Each year, the McGill Desautels African Business Initiative (DABI) brings together attendees, panelists and guest speakers for an opportunity to learn, network and engage in stimulating discussions about the future of business in Africa. This year’s panelists included Sekou Coulibaly (BCom’03), who was executive director at L’Oréal before launching a sustainable, made-in-Africa luxury clothing brand called SEKBI Bogolan in 2020.
“Epidemics and pandemics are without pity,” says Joanne Liu (MDCM'91, IMHL'14, DSc'16) “If there are weak links, they will break.” Liu is the former president of Médecins Sans Frontières, and a graduate of Desautels’ International Masters for Health Leadership program. In 2021, she joined McGill’s School of Population and Global Health to create the new Pandemic Emergency Readiness Lab (PERL).
For Jim West (BA’79) and Justin West (BCom’04), the music industry is a family affair. From a young age, Justin accompanied his father to industry conferences, and during his teenage years, he spent the summers working for his father’s record label: Justin Time Records. The younger West graduated from Desautels with a degree in accounting, but ultimately followed in his father’s footsteps. In 2006, he launched a label called Secret City Records.
On Friday, February 3, the Desautels Faculty of Management hosted the 43rd edition of the Desautels Management Achievement Awards, a student-run initiative which brings the global Desautels community together to celebrate the achievements of industry leaders who have demonstrated a career of great achievement and commitment of responsible business.
Marcel Desautels, LLD’07 (CM, O Ont, OM) generously donated both his resources and his time to furthering business education at McGill. The business leader and philanthropist passed away on January 31 at the age of 88. Desautels invested over $38 million in students, programs, research and facilities at the Desautels Faculty of Management. “Marcel was deeply passionate about inspiring others to give and get involved,” says Dean Yolande Chan. “And because he believed in us, so many others did too.
Finding available ice time or sports fields to book can be a challenge, but CatchCorner aims to change that. The app, which has been compared to OpenTable for sports facilities by Forbes, allows users to find and reserve fields and facilities that meet their needs. Co-Founders Maya Azouri (BCom’17) and Jonathan Azouri (BCom’16) have recently partnered with Sports Illustrated to become CatchCorner by Sports Illustrated.
Rima Qureshi’s (BCom’87, MBA’96) career has taken her to Stockholm, Dallas and New York, but she retains strong connections to Montreal and McGill. Now the Executive Vice President and Strategy Officer at Verizon in New York, Qureshi began her career with Ericsson, and helped the company integrate thousands of new employees when it acquired parts of Nortel. Qureshi returns regularly to Montreal to spend time with family and mentors MBA students at Desautels.
Positive storytelling can encourage consumers to make better, more eco-conscious choices. That’s the vision the Stephanie Beaulieu (MBA’22) shared with Karl Moore in an article for Forbes.com. Beaulieu founded the eco-fashion company Ecova to make change in the fashion industry.
The COVID-19 pandemic was incredibly costly, for the health of the population and the economy. But the next infectious disease pandemic could be even worse. Politicians can choose to prevent it, but they need to take action now, argues Dr. Joanne Liu (MDCM'91, IMHL'14, DSc'16) in Scientific American. For this to happen, there needs to be a leader-level council that identifies gaps in preparedness, mobilizes finances where they are needed, and holds its stakeholders accountable.
Harvard’s Tiya Miles won the 2022 Cundill History Prize for her book All that she carried: The journey of Ashley’s sack, a Black family keepsake. The prize was launched by Peter Cundill (BCom’60) in 2008, and is administered by McGill. It awards $75,000 each year to a book that embodies historical scholarship, originality, literary quality and broad appeal. The Cundill History Prize awards an additional $10,000 to two other award finalists.
Congratulations to Taryn Welikovitch (BSc’16, GDip Accounting’18, GCPA'19) on receiving the Graduate Certificate in Professional Accounting Teaching Award for Guest Lecturers.
This award recognizes excellence in teaching by guest GCPA lecturers. Excellent teaching can be demonstrated through a well-designed course, engaging in-class activities and materials, use of innovative teaching strategies, and a commitment to improving one's courses through feedback.
People get in to policing to fight crime, but most calls to police are not about crimes at all, said Fady Dagher (EMBA’12) in an interview with CBC. Officers regularly respond to calls that involve people experiencing mental health crises, or people with disabilities. The new Chief of the Service de police de la Ville de MontrĂ©al (SPVM) wants his officers to better understand what it is like to be on the other side of these calls.Â
Graduate Certificate in Professional Accounting (GCPA) participant Megan Robertson (BCom'21, GCPA'22) has been named to the Honour Roll of the
In 2018, when the Fetherstonhaugh family envisioned an award to recognize and reward teaching excellence, they hoped for great teachers and at the Desautels Faculty of Management extraordinary teachers emerged. As the recipient of the 2022 Fetherstonhaugh Family Foundation Distinguished Teaching Award for Undergraduate Programs, Prof. of Practice Sujata Madan engages with students in a way that promotes and accelerates their classroom and lifelong learning.
On November 14, the Laidley Centre for Business Ethics hosted students, faculty, staff, donors, alumni and friends of McGill Desautels for the official launch of the Centre.
The Laidley Centre for Business Ethics will serve as a hub for McGill researchers across disciplines, from law and religion to economics and engineering, to work toward solutions for the most pressing ethical issues of our time.