After a six-year hiatus, the Graduate Business Conference (GBC) returned in 2025 at Ivey Business School, bringing together more than 60 student leaders and student leader alumni from 25 schools for three days of learning, collaboration, and camaraderie.
Titled Resilience: A Pillar for Tomorrow’s Leaders, the conference theme captured not only a foundational trait of modern leadership and business but also the driving force behind the event’s revival.
That force was Mohit Gupta, MBA ’25 candidate and President of the Ivey MBA Association (MBAA), who – alongside Phoebe Laughlin, an MBA student at NYU Stern – received the Graduate Business Forum’s prestigious Student Leadership Award for reviving the GBC. The award, which dates back to 1991, has a storied legacy: its first recipient was Ivey’s Scott Hellofs, MBA ’91, recognized for launching what is now the LEADER Project. Gupta’s win marks Ivey as one of only two schools to have three recipients of the Student Leadership Award, with previous recipients including Hellofs in 1991, and Prakash David and Mark Healy, both MBA ’05, in 2005.
L-r: Jim Deveau (GBF Board Founder), Ivey Dean Julian Birkinshaw, Mohit Gupta, MBA Faculty Director Martha Maznevski, and Wieteke Dupain (former CEO of the GBF Board)
Lessons in resilient leadership
Gupta decided to relaunch the GBC after hearing about it from his MBAA predecessor. He then assembled a conference executive team, developed a strategic proposal, and secured funding from Ivey’s Scotiabank Digital Banking Lab as well as external sponsors. Despite facing numerous hurdles, Gupta persevered. His perseverance prompted Birkinshaw to praise him at the opening gala for his determination. Ivey last hosted the GBC in 1995.
“Sometimes you have to be unreasonable to move mountains,” said Gupta, echoing Birkinshaw’s advice from his keynote presentation at the conference on resilience in business. “I believe what helps student body leaders is their resilience – staying strong and true to their values – and reviving this conference is a testament to resilience.”
Birkinshaw’s keynote, Future-Proofing Business: The Resilience Imperative, launched the conference and explored how resilience often outweighs agility during volatile times. Drawing on business history and real-time data, he showed how resilient organizations – not necessarily the most innovative – are those that survive and thrive by doubling down on their core strengths. He concluded with a powerful call for individuals to embrace a mindset of adaptive unreasonableness.
“In many business cases, it’s down to an individual – that one person who has the unreasonableness to believe they’re onto something … Progress depends on the unreasonable person,” he said. “We all have agency. We all have the capacity to do something interesting and to be a little bit unreasonable … This entrepreneurial view, ultimately, is the thing that lies at the heart of making any organization more adaptive and resilient in a changing world.”
Ivey Dean Julian Birkinshaw gave the keynote address
Learning through experience
Throughout the conference, attendees explored the theme of resilience through immersive simulations, case studies, and candid conversations. Highlights included an Arctic survival simulation focused on team dynamics, a keynote on personal reinvention from 3M Canada’s Managing Director, and a case-based workshop featuring a surprise appearance by the case protagonist – showcasing Ivey’s distinctive approach to connecting theory with real-world leadership.
A highlight of the event was a prerecorded address by Lois Mitchell, former Lieutenant Governor of Alberta, who pledged to bring three GBC student leaders – including Gupta – to her upcoming Global Business Forum in Banff, Alberta, alongside seasoned executives.
Future momentum
Gupta said one important takeaway from the event was the power of relationships. He observed how attendees shared practical tools, forged lifelong friendships, and gained deeper insight into the shared challenges they face. The experience also reinforced a key personal lesson: to embrace challenges.
“It motivates me to always take on a challenge because you have nothing to lose; instead, you gain from going through these experiences,” he said. “If you believe in yourself, you’ll find a way to overcome every obstacle in life – that was my personal learning.”
Beyond its immediate success, the conference sowed the seeds for future growth. Gupta said two schools – Carnegie Mellon and William & Mary – have already expressed interest in hosting future editions of the GBC.
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