Following the Conference ReImaginar Portugal, which happened last Monday, Maria José Amich, The Lisbon MBA Executive Director, shared her vision for the future of Portugal and the role of higher education in shaping it.

 

With this ambition for the future, we should seize the opportunity to “reimagine” Portugal – move towards rebuilding the country, accelerating the fight against climate change, the digital transition, the strategic autonomy of our economy, the optimization of our resources, fighting inequality for inclusive, fair and sustainable development.

 

These are changing times and an opportunity to redesign the country. Society as we know it will not exist after this crisis. In a 1959 speech, John F. Kennedy said the well-known phrase: “Crisis in Chinese consists of two characters, one represents danger, the other one opportunity.” JFK’s words are still relevant today.

 

Change represents the opportunity for a new beginning – this is where we must bet. We want a new cycle for the country, reflecting on the right vision and our strategic options. We shall reflect deeply on the ways Portugal functions as a whole, aiming at the structural reforms of our economic recovery.

 

The breakdown we are witnessing will be global, with lasting consequences for society and future generations. To these, we owe our commitment, which should be based on collaborative work between the Government, Companies, and the Academy to be able to outline a non-partisan vision, based on a strategy for a sustainable country, with clear and measurable objectives.

 

But as the Japanese proverb says, “vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare”. The execution of the strategy that will be defined is crucial. In the extremely volatile and uncertain times that we are currently living, we must have the capacity to act with agility, revisiting and adapting the action plans without losing the direction and the long-term vision.

 

With this ambition for the future, we should seize the opportunity to “reimagine” Portugal – move towards rebuilding the country, accelerating the fight against climate change, the digital transition, the strategic autonomy of our economy, the optimization of our resources, fighting inequality for inclusive, fair and sustainable development.

 

The pandemic brought us a growing spread of the technology – our society was able to make a quick adaptation switching to remote and staying open to the challenges demanded by the education and business sectors. We kept safely wired, showing everyone that the digital acceleration is key in the future sectors, in which we want to have a leadership position. We will have to make smart choices, eventually cutting support to sectors that have no future, or to those where scale and size are crucial, strongly betting on developing the differentiation factors that give uniqueness to our proposals, so that we can be the “best in the world” in most of what we do. Yes! “The best in the world”, this must be our drive for the country´s new development phase.

 

We must reinforce our foundations and broadcast the perception of a country that incentivizes and supports innovation and entrepreneurship, to have a more efficient public sector that applies justice faster and correctly, in convergence with a more capitalized and dynamic private sector.

 

Education and digitalization must be priorities. We must take our universities, technical schools and management schools to a world top level, ensure that our human resources have an unparalleled foreign languages proficiency, we must also ensure that our country stays safe and stable, so that we can relaunch local investment and attract foreign investors to boost our strategic projects that are the pillars for our long term development.

 

While “reimagining” Portugal involves rethinking the education system, higher education can and must strengthen its connection to the business world. We must include the development of digital skills, invest heavily in education models based on action learning and support the need for lifelong learning, working in partnership with organizations, to prepare future leaders who will lead organizations, which in turn will increase the country’s competitive advantage to embrace opportunities on a global scale.

 

Now, more than ever, Portugal needs to have more agile organizations, companies, and Government, placing people at the center, and leaders who stand out for their strategic vision and ability to execute, as well as for their interpersonal skills and values such as ethics, authenticity, empathy and resilience. Leaders capable of creating safe and reliable environments that promote a culture of excellence based on meritocracy and foster creativity and innovation to find the path to the next normality.

 

In conclusion, let us focus on our purpose, the requalification of our human resources and the environment. Let us learn to prioritize and protect public health, social well-being, energy transition and financial viability. Together, these forces must be the engine for the desired reconstruction of our society.

 

 

Read here the full article from Maria José Amich, The Lisbon MBA Executive Director, in the Expresso newspaper, in Portuguese.

Source: Expresso

 

 

“ReImaginar Portugal” was created by The Lisbon MBA Alumni Club to promote, on a single platform, a public debate about the long-term sustainable recovery and growth of Portugal.

 

The Lisbon MBA Alumni Club invited 30 leaders, decision makers and thinkers from The Lisbon MBA community, to contribute with their vision and strategic options. The outcome of these important insights was gathered in a document that was presented and discussed at this Conference. The document with all the contributions can be downloaded here.

 

You can watch the full conference in Portuguese here.