Sustainable Futures Challenge builds a new generation of global leaders

As organisations, their supply chains and their markets increasingly cross borders, accountants capable of defining and solving multifaceted, global challenges will be valued most highly.

And yet, says Professor Nick McGuigan, an educator and innovator in the Department of Accounting at Monash University, current accounting education programs don’t focus on accounting in a complex environment.

“I’m big on the future of accounting as a profession, and the fact that we have to be able to deal with these complex, global problems,” McGuigan says.

“But a lot of accounting education programs are not built around complexity or sustainability. That’s a problem, because from now on we will always be working with strong levels of complexity, ambiguity and uncertainty – all of the things that an accountant is averse to.”

To begin preparing young minds for a future of global business complexity, McGuigan has helped nurture a partnership between Monash University, the IPA, the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP, one of five regional commissions of the United Nations) and research firm Incept Labs.

From that partnership, an annual, 10-day intensive educational unit, known as the Sustainable Futures Challenge, has been developed.

“ESCAP provides a real-world problem they’re looking to solve, and the students have the period of the program to design a solution, which they then pitch to ESCAP,” McGuigan says.

Each year’s program carries a theme related to the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

The challenge for 2023

Running from late November to early December, the 2023 Sustainable Futures Challenge will be themed around disaster recovery and disaster planning. Last year’s program was based on energy transition in the Asia Pacific region.

“Parts of the Pacific region that are less developed will benefit from the transition of energy,” says Professor Philomena Leung, Group Director of Education at the Institute of Public Accountants. “But it’s easier said than done.”

“For last year’s program, the students had to interview people from the UN, as well as other experts and stakeholders in particular fields, before coming up with specific solutions. On the final day, the students presented their solutions.”

The program sits outside particular educational disciplines, meaning that within each multi-disciplinary project group, accounting students work alongside students from astrophysics, environmental science, chemistry, international business, engineering, marketing and communications, and other majors and minors.

“It tests the students’ management skills, research skills, communication skills and problem-solving skills,” Leung says. “And for the UN’s ESCAP, this is the first time they have involved an Australian university to help solve SDG challenges in the Asia Pacific region. We are currently looking into a longer-term partnership as a great initiative to heighten the awareness of the SDG amongst students.”

How leadership skills are developed in a complex environment

McGuigan notes that when students are tossed in the deep end and asked to help solve highly complex issues in countries and cultures that are not their own, they develop new and valuable skills.

“Students don’t just get to interview technical expertise from the UN, and they don’t just solve a complex problem,” he says.

“They are building future trend analysis capabilities, and deep research and investigation skills. They have to look at problems from different perspectives, using their specific degree knowledge, and bring those together in an integrated way.”

Perhaps most importantly, McGuigan says, the students have the opportunity to work closely with a vital branch of the UN, an organisation that is about as complex as it gets.

“So, the students walk away from the program with a much greater appreciation of complex problem solving, but also with an excellent appreciation of complex organisations and deeper insights into politically how they work,” he says.

“That’s exactly the type of business acumen they’ll need to navigate future business environments.”