Founding fathers of Cranfield had a vision

Around 1946 a group, here with Lord Kings Norton, considered the need for an institution that provided leaders for industry. We need to remember that around then - a lot of people were being lost in second world war.

Well, ever since then Cranfield has pretty much been doing what it set out to do. We can see a great number of leaders in industry that have been to Cranfield, either in one of the thematic areas of Technology, Aerospace, Environment, Energy and of course Management.

Cranfield has also gained a lot of ground in providing leaders for early stage and growth businesses. Among the alumni are founders of Hotel Choclat, Moonpig, Go-Ape, Cobra Beer, Coolmilk, RinGo to name just a handful.  These are examples of companies with strong leadership whose mojo, skills and networks grew as a result of the MBA and/or participation on the Business Growth Programme. https://www.cranfield.ac.uk/som/open-executive-programmes/growing-businesses/business-growth-programme

We celebrate them! And we carry on to bring a distillation of lessons/ideas and for this year stimulate debate around the idea of growth to supergrowth at our Venture Day conference on 22nd September.

For those of us who want to see a growing, thriving sustainable economy this is a wonderful day to recharge batteries and meet some new people and reconnect with old friends.