Imperial’s New Executive Education Programme Combines AI, Sustainability, Ethics And Action To Create The Transformational Leaders Of The Future

Imperial has launched a new programme designed to enhance business leaders’ practical, intellectual, and emotional competencies, equipping them to tackle the challenges of AI, digital transformation, and climate change more effectively.

Responsible Leadership in a Complex World empowers leaders to tackle the challenges presented by contemporary and future industry issues. By cultivating crucial skills, leaders can effectively navigate complexity, make well-informed decisions, and generate enduring impact within their organisations and wider society.

The programme’s foundation is shaped by Imperial’s Centre for Responsible Leadership — a hub for cutting-edge research and globally inclusive leadership development. The Centre incorporates the means for deep, sustainable transformation across industry and society.

Kate Coombs, Managing Director for the Centre for Responsible Leadership and Programme Director says;

“Leaders, and in particular mid-level leaders are being increasingly challenged by dilemmas and decisions that are driven by a new and complex range of stimuli. To be successful they need not only solid leadership capabilities, but also the understanding of the drivers of this new complexity and how they are converging. As a STEMB university, no other institution can offer the research based yet practical insight required to build a learning experience that will enable participants to outperform their peers.

“At the heart of the Centre’s mission is the belief that responsible leadership goes beyond superficial compliance and trend-driven theories—it demands deep, organic transformation grounded in diverse cultural and organisational perspectives,” says Coombs. “By leveraging the Centre’s intellect, alongside Imperial’s well-established strengths in technology, innovation, and science, Responsible Leadership in a Complex World offers an invaluable synthesis of cutting-edge, thoughtful insight and practical application.”

Taking place over five days, the programme will blend in-person classes with a tailored pre and post-programme analysis session conducted online. Participants will have the opportunity to build enduring networks with fellow participants, engage with additional learning resources, and gain a better sense of their needs via a psychometric tool.

Learning will be led by Imperial’s faculty, as well as leading practitioners in AI, sustainability and emotional intelligence, allowing learners to understand the real-life application of the curriculum. Education takes a tailored approach, requiring participants to complete pre-work assessments and surveys in order to create development opportunities tailored to learners’ individual needs.

As well as practical skills and greater industry and societal awareness, the programme will seek to build emotional intelligence and self-awareness in participants to better understand how their actions play a pivotal role in addressing and overcoming global challenges. Participants will benefit from enhancing their capability to navigate moral and ethical decision-making and develop actionable strategies for positive change.