Nayaran Pant,
Dean
Executive Education, INSEAD

Looking back at his childhood and work life, moving seems to have been a permanent fixture until Nayaran Pant came to Singapore. As a child, he moved from India to Switzerland, then from India to Kenya and back to India again in a short span of six years. After high school, over the next nine years, he moved through six cities. Nayaran admits that he used to love moving … but with a spouse, two children and a dog in the equation now, leaving Singapore is the last thing on his mind.

When the academic first came to Singapore in 1994, he did not know very much about the National University of Singapore (NUS). Then, a friend from NUS introduced him to the head of its business policy department which led to an offer from the university. There, he discovered what was then one of the best kept secrets among global business schools. “I said it then, and I will say it again,” states Nayaran. “I met colleagues who were writing in excellent publications. They were having a global impact on their fields and all the while flying so low under the radar that few, if any, in the West had heard of them. Of course, all that has changed now.” He also found great colleagues who helped him adapt to the environment in Singapore.

Five years later, he joined a strategy consulting firm in Singapore to get a corporate perspective. After gaining insights into the world of business practice, he was ready to return to the world business education, which meant possibly returning to North America.

However, he was not thrilled at the thought of leaving Singapore. The family had gotten used to visiting grandparents in India once or twice a year. Another reason was the children’s school, which is one of the established colleges in the United World College system. “Quite apart from the curriculum – which is incredibly well rounded – the sheer diversity of the student and teacher pool makes it quite simply one of the best educational experiences in the world,” Nayaran says.

Luckily for him, INSEAD set up its first Asian campus in Singapore in the year 2000 and he was able to get a position in the renowned business school.

Today, as then, he says, “Ask me to move now and I would be reluctant. My children have lived in Singapore all their lives. To see their obvious relief at disembarking at Changi Airport at the end of a vacation, brings a smile to my face and simultaneously fills me with dread. They have no idea how good they have it.”