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Michael Unger, Ph.D., an executive in residence and associate professor of international business at Loyola College in Maryland, will travel to Kigali, Rwanda at the end of May to plan a three day workshop on the Microeconomics of Competitiveness. He will teach this workshop for the second time in the fall. The workshop is based on a course developed by famed Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter, Ph.D. Through Unger, Loyola is one of six schools in the country and 84 in the world authorized to present Porter’s course. Last taught by Unger in Rwanda in October 2008, the workshop was designed to implement strategies developed by the President of Rwanda, Paul Kigami, and Porter, who advises Kigami on a regular basis. Their goal is to enhance Rwanda’s competitiveness in the east African and global economy. The workshop is sponsored by the Rwandan Private Sector Federation, created to foster growth of Rwandan companies and business chambers through training and research on product development, marketing and trade promotion, and the Rwandan Investment Climate Project, an initiative funded by the Rwandan government and Investment Climate Facility for Africa to improve the business environment in Rwanda. Rwanda’s name still conjures up the images associated with the popular movie “Hotel Rwanda”—which recounted the genocide and poverty that plagued the country in the early-to-mid 1990s. Today, however, Rwanda is one of the safest and fastest growing countries in Africa. The Rwandan government has established international partnerships with companies like Costco and Starbucks. Its leaders have created ambitious growth goals to quadruple per capita income and become the African center for technology by 2020. “The challenge the country faces now is to maintain their strong economic growth by learning to compete at the level of the firm and globally,” said Unger. “Most economic development research looks only at what governments do, but that’s not sufficient. Governments create an enabling environment, firms create wealth.” Unger teaches international business at the graduate and executive levels at Loyola College in Maryland’s Sellinger School of Business and Management. He has more than 25 years of professional experience working in over 35 developing countries in the areas of international trade, finance, investment and competitiveness. Most recently, his work has been focused on the regionalization efforts of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania – helping to merge their stock markets to bolster trade and create more wealth in East Africa. In addition, he is a senior institute associate at Harvard Business School’s Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness and a visiting professor and senior fellow at Strathmore Business School’s Institute of Strategy and Competitiveness in Nairobi, Kenya. The art of reflection is a critical component of Loyola’s graduate business programs. Loyola emphasizes the importance of a global perspective in order to develop as a reflective leader and Unger’s outreach in Rwanda and broader east Africa is directly related to fulfilling Loyola’s mission. “My goal is to teach students how to apply their course work to their own profession and to think globally," he says. “What better way to develop this skill than to have hands-on experience in the economic and global growth of a country like Rwanda?”
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