Article

UNU-MERIT’s CDO Programmes Contribute to SBE’s Financial Times Executive Education Ranking

A successful collaboration between UNU-MERIT and the Maastricht University School of Business and Economics (SBE).

Our Capacity Development Programmes have helped the Maastricht University School of Business and Economics (SBE) rank among the global top 80 business schools for open-enrolment executive education.

Last week, SBE announced that its open executive programmes had been included in the global top 80 by the Financial Times in their Open-enrolment Executive Education Ranking 2025. For this ranking, SBE’s executive branches – Maastricht School of Management (MSM), UMIO and UNU-MERIT – were assessed based on criteria such as course design, faculty, participant diversity, and overall satisfaction.

Capacity development is essential. Developments in the field of digitalization and AI go fast and the global political landscape changes continuously. Policy makers and working professionals need to continuously be trained in order to gain new skills and update their knowledge allowing to design, implement and evaluate policy that enhances development and supports achieving the SDGs. We are happy to service an increasingly diverse group of policy makers in global south and north and train them on the thematic topics including development, public policy and innovation, both online and on-site | Dr. Mindel van de Laar, Head of CDO, UNU-MERIT

UNU-MERIT’s CDO provides career-enhancing training for policymakers and practitioners; our programmes are designed to help participants influence and implement policy related to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more about our capacity development offerings here.

SBE’s original news item can be found here on their website, published on 5 June 2025.

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