Innovation and Impact
At CKGSB, we innovate beyond the traditional boundaries of business education to become a force for good.
At CKGSB, we innovate beyond the traditional boundaries of business education to become a force of positive impact.
World-class Faculty
and Unrivaled
China Insights
From a founding team of seven, CKGSB’s faculty has grown six-fold since its establishment 20 years ago. Today, most of our professors held tenured positions at top academic institutions worldwide - such as the University of Chicago, Columbia University, Darden School of Business, University of Michigan, MIT, Wharton and Yale - prior to joining CKGSB, and thus bring a global perspective to the classroom.
Our faculty members - most of whom are Chinese by heritage – have a native understanding of Chinese business and culture. This, combined with the school’s research focus and access to China’s most influential alumni network, allows CKGSB to offer unsurpassed insights into China’s business landscape.
40+
Full-time, resident professors
110
Global academic awards
50%
Previously tenured at top global schools
65
Papers published in
Financial Times 50 journals
127
Papers published in 77 top peer-reviewed journals globally
500
Faculty-led case studies on China and global business
CKGSB professors offer an in-depth look at topics that are critical to both established business leaders and developing unicorn leaders.
Flagship Indices
to Gauge Economic Development
CKGSB professors provide monthly, quarterly and annual research that often serves as a barometer of economic conditions in China, the US and other key markets.
Business Conditions Index
As a set of forward-looking, diffusion indices conducted by Associate Dean and Professor of Economics Li Wei, the CKGSB Business Conditions Index studies 400+ senior executives of private companies across different sectors, including consumer goods, industrial, real estate, manufacturing and consumer staples, to indicate overall confidence of business in China.
Business Sentiment Index
The Business Sentiment Index has been following China’s manufacturing sector since 2014. Led by Professor of Finance Gan Jie, this index surveys more than 2,000 Chinese companies from within the industrial sector every quarter to provide the most comprehensive set of independent data currently available.
Cheung Kong Investor Sentiment Survey
Started in January 2018 by Professor of Accounting and Finance Liu Jing, the quarterly CKGSB Investor Sentiment Survey monitors investor sentiment and expectations in China's domestic equity market. Since August 2018, the survey has expanded its scope to 13 major Chinese cities and conducted on a quarterly basis with approximately 2,500 valid samples, including 1,900 samples from individual investors and 600 from institutional investors.
Understanding China’s Generation Z in the Workplace Report
Based on a survey of more than 17,000 Chinese professionals, Associate Professor of Organizational Behavior and Associate Dean Zhang Xiaomeng runs a first research of its kind and scale to study the professional behaviors of Generation Z in China. This annual survey tries to understand their values, career choices, psychological resilience, gender discrepancies, and impact of corporate culture.
Educational approach
Since its establishment in November 2002, CKGSB has focused on the decision-makers of top companies, such as Chairmen and CEOs of the most influential companies and iconic entrepreneurs, which few other educational institutions have been able to serve.
Going beyond the professional managers that most business programs traditionally target, CKGSB pioneered a ‘top-of-the-pyramid’ approach because we believe that companies’ leaders need to learn to cope with the complexities brought by globalization, technological disruptions and geopolitical instability.
Unrivalled Alumni Network
18000+
Alumni, 50% of whom are at the Chairman or CEO level
20%
Of China’s most valuable brands are run by CKGSB alumni
76
Of Fortune China’s 2021 Top 500 companies are run by CKGSB alumni
11
Companies on the 2021 Fortune Global 500 List are run by CKGSB alumni
4000+
Global senior executives at multinational companies
23
Alumni listed in the 2021 Forbes China Philanthropy List
Fostering Economic Disruption and a New
Generation of Unicorns
We at CKGSB believe economic disruption is key to economic development, social advancement and the promotion of social mobility. Hence, we strive to build a global ecosystem that fosters a new generation of economic disruptors, especially unicorn and unicorn-to-be companies, with a renewed and enhanced emphasis on global responsibility, social purpose and a long-term perspective.
CKGSB is the first business school to offer programs specifically designed for unicorn and soon-to-be unicorn founders and co-founders since 2015 in China. We have been partnering with some of the most prominent Chinese and global companies, like Alibaba, Amazon, ByteDance, Baidu, JD.com, Microsoft (China), SenseTime, Tencent, and leading venture capitals, to develop unicorn and soon-to-be unicorn companies.
Building on our success in China, we extended this initiative to Europe in 2016. We are now working with like-minded partners worldwide - such as Berkeley Engineering, IMD, UNESCO and Dubai Executive Council - to extend our programs for unicorn and soon-to-be unicorn founders in the Americas, Europe, Middle East, Asia and Africa.
1000+
Founders of companies with at least Series A funding have studied at CKGSB
136
Unicorn companies are founded or co-founded by CKGSB alumni
38
Alumni-led unicorn companies are listed on CB Insights (2017-2022)
11
European sessions of unicorn acceleration programs have been delivered
200
Global entrepreneurs representing 159 companies across 30 industries and 37 countries joined our European sessions
3
European companies have become unicorn companies since the program
Unbabel, Portugal;
Sword Health, Portugal;
Teledoc Health, USA
Selected Partners
Selected Unicorn Companies @CKGSB
AI
Food
Fintech
Retailing
Entertainment
Home Renovation + Internet
Car Maintenance
SaaS + Tax
Transportation
Live-streaming
Clothing
Education
Voice Technology
Health
Robotics
Sports
Services
Social Media
Logistics
SaaS + Live-streaming
E-commerce
Battery
E-commerce
Advertisement
AI
Food
Retailing
Fintech
Entertainment
Home Renovation + Internet
Car Maintenance
SaaS + Tax
Transportation
Live-streaming
Clothing
Voice Technology
Health
Robotics
Education
Sports
Services
Social Media
Logistics
SaaS + Live-streaming
Battery
E-commerce
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Creating Positive Impact on Society
Embedded in the School’s DNA, social responsibility has been woven into CKGSB’s management education since day one to foster business leaders who create positive impact on society.
To give business leaders a more holistic and long-term view of business, we pioneered the integration of the humanities into the core business curricula in 2005. In 2010, we began requiring EMBA students to complete 48 hours of community and philanthropy work in order to graduate, an experiment that was extended to all degree programs at CKGSB in 2012.
Since then, CKGSB has been advocating for social innovation - the collaboration across government, businesses, NGOs, civil society and international organizations to address the most challenging problems facing humanity - by offering a compulsory module on social innovation for EMBA students in 2018 and for all degree students in 2022. We are proud to be the first business school to offer a one-year field course on “Social Innovation and Business for Good” since 2021, which requires EMBA students to incorporate ESG in their institutions.
CKGSB’s Timeline on Social Responsibility and Social Innovation
CKGSB is working with partners across sectors to develop a global ecosystem to foster economic disruption with an emphasis on social innovation.
CKGSB developed the unique Social Innovation and Business for Good field course for EMBA students.
CKGSB made social innovation a compulsory course for EMBA program, which is now a requirement in all degree programs.
All degree programs at CKGSB were required to commence their studies with a mandatory course on ESG.
CKGSB offered social innovation as an elective module for EMBA and MBA students.
From 2014, EMBA students were required to take a course on ESG, social responsibility and philanthropy for the first time.
CKGSB required EMBA students to complete 48 hours of community and philanthropy work in order to graduate; now a requirement across all degrees programs.
CKGSB started incorporating the humanities (history, philosophy and religion) into core business curricula to give students a holistic view of business.
CKGSB awarded the first EMBA Philanthropy Scholarships to outstanding civil society and NGO leaders, which are now awarded across all of our degree programs.
23 CKGSB alumni were named in Forbes China Philanthropy List in 2021, accounting for 23% of the total. Collectively, they contributed RMB 6.3 billion in charitable donations, accounting for nearly 30% of the total amount.
CKGSB was awarded the 2019 China Social Impact Award in “Poverty Alleviation” by the United Nations and the British Chamber of Commerce in China, in recognition of our consistent efforts in reducing poverty for Ji’an since 2017 and other sustainable development campaigns.
ESG and Social Innovation Programs
and Initiatives
"Social Innovation and Business for Good" Practice-Based Course
CKGSB rolled out an innovative, one-year practice-based course on “Social Innovation and Business for Good” in the EMBA program in 2021. Led by Professor of Marketing Zhu Rui, the course requires EMBA students to incorporate ESG practices and sustainable business mechanisms in their companies.
Based on the idea of “Challenge Based Learning” (CBL), this course allows students to pinpoint real societal problems, explore solutions under the guidance of mentors and professors, reform a core part of their business to be socially responsible and turn that into a sustainable project in the businesses they lead.
The key purpose of this course is to move from solely teaching theory to pushing students one step further to practice business for good by taking action, and really making a difference in their organizations.
Zhu Rui
Professor of Marketing and Director of the Social Innovation and Business for Good Center, CKGSB
A Three-project Campaign to Alleviate Poverty in Ji’an
To enhance public welfare and give back to society, CKGSB initiated a three-project campaign in 2017 to alleviate poverty in Ji’an, an impoverished district in Jiangxi province, China. CKGSB used its core business – education and business management – in creative, socially innovative ways to improve access to basic services of the community, reduce the impact of disasters and raise the living standard in Ji’an.
By working with the government, industries, enterprises and the school’s alumni ecosystem, CKGSB fueled and empowered 150 local start-ups, educated farmers on how to market and sell their Gougu tea products on e-commerce platforms, and provided scholarships of RMB 20,000 per student to learn the trade of the tea industry. After years of cooperation and joint poverty alleviation efforts across sectors, all five counties in Ji’an were lifted out of poverty in 2019, benefiting over 347,000 people.
Promoting Economic Growth through the Sale of Goji Berries
During a trip to Gansu province, China, in 2015 for the Gobi Desert Challenge, a group of CKGSB professors, alumni, students and staff realized that the impoverished local farmers were not making full use of a great local resource, the Goji berry.
CKGSB professors and students organized their resources to voluntarily help the villagers sell Goji berries using innovative business strategies to design, market and distribute their product, raising the entire community’s annual income by 35% and expediting the progress of poverty alleviation in the region.
Narrowing China’s Higher Educational Gap through MBA Training
CKGSB has been growing with and witnessing the rapid development of management education in China. However, we have also noticed areas in need of improvement, especially in western China, where educational institutions lack financing, talent and other resources.
To help bridge the gap in higher education, since 2007, CKGSB has been working with the China National MBA Education Supervisory Committee to provide annual training for more than 400 MBA professors from over 50 universities across 20 less developed provinces in China.
CKGSB Annual Philanthropy Awards
CKGSB launched the CKGSB Philanthropy Awards in 2014 to advance the culture of philanthropy within the school. By 2021, the Philanthropy Awards had received 960 applications for charitable projects from students and alumni of various programs, including EMBA, MBA, Business Scholars Program and Executive Education. To date, 1,427,188 online votes have been cast for philanthropic projects and leaders of the year.
Social Innovation @CKGSB in Numbers
1427188
Online votes received for the CKGSB Philanthropy Awards since 2014
260000
Students helped by CKGSB’s Red Scarf Children’s Library Project
¥1,3 billion
In cash and supplies were donated by CKGSB alumni and their companies for Henan's flood relief and recovery efforts in 2021
745
Libraries constructed by CKGSB in China’s most impoverished regions
165000
Hours of philanthropic service contributed by CKGSB students until 2021
7%
Of China’s total donations for 2008 Sichuan earthquake relief were from CKGSB alumni and their companies
¥4 billion
In financial and equipment donations were made by CKGSB alumni and their companies towards COVID-19 alleviation efforts in 2021