive.

Phillips elaborated on this matter by stating that to solve the future, we have to solve today's issues. “We will create the future – one that consists of collective ownership and control of our energy systems,” said Phillips, elaborating: “What we don’t need is upscaling, we need to have a learning and all-inclusive mindset and encourage participation”. Forming this net-positive transformed world is fundamentally the type of world that partnerships will have a wide focus on.

Other points that were discussed in the roundtable included what is unique about African countries and the implications of just transition for the private sector, including investors, alternative climate finance, and market and regulatory mechanisms. Ultimately, the main takeaway of this insightful conversation was the role of African universities and business schools in contributing to climate action and a just transition for Africa.

To watch the full roundtable, click here.

In 2007 the Principles for Responsible Management Education (PRME) was launched by the United Nations Global Compact. It has, over the years, become the most prominent, well-established bridging entity between the United Nations and business schools around the world. PRME’s main goal is to promote a culture of sustainability and the embodiment of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals in business and management-related educational institutions. This is an effort to produce a caliber of younger leaders from around the world who value and uphold a sustainability-oriented mindset, aiding them in ushering in a new wave of sustainable business practices into the corporate world.

On March 15, 2022, during the third roundtable of the 2022 AUC Business Forum, the launch of the PRME Chapter Africa was announced. The chapter aims to further advance PRME’s missions in the African continent on a more local and regional level in terms of collaborating with business schools in Africa to encourage an increased emphasis on responsible management education in academia. PRME Chapter Africa is currently the newest of the 15 PRME chapters around the world.

The third roundtable was moderated by Sherwet Elwan Ibrahim, associate professor and director of the MBA and Executive MBA Programs at the AUC School of Business and the vice chair of PRME Chapter Africa’s Founding Committee. A welcome note was given by Dean of AUC School of Business, Sherif Kamel, followed by some opening remarks on the launch by speakers Mette Morsing, head PRME secretariat, and Morris Mthombeni, board member of the PRME Global Chapter Council. Thereafter, the roundtable featured an esteemed group of experts from a diverse array of African countries.

PRME Chapter Africa’s alignment with the School’s principles

During the launch event, Dean Kamel highlighted the school’s shift towards a more sustainable and responsible business orientation by stating that “in 2009, we restructured the School to be centered around three major themes, namely entrepreneurship, responsible business, and economic development. These elements have been guiding our strategic directions and priorities over the past decade.” He further added: “This is why, as you can imagine, our teaching, research, and services offered for the AUC community uphold those three elements that include responsible business.”

Furthermore, Kamel also underscored the longstanding partnership of the School with PRME. “We have had a long history with PRME which dates back to October 2011, when the School hosted the first PRME MENA regional forum. This forum was well-attended and kick-started our collaboration with PRME, mainly through the John D. Gerhart Center for Philanthropy, Civic Engagement and Responsible Business, the main developmental arm of the School,” emphasized Kamel.

Fostering sustainability-oriented mindsets

Morsing illustrated what she believed should be the three main aspects – the so-called “three S’s” – that should be considered when planning for the future of PRME and its community. “The first is “society”. We need to create business students with the kind of mindset that puts society at the center of the stakeholder model rather than the corporation,” explained Morsing.

The second is “success”. Morsing highlighted that “When I observe many of the strategy textbooks that I own, I find that the language used is very attack-based and ‘winning’ oriented. We should change this language to a more co-creational oriented one that creates a different more partnership-inclined mindset within business students.”

In addition, Mthombeni also elaborated on this point by mentioning that “business schools have been built on the notion of competition. However, I believe they should be focused more on justice and inclusivity, and try to replace this notion of competition with one of collaboration.” He reasserted: “All business schools in the continent need to view each other as collaborators rather than competitors.”

The last is “skill sets”, as Morsing explained: “It’s the responsibility of educators to develop skill sets in students to solve business problems and address them, not only from a financial point of view, but also considering other factors such as which investments are considered green or can improve human rights.”

Aims of PRME Chapter Africa

Sammy Bonsu, chair of PRME Chapter Africa’s Founding Committee and director of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration illustrated some of the main goals of creating PRME Chapter Africa. “One of our main goals was to develop a governance structure and a scheme based on specific guiding principles [of sustainability and collaboration] which we hope to entrench into and throughout the African continent,” he stated, adding: “We were also trying to establish strategic relationships.”

Noting the need for collaboration, Ibrahim stated: “One of the strategic priorities of the chapter is establishing closer links with PRME UN Global Compact’s local networks in different regions across the continent and to provide support for these networks in terms of driving ambition and action towards the UN’s SDGs.” She further elaborated: “We [referring to PRME Chapter Africa] have many ideas on how to engage in joint activities with students and promote sustainability-related dialogues between business leaders and academia.”

In short, the Chapter’s mission coincides with the School’s goals and priorities which entails producing sustainably conscious market leaders. Furthermore, the Chapter aims to instill the SDGs into businesses’ operation and decision-making all over the continent and help provide African-based businesses with the assistance and infrastructure to do so.

Click here to watch the full roundtable.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has placed high pressure on members of the learning and development industry to adopt new, more effective modes and methods of training that fit the current business landscape. There has also been an increased need, from the corporate side, for individualized executive education that tackles the development of skills more practically.

This constitutes the key themes discussed throughout the second roundtable of the 2022 AUC Business Forum held on March 14, 2022, under the title “The Future of Corporate Learning and Development”. The roundtable was moderated by Ghada Howaidy, associate dean for Executive Education at the AUC School of Business. The roundtable featured five experts in the Human Resources field who are thought leaders in the area of learning and development.

The need for practice-oriented training

Executive education and on-the-job employee training must move away from the typical inapplicable, sometimes irrelevant, textbook knowledge and lean more towards building competencies applicable to the workplace.

Mohamed Kesseba, senior director of Executive Education Programs at AUC School of Business, spoke on this matter. “There is a consensus, between corporations, about the need for education that focuses on closing the theory-practice gap. All corporations across the board are concerned with executive education that includes practical applications relevant to specific industries of operation, local markets, and the needs of the organizations on an individual level,” emphasized Kesseba.

Human Resources Director at Hassan Allam Properties, Hanan Moselhy, also shared her insights on this matter.“A lot of training nowadays tackles topics such as leadership and agility but unfortunately in a very superficial, textbook-oriented way,”  she highlighted.

She later added: “In many human resource departments, learning and development is about training from a purely operational perspective which is quite disconnected from a business's actual needs.”

Moselhy additionally emphasized the importance of training needs assessment (TNA), a process by which corporations aim to identify current and specific training needs within their workforce in order to provide more practical and company-tailored pieces of training that address relevant competencies.

Furthermore, George Sedky, a chief human resource officer at Ghabbour Group, reinforced Moselhy’s remarks. Sedky stated: “Many training providers do not create practical tailored solutions for the corporations. They often use, ‘one-size fits all’ training that is highly theory-oriented.” He continued: “Instead they should provide training that is relevant, fits the specific needs of each corporation, and is up-to-date based on each industry’s newest trends.”

The importance of utilizing hybrid learning modes

The pandemic posited that many corporations had to conduct their executive training through online mediums, this presented both a challenge and an opportunity for companies worldwide. Emad Nasr, chair of the Human Resources Committee at the American Chamber of Commerce in Egypt and human resource director at Lecico Egypt, stated that: “Due to pandemic-related concerns, companies had to reduce face-to-face training and replace them with virtual training. Executive trainers and Human Resource managers are all currently being guided towards the use of blended learning and hybrid training.”

He further added: “While I do not believe in solely virtual training, some level of utilizing virtual training has proved to be cost-efficient, practical and are convenient as you can attend them at any given place thus, we now must use blended learning to capture the benefits of both online and offline training.”

Tom Ryan, an independent consultant based in the United Kingdom, mentioned the benefits of the utilization of blended learning. “I am currently involved in delivering a self-directed [online] learning program and some of the assignments given to participants involve actionable steps, for example, towards departmental collaboration. I think with a blended self-directed program like this one, individuals are able to conduct their daily business practices without disruption, thus, allowing them to immediately apply what they have learned in a practical manner,” underscored Ryan.

He further elaborated on the weaknesses of utilizing online learning alone without practical application. “What makes training interesting for executives and employees is when they have gone through what they learned in a very practical way and have applied the concepts they learned to leverage their business practices, on the other hand, merely watching hours of online instructional videos in a passive manner is quite sub-optimal,” he stated.

In summary, it is crucial for corporations to provide practically applicable trainings and to deemphasize the fixation on theoretical approaches to learning and development. Furthermore, corporations must employ the use of both online and offline training methodologies in conjunction in order to leverage training capabilities and impact.

Click here to watch the full roundtable discussion.

In recent years, there has been a significant point of inflection in the Egyptian entrepreneurial ecosystem specifically in terms of increased venture capital investment, especially in the deep technology-related, early seed-stage start-ups. Nevertheless, the entrepreneurial deep technology space in Egypt is still operating at the nascent level and requires a lot more maturity. Start-up valuation, establishing proper criteria for start-up selection, and recognizing the prospects of start-up exits are all critical matters considered by investors and venture capitalists.

These are some of the key issues addressed in the first roundtable of the 2022 AUC Business Forum held on March 14, 2022, entitled “Investing in Tech Startups: The Road Ahead”. This roundtable was moderated by Ayman Ismail, Adul Latif Jameel endowed chair of entrepreneurship, founding director of AUC Venture Lab, and associate professor at AUC School of Business. The roundtable featured a diverse panel of experts in the start-up funding and investment field.

The reasoning behind the increased valuation of start-ups

As Ismail explained, many traditional business owners are dumbfounded when start-up companies with little-to-no profits and negative cash flows get valuated at much higher levels than their well-established, profitable businesses.

Chairman and Co-Founder of Sawari Ventures and Founder of Flat6Labs Ahmed Alfi illustrated his thoughts on this matter: “Investing in a well-established industrial company will never give you this level of return on investment as early stage startups. This is why valuations of start-ups are usually higher.” He added: “When one invests small amounts of capital in an early stage of a business venture, it will eventually grow to 200 or more times one’s initial capital investment. When investing at later stages of a start-up venture, one should expect to make around five to ten times one’s initial investment.”

Alfi further elaborated: “Another reason for the growth in valuations is that the talent pool that is participating as management in startups and high growth companies is tremendously stronger than it previously was.”

Basil Moftah, a general partner at Global Ventures, also shared his thoughts on this matter. “The question of valuation relates to how much return an investor expects and we [referring to venture capitalists] target incredibly high returns. Egypt is not digitized enough, therefore, a lot of opportunities in the fintech area exist,” highlighted Moftah, adding: “Digitizing processes in Egypt serves as a business opportunity with huge potential of growth and substantial returns.”

Investment analysis and criteria for the selection process of investors

Investing large sums of money into new businesses is accompanied by considerable risk. Therefore, for investors, it is important to conduct a thorough selection process when comparing investment options.

“In the selection process, we look at early product-market fit and there needs to be a good indication of that. As investors, we like companies that are solving an acute problem that is addressing the masses and a real need in the country,” explained Rafeh Saleh, founding partner at Cubit Ventures. “We need to see actual customer validation towards the business idea,” he continued.

Moftah also illustrated factors venture capitalists consider when investing in new business ventures. “It’s important to see what type of help the entrepreneur needs and whether we [referring to venture capital] have the bandwidth to take this project on and the skills and capabilities to aid the entrepreneurs in their journey. If we are not doing that, then we are setting false expectations for entrepreneurs.”

Moftah also highlighted another point, which entails the importance of considering the need for a level of profitability, not only the potential growth of start-up ventures, as some businesses continue growing without showing any signs of profitability and continue to have bad unit economics, which would be a loss for investors who injected capital into those businesses.

Prospects of start-up venture exits

Many start-up founders’ main goal is to create and grow businesses to eventually cash this business venture out by selling its ownership, this is formally known as an exit. Shehab Marzban, CEO and founder of DFin Holding and Camel Ventures, discussed exit possibilities in the Egyptian entrepreneurial ecosystem. “I believe the majority of exits in the local market will come mainly from strategic acquisitions, mainly from conventional players in the Egyptian market,” said Marzban “However, very substantial exits will probably need to be more on a regional or global scale, as in these cases the local market might not be able to absorb the exits,” he added.

On a similar note, Chief Investment Officer at AUC and Founder and Managing Partner at Lotus Capital Amal Enan expressed her perspective on exit prospects. “It excites me to see the role that both local and international corporations in Egypt are starting to play in helping business ventures exit.” She reiterated: “I think corporates are increasingly starting to become good exit vehicles for businesses as they provide diverse exit avenues.”

Other topics discussed in the roundtable included the change in the deep tech space in Egypt, challenges of female entrepreneurship and sustainability-related entrepreneurial concerns. To summarize, start-ups are valued based on their reward-potentiality, several aspects must be considered by investors who choose new ventures to inject capital into and the prospect of start-up exits in Egypt has improved.

Click here to watch the full roundtable discussion.