GIA hosts global leadership programme with Harvard Business School

GIA and the Harvard Business School (HBS) organised a global leadership program, with the aim to address the unique challenges facing the gem and jewellery industry. It hosted 44 senior executives representing gem and jewelry firms from 15 countries, who examined the current issues of global businesses, how to apply the experiences of other sectors and industries to their own, and discussed industry challenges.

The programme took place between April 28 – May 1 at the Harvard campus in Cambridge, Mass. GIA initiated the program with HBS to converge global leaders of different sectors of the gem and jewellery industry to help further develop senior management expertise.

“Developing innovative programs like this to meet the needs of our global industry directly supports our public benefit mission of protecting the gem- and jewelry-buying public,” said Susan Jacques, president and CEO of GIA. The custom curriculum of the four day programme, based on the renowned HBS case study method, examined topics ranging from strategy to customer centricity to leading high performance teams.

Given the success of the inaugural program, GIA will hold another global leadership program at HBS in June 2015.