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Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL)

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Applications for the 2021 part-time Master’s and Postgraduate Certificate are now open. 


Leaders today are making decisions in a world which is more volatile, complex and uncertain than ever before. Many organisations are recognising the need to better understand this changing context and equip themselves to lead positive change.

At the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, we focus on building the capacity to effectively tackle the world’s most critical social and environmental challenges. Our part-time graduate programmes are based on a blended approach of short residential workshops and virtual learning. 


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Part-time Postgraduate and Master’s courses in sustainable business


Mst in Sustainability Leadership

Master of Studies in Sustainability Leadership

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Develop leadership capacity to tackle critical sustainability challenges, with practical assignments and a research dissertation


Date

Full Master’s degree, part time over 2 years

Postgraduate Diploma in Sustainable Business

Postgraduate Diploma in Sustainable Business

LocationExplore emerging and cutting-edge responses to topical sustainability challenges and opportunities, with practical assignments.


Date

Equivalent to 2/3 of a Master’s, part time over 1.5 to 3 years

Postgraduate Certificates in Sustainable Business

Postgraduate Certificate in Sustainable Business – organisational/value chains  

LocationExplore embedding sustainability within organisations, or across value chains, with practical assignments and a group project.


DateEquivalent to 1/3 of a Master’s degree, part time over 9 months

 

Find out more

 

Unrivalled credibility


The Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) is a globally influential institute based at the University of Cambridge, with HRH The Prince of Wales as Royal Founding Patron. With more than 30 years’ experience of developing interdisciplinary leadership for a sustainable economy across multinationals, governments and individuals around the world, CISL’s delivery of these part-time courses provides unrivalled sustainability credibility.

 

Learn to lead transformational change


Study a part-time Master’s-level course to strengthen your leadership skills and embed sustainability in your organisation. These are some of our graduate students leading transformational change:

"I highly recommend the Master’s to any sustainability practitioners looking to be inspired, learn at the heart of where the action is and benefit personally as well as professionally from the experience - at a time when the sector is gaining increasing momentum."

Katerina Fragos, Manager of Sustainability and Climate Change at Procter & Gamble, Canada

 

"Within my cohort, we had participants from a range of sectors and countries. Having mainly worked in retail and fast-moving consumer companies, I relished sharing professional war stories with peers from automotives, chemicals, pharmaceuticals and finance, and from both in-house practitioner, consultancy, and civil service roles."

Helen McTaggart, Senior Sustainability Manager, Amazon

 

"Professionally, the courses definitely gave me the credibility and skills to communicate and be a leader on sustainability issues within my working environment. I also felt I had earned the right to talk about them. On a personal level, I became more reflective and considered in the way I approached issues."

Andrew Phillips MA FCA, Rural Director of Finance for the Duchy of Cornwall

 

"The course equipped me with the knowledge to move to the next level of my career. I had developed the expertise and confidence to use sustainability frameworks and models so fund managers could use that knowledge to ‘do well by doing good."

Elena Vydrine, Head of Portfolio Management and Environmental Social Governance (ESG) Integration at Ryedale

 

"The individual assignments set throughout the course gave me the opportunity to reflect on the topics that we had learnt and how these could be applied to real world examples. They answered questions that I had asked throughout my career."

Galina Parmenter, PG Diploma student, Project Manager, Global Sustainability, C&A

 

Read about our graduate students leading transformational change


Postgraduate training in sustainability: a unique opportunity for working professionals

21 March 2016

Dr Kayla Friedman, Programme Manager at the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, describes the benefits of the range of accredited postgraduate courses on offer in sustainable business and sustainable value chains.

How Jaguar Land Rover ditched traditional supply chain thinking to create a closed loop value chain

3 March 2016

As part of our Postgraduate Certificate in Sustainable Value Chains, Paul Cassell, Vehicle Engineering, Jaguar Land Rover, evaluated the REALCAR project: a closed-loop value chain collaboration between Jaguar Land Rover, Novelis, Innovate UK and other partners, with the aim of introducing more closed-loop aluminium into Jaguar Land Rover cars.

The power of storytelling for business engagement on sustainability

20 January 2016

Former SustainAbility Director Zoë Arden was a Master’s student at the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership from 2012–2014. In this blog, she explains how the Master’s programme helped her embrace her communications credentials and appreciate the power of storytelling.

Leveraging the Master’s experience and the Cambridge network in the academic world

5 January 2016

David Disi was a Master’s student at the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership from 2012–2014. In this blog, he reflects on his experience in Cambridge and how learning about sustainability influenced his career path. David is currently an executive doctoral student at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education.

Creating value from uncertainty

17 August 2015

18 August 2015 – Simon Davis, Agriculture and Sustainability Development Manager, NSF International, attended our inaugural Sustainability Leadership Lab, which focused on how organisations can innovate their business model in order to generate and deliver opportunities for sustainable value creation. The intensive two-day Labs are designed to be truly beneficial to the organisations represented, with participants able to put forward case studies which are then focused on during the Lab.

About

Strengthen your leadership skills, further your career and learn how to implement change and embed sustainability in your organisation.
Study a part-time Postgraduate or Master’s course through online learning and residential workshops.

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CISL is monitoring the Covid-19 situation and responding accordingly to UK Government and WHO advice. At present, we expect to deliver our Graduate programmes in 2021 as advertised. We are well equipped to deliver workshops remotely should the situation demand.


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Minette Belingham

“CISL helped me recognise that within the sustainability space I can have an impact within my sphere of influence.”

Minette Bellingan, Director of Global Sourcing, Amazon

Recent organisations represented

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