Nottingham MBA team wins PRME Innovation Challenge 2018-19

A team of three Nottingham MBA students are the winners of the 2018 - 2019 Principles for Responsible Management Education (PRME) Innovation Challenge.

This prestigious global competition gives students the opportunity to address an actual sustainable development challenge for a real company - the Manitou Group.

Students as innovators

PRME say that they are always looking for ways to engage students to connect with both the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and with companies actively seeking solutions to their challenges.

They believe that companies are slowly starting to see that students from PRME business schools are an important untapped resource when it comes to sustainability and more companies are looking to work with them to tap into the innovative ideas students offer.

Manitou is a world leader in the design, manufacture, distribution and servicing of all-terrain, material-handling equipment for construction, agriculture, mining and industrial applications. They are looking to become sustainability leaders with objectives that include having 100% of new projects include eco design criteria.

The Nottingham team - Mecia Petersen, Badr Elharradi, and Abu Nuruzzaman - presented their final recommendations at Manitou's corporate headquarters in West Bend, Wisconsin, USA on June 7 2019.

The Manitou challenge

The Nottingham team chose the 'Total Cost of Ownership' challenge of the two possible projects. Manitou asked the students to provide some insights and solutions into how to change their customers' mindset from the acquisition price to a full cost of services approach. 

Teams submitted their entries in October 2018. Two final teams were then chosen to work with Manitou on their projects between November and April and sent their final projects to the company in May 2019.

Mecia Petersen said:

Our solution was based on creating a circular economy to decrease environmental impacts while increasing social impacts and creating a shared value proposition which would become the centre of Manitou’s approach and integrated marketing campaign. The project was focused on Manitou North America, however our proposed solutions are now being implemented for Manitou global. We competed for the winning spot with a team from Macquarie Business School in Australia.

Manitou's focus on sustainability and the work of the winning Nottingham team were featured in an article in Forbes on June 28 2019.

PRME Champions

Nottingham University Business School was among the first UK business schools to champion the United Nations Principles of Responsible Management Education (UN PRME) initiative.

In January 2018, the School was awarded UN PRME Champion status for the third time.