Blog: Monday, 15 December 2025
What does it take to develop leaders who challenge existing systems rather than reinforce them? That’s the question behind Aleksandra Wróbel’s PhD dissertation Leadershift: educating rebels with a cause, which she successfully defended on 11 December 2025 at Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University (RSM). Aleksandra is an executive coach and a Part-time PhD candidate at RSM. Her research shows how MBA candidates’ motivations to address major societal challenges develop, and how MBA programmes can support them. By giving students space to explore their values, work in diverse teams and tackle real societal problems, these programmes build responsibility and agency. They help students become ‘rebels with a cause’: leaders who push systems forward.
When Aleksandra Wróbel examined the life stories of social entrepreneurs to see how their motivation takes shape, she asked herself if business schools could recreate those experiences. She examined several impact-focused MBA programmes around the world, and one pattern stood out: they all create deliberate space for students to understand themselves before teaching them how to lead others. “Education can also be a place where you explore oneself,” she says. In the programmes she studied, students spend time on structured reflection, coaching conversations and exposure to diverse perspectives.
This developmental approach aligns with what Wróbel calls rebels with a cause: leaders who challenge existing systems and choose careers dedicated to addressing social issues. “Rebels with a cause are individuals who redefine what success means in life,” she explains. “They look beyond a capitalistic society driven by goals of maximization of wealth and status, and they’re prepared to challenge existing ways and take things somewhere else.”
These leaders often act out of responsibility to their motivation to improve the state of the world rather than personal gain. “Many of them told me that they couldn’t ignore this,” she says. “They felt a responsibility to the idea they cared about.” Her interest in this mindset emerged from her years in corporate finance and investment. She moved through start-ups and private equity negotiations, where she saw how strongly financial gain dominated decision-making. “It was all about money,” she recalls. “Coffins don’t have pockets. We cannot only be about money.”
Even mission-driven founders were often pulled into the priorities of venture capital and rapid growth, she noticed. “Even founders who care about their mission get pulled into this machine of venture capital,” Wróbel says. “I thought there must be something more.” That question led her to interview entrepreneurs who had chosen purpose over prestige. One graduate rejected a consulting job to work for a community she saw as being ‘undervalued in society’. Another founded an organisation supporting mothers at risk of abandoning their newborn babies. When warned that her work could lead to legal consequences for her and her board, she said she didn’t care. ‘First you have to live to know who your parents are’, said this entrepreneur.
What struck Wróbel most was their modesty. “They didn’t see themselves as better than anybody else,” she says. “Many said ‘anybody in my place would have done the same’.” Their stories raised a central question in her research: if people develop such purpose through life experience, could education help spark similar motivations?
Wróbel’s analysis suggests it is possible, but only when leadership education is designed for identity development as well as knowledge acquisition. In the programmes she studied, development starts with the individual. Students receive dedicated time for exploration of their personal values and motivations and engage in a variety of exercises to support this, such as lifeline mapping, reflective assignments on their own beliefs and biases and exercises like the ‘hot seat’ when they listen to feedback without responding. “You first achieve that people are at ease with their own values and feel: I am enough,” she explains.
Once this foundation is laid, students move into social learning. They work in diverse teams, volunteer in communities, participate in international immersion weeks and practise peer coaching. These experiences broaden their sense of responsibility. “Everybody comes from different cultures and backgrounds,” Wróbel notes. “Talking about values in such a group can be eye-opening.”
Only then do programmes zoom out to societal challenges. Students learn to formulate social problems, explore root causes and imagine alternative futures. This prepares them for building self-efficacy. By taking leadership roles in student organisations, real-world project teams or entrepreneurial ventures supported by mentors, they begin to experience that they can create change. “People need to believe: I can actually change something,” Wróbel emphasises.
Finally, programmes support students in taking action through networks of socially impactful professionals, taking time to work on initiatives and, in some cases, seed funding. Crucially, Wróbel stresses that these elements only work when they’re part of a coherent whole. “None of these interventions by itself is likely to work,” she says. The cycle of this learning needs to be reinforced. “You do things that help people find themselves, then their place in a group, then in the world and then you go again. Ultimately, they are ready – or actually can’t wait – to take action.”
Meet the student where they are at. Give students regular guided reflection moments to clarify their values and motivations.
Use peer-to-peer coaching to strengthen listening skills, self-awareness and a sense of personal purpose.
Integrate personal development into courses through building ‘hidden’ ethical leadership problems into case studies and holding structured debates on the outcomes.
Integrate ethical and global challenges into all subjects, instead of limiting them to a few optional electives.
Give students leadership roles and projects so they experience they can create meaningful change. Encourage collaborative projects between different types of programmes.
Aleksandra Wróbel’s PhD dissertation is archived here: Leadershift: educating rebels with a cause. Identity development for purpose-driven leadership in business education
Read more about MBA programmes at RSM: www.rsm.nl/education/mba/
Science Communication and Media Officer
Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University (RSM) is one of Europe’s top-ranked business schools. RSM provides ground-breaking research and education furthering excellence in all aspects of management and is based in the international port city of Rotterdam – a vital nexus of business, logistics and trade. RSM’s primary focus is on developing business leaders with international careers who can become a force for positive change by carrying their innovative mindset into a sustainable future. Our first-class range of bachelor, master, MBA, PhD and executive programmes encourage them to become to become critical, creative, caring and collaborative thinkers and doers.
