Ten Years Hence: Exploring global trends for the next decade

"Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which has the grander view?" This question from Victor Hugo's Les Miserables may seem obvious at first glance; however, both instruments offer a brilliant view. The microscope illuminates minute objects; the telescope, distant ones.  

Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business offers a similar illumination:  students gain both a micro view of business principles in such disciplines as accounting, marketing, and management, as well as a macro view of global issues that intersect with business. The Ten Years Hence Lecture Series course, coordinated by Professor Jim O'Rourke, Director of the Fanning Center for Business Communication, examines emerging issues that our graduates will face in the next ten years. The series, open to the public, features diverse speakers from varied backgrounds, with course topics ranging from immigration to biochemistry, from Islamic finance to terrorism. This year's panelists include Anne Thompson, Notre Dame graduate and Chief Environmental Correspondent for NBC, as well as General James L. Jones (USMC), the former Supreme Allied Commander in Europe.

 "It's good to take a break from the nuts and bolts of studies to look at real-world issues," says 2008 MBA candidate Anca Paunescu. Fellow student Jon Peach agrees, saying, "The lecture series offers a rare opportunity to think about the future, including likely scenarios that we will face, with discipline and rigor rather than with the unfocused attention that so often comes with late-night dorm-room discussions." That, of course, is part of the vision that Carolyn Woo, Dean of the Mendoza College of Business, has for the students: to become leaders who make our future together better by the privilege of the positions they will hold, the decisions they will make, the resources they will develop and use, and the people whose lives they will touch.

It is this disciplined long-range look at business and global issues, with all their inherent challenges and possibilities, coupled with a close-up examination of real-world business practices, problems, and solutions, which provides each MBA with the vision essential to impact a changing world.

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