Representing Nyenrode at the annual University Battle #Lifeasanyenrodian

Last May, a group of Full-time MSc in Management students represented Nyenrode Business Universiteit in the annual Universiteitsstrijd (University Battle) Dorus Manders, Janneke Klip, Hans Hilberdink and Maxim Mommers share their experience.

'In this competition, 14 universities from all over the Netherlands spend the day solving a particular case for partner companies. This year, we had the honor of representing Nyenrode Business Universiteit.

The day started early at the Royal Tropical Institute in Amsterdam, hosted by the University Battle organization in cooperation with partners such as Achmea and Makro.

Caring for the well-being of employees

The program kicked off with the case introduction: business organizations nowadays feel the pressure to improve their employees’ health, both physically and mentally. In short, our task for the day was to come up with an extensively elaborated plan on how to improve mental and physical health within organizations.

This plan had to include a business model, projected financial statements and a detailed canvas model. As the final step, we had to
pitch our product at the end of the day.

The strength of diversity

With students from all Master tracks (Finance, Global Strategies and Digitization), our group was very diverse. This diversity was clearly an advantage for team Nyenrode.

In addition, our team members already had a great deal of experience with case-solving competitions (Nyenrode also took part in the HEC Business Game in Paris in April). Both these advantages gave us a head start and allowed us to come up with an idea quite quickly.

Developing a health assurance label

The idea in essence was to start a business that provided commercially-oriented quality assurance labels that focus on the legitimate efforts companies put into creating a healthy working environment and good conditions for their employees.

Before granting such a label, our consultants would analyze the particular organization according to a checklist and fill in the blanks together with the organization’s executives. In our view, this “health consultancy” should be carried out in cooperation with insurance companies that would be willing to offer a premium discount based on the health label granted to clients at the moment they meet the checklist’s criteria. Although the label would cost companies money, this would be earned back through such discounts.

Reaching the finals

Our reasoning that everyone would benefit from this type of initiative was recognized and acknowledged by the jury, which ultimately landed us in the finals! The last hurdle was a four-minute pitch. During this pitch we distinguished ourselves with a clear and sustainable business model and, of course, with a bit of the “Nyenrode touch”.

In the end, we finished second out of 14 universities in the competition!

This is a result we are proud of and once again serves as proof that studying at Nyenrode can be considered a reward for life.'