B (2:29)

I think it of course, enhances your creativity.

A (2:32)

And why is that?

B (2:33)

Because creativity is basically all about combining things that are usually well known, but in new ways. So if you sort of open the freeways that you have in your brain and in your connections to others.

A (2:50)

It'S.

B (2:51)

More probable that you come up with new things. It's sort of if you just walk on the track that you've always been walking on, you won't come up with new ideas. But if you are exposed to and sort of urged to see the world in new ways, it creates something new.

A (3:08)

In German or in German language, you split between ausbildung and bildung. I'm not sure we have a good word for it in the Scandinavian language.

B (3:18)

Yeah, we do actually. In Scandinavian we do, we have. And bildning, but English does not have it.

A (3:23)

Right. And you basically educate the leaders of tomorrow. Why is it important for future leaders to have bildung?

B (3:31)

Bildung is that which is left after you've forgotten what you've learned. So that means that what you've forgotten what you've learned. I mean, we all do that. We forget lots of things, right? What years, things happened, et cetera. But what's left is an approach to the world and a stance to the world and a way that you approach it. So it's sort of a position more than a goal.

A (3:56)

And the stuff that you are doing, how does that make bildung better?

B (4:01)

Well, it does, because what we do is to try to. We have an educational mission that we abbreviate as free F R, E E. And the F stands for fact and science based approach. Completely key in this world, right? Especially in the age of generative AI, when truths are not what they used to be because they can now be fabricated and you cannot believe your eyes or your ears anymore. So we're living in some kind of ontological crisis where you don't know that what you see actually exists. So practicing that your fact and science based mindset is key. And then the R stands for reflective and self aware. So sort of asking yourself, you know, where does this piece of data come from? Who benefits from this? And where do my attitudes, my opinions and even my feelings come from? Are they my own or are they produced by somebody else and then internalized by me? So I think they're my own important things to do, right? And then the first E stands for empathetic and culturally literate. And that's sort of why we use the arts in order to create this or enhance your empathy and your cultural literacy. And then the final E stands for entrepreneurial and responsible, which means that you actually do something. You have agency. So this abbreviation, free, that is our definition of, of Bildnung. So if you have that approach, if you go into the world being fact based, reflective Empathetic and entrepreneurial. It's sort of a vaccination to getting stuck in mental models and theories that used to be true but perhaps no longer are. So thereby it's sort of an approach to ensure some kind of lifelong learning. And that's exactly what you need in this world that's changing so quickly. And everything you thought was true just a week or two ago has proven not to be. So you have to be able to shift your mindset to not sort of get stuck in the models that you used to operate by.

A (6:02)

What do you think are the traits that you are seeing in great leaders? Do you spend time observing great leaders?

B (6:09)

Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. I mean, absolutely.

A (6:11)

And when you abstract it down, what do they have in common? Why are the best ones very good?

B (6:15)

I think it's. I mean, if you were really condensing it to a couple of terms, I would say authenticity. I mean, that you actually believe that what they're saying is what they think. And that's not the same thing as not lying nota bene, but actually being authentic in what you want to do. And that people feel that this is. That it matters to you, that you're not playing a game, that you're not sort of politically correct, whatever that means, but sort of that it's your true self speaking and being there. I think that's absolutely key. I also think, I mean, being able to create a sense of meaning, you know, to make people understand and feel that they're part of something that's greater than themselves.

A (7:03)

You wrote a book called and you there talk about the importance of hiring people who do not have a business background. And indeed, in my previous life I worked with historians and people who had studied theology and all these kind of things, and they were the best investors and the best financial brains I've seen. So should one actually study business?

B (7:29)

In the book I say that you should study business, but that's not enough. You have to sort of open your mind as well.

A (7:36)

Right.

B (7:36)

I mean, I love the business school that I'm heading, of course, and I think the subjects we need are extremely important because they are ways of understanding the world. But it's all about, again, really sort of expanding the blinders that we have. I mean, every type of education, it's specialized, right? So it's a bit like watching the sky through a straw. And you need to have many straws nowadays in order to understand the world that we're living in.

A (8:07)

How will AI change education already? How does it already change?

B (8:11)

It already has. I mean, in every way. But fundamentally, I mean, we know that cognitively the artificial intelligence actually outperforms us quite a bit. So it really changes. And all over the world, university or educators are now trying to understand and think hard about how do we actually secure learning? Can we do the same type of tests that we used to do? Can we do take home exams? Do we need to pull out the plug and not let them use their computers? Should we only do handwriting, should we only do oral exams, et cetera? But it's kind of futile, all this, because fundamentally generative AI and AI is here to stay. Our students don't even use Google anymore, right? They use generative AI. And I think it poses much more fundamental questions that are about knowledge in itself. So what is a university to do when it's got a student for three years or sometimes even five years? What should you learn? What's the purpose of it all and.

A (9:29)

What should you learn?

B (9:30)

I think fundamentally it's about the division of labor between machines and, and human beings, because machines are great at being machines. You know, we can't beat them in being machines, but they are not human. And they can't beat us in being human because they are. It's artificial intelligence, it's not human intelligence. So I think educational institutions should really help students to develop their human intelligence. And in that is of course included to understand how AI operates and be sort of able to interact with AI, but then also developing your human skills. So developing your empathy, developing your sense making, your understanding of the world, your contextualization capabilities, your language skills, all these things that AI is doing but not doing to the same extent. So it's basically trying to how do we become even better humans as the machines are becoming better at what they're doing?