Written by Rasmus Møller Sørensen, WELL

There were dark rings under the eyes of the contestants at last Friday's WELLcontest final. This was the end of a number of intense days for the seven competing teams of students from business schools in the Nordic countries. In week 17, they have all been working non-stop at CBS to solve a case based on Shell's CSR initiative Intilaaqah (“rapid take-off) in the sultanate of Oman.

Only three teams made it to the final
The contestants from Jönköping International Business School, Helsinki School of Economics and CBS were singled-out for the final. In front of the audience and the jury, they presented their recommendations on how Shell in Oman in the future should work with the Intilaaqah programme, a CSR-initiative targeting young, unemployed Omanis to encourage self-employment.

The jury was, among others, composed of the director of the Intilaaqah programme, Mohammad Al Balushi from Shell in Oman, associate professor dr. Kai Hockerts from the CBS Centre for Corporate Values and Responsibility, and Sten A. Christensen, Vice President of Environmental Protection, Danisco. They had a hard time picking the winner.

CBS came first
Finally, the choice fell on Ellora Faraq, Kim Yong Ng Chris and Erik Vindahl Andersen representing CBS. The three students had managed to come up with a general view of all the financial, ethical and social interests and considerations facing Shell in Oman and convincingly presented their suggestion for the future strategy of the Intilaaqah programme. The Swedish team came in second while the Finnish contestants took third place.

Nordic students going forward with CSR
WELL hopes that this event will be the first successfully accomplished step towards establishing a Nordic platform for students where knowledge about CSR is explored, created and exchanged. The next step will be a wide-ranging survey of Nordic students interest in - and knowledge about - CSR. The survey will be carried out during 2006/2007.

Read more about WELLcontest.