Excellence is one of NEOMA’s core values. But its definition can vary from country to country. We decided to take a “world tour” with our students and professors who have passed through prestigious universities and schools. First episode with Nishani Bourmault, teacher-researcher in the Hommes et Organisations department.

Dynamism and openness. Nishani Bourmault is an American professor who has frequented the major American universities and is now American professor at NEOMA. She first studied at Princeton, where she followed a liberal arts pathway, combining humanities with social and natural sciences. “Those first two years provide us with knowledge across all areas before we specialise,” she explains. She then studied mathematics and finance, becoming a trader in a New York investment bank. After a few years in that relentless environment, Nishani Bourmault returned to her studies at Harvard, where she obtained a doctorate. She is now a teaching and research fellow at NEOMA in the Department of People & Organisations. Having followed such a prestigious career trajectory, our American colleague brings with her a dynamic and open-minded vision of excellence. “It’s great to have a very strong knowledge base in a specific field, but it’s also important to recognise that you don’t know everything, and that there is a field of exploration still open to you, that you can go further, dig deeper, in short it’s important to know your own limitations.”

Discovering new truths. Our American researcher believes that excellence is also the ability to explain what you know, to present your ideas in a simple, concise way, to express yourself, to summarise. It’s also being able to change the minds of others by your powers of persuasion. “In the United States, good research leads to thinking up something new. You explore, you discover new truths, new knowledge, you follow your curiosity.” You also try to learn to think in a different way, or at least to understand opposing points of view. “In American universities, we like the students to follow different pathways, and to do lots of activities. The diversity of profiles allows us to stir up the way we look at subjects, and helps everyone get out of their narrow way of thinking.” That goes a lot further than just getting good marks.