First Place for WHU’s Leading with Impact Program

WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management has been honored with the Evidence-Based Leadership Development Program Award by the Academy of Management (AOM). Presented as part of the Management Education and Development (MED) division, the award is regarded as one of the most prestigious distinctions worldwide in the field of leadership development. It is granted exclusively to high quality, evidence-based leadership programs that not only demonstrate strong conceptual foundations, but also provide scientifically grounded and empirically proven impact.

“We are very pleased to receive this recognition from the Academy of Management. It places WHU in the same league as Harvard, Stanford, and INSEAD—previous award recipients. It also reflects our commitment at WHU to developing responsible leaders who can operate effectively in complex, real-world ecosystems,” said Professor Yuval Kalish, Academic Director of the Full Time and Part Time MBA Program at WHU.

The award recognizes the Leading with Impact, which was developed at WHU in collaboration with social enterprise Bookbridge for the school’s MBA program. After a competitive selection process, WHU prevailed over numerous international universities. From the pool of applicants, alongside WHU as the winner, four finalists were selected and invited to present their concepts at the Academy of Management Annual Meeting. The WHU program is built on the principle that leadership is best developed through experience, reflection, and responsibility. Participants are placed in complex, multi-stakeholder environments where they are required to take ownership of decisions and outcomes, with a strong emphasis on sustainable value creation.  

Entrepreneurial leadership in real-world social enterprises across the globe

As part of the Leading with Impact program, participants in WHU’s Full-Time MBA become social entrepreneurs for a period of four months. Within one week, they develop, in self-organized teams, business ideas for social enterprises in another country aimed at solving social issues. Following the concept phase, the projects are presented to investors and subsequently implemented. After launching the ventures on site, participants continue to support their development over several months by establishing processes, financial structures, and marketing strategies, thereby ensuring economic sustainability. At the end of the MBA program, the enterprises are handed over to local stakeholders, allowing them to continue the projects and create lasting opportunities for their communities.

Numerous social enterprises have already been established worldwide, e.g., in Poland and Greece. These initiatives not only drive sustainable change in their local environments, but also have a lasting impact on the participating leaders. “Leading with Impact is a unique capstone experience that combines academic rigor with hands-on leadership practice, allowing participants to assume responsibility, work with diverse stakeholders, experience leadership and followership, and generate measurable social impact,” Professor Kalish added.

The jury’s decision to honor Leading with Impact underscores the high quality of WHU’s approach to leadership development. At its core, there is a clearly defined vision of effective leadership, structured implementation, and robust evidence demonstrating the program’s impact on the participants’ competencies. These three dimensions also form the central evaluation criteria for the award.

About the Academy of Management (AOM)

The Academy of Management is the world’s leading scientific association in the field of management and organization, with around 18,000 members from more than 120 countries. Within the organization, the Management Education and Development division annually presents the Evidence-Based Leadership Development Program Award to highlight outstanding and innovative approaches to leadership development and to promote their broader adoption.