Over the past two weeks, Alba Graduate Business School welcomed EMBA/MBA participants from Henley Business School Africa and Henley Business School UK to Athens to explore how AI could shape the future of two companies, MELISSA Kikizas and Thrace Group.
For business leaders, the challenge is no longer simply to experiment with AI, but to identify where it can contribute to business strategy and deliver lasting value.
Under the academic leadership of Professor Nikos Mylonopoulos, the program opened with a two-hour session on business transformation in the AI era, examining how AI is changing business practices and the challenges this presents for leaders. Each cohort then met with its client company to learn about its markets, operations, strategy, and use of technology, providing a real-world context for the week's work.
Through hands-on GenAI prompting workshops, participants used tools such as ChatGPT for research, data analysis, and business planning. The sessions focused on refining prompts and critically evaluating AI-generated outputs.
In a Science Fiction Prototyping workshop, participants imagined a future shaped by autonomous AI and worked backward to identify strategies their client companies could adopt today.
The program culminated in an AI Strategy Workshop, where participants took on the roles of competitors, customers, and AI to identify potential threats, opportunities, and applications within each business. On the final day, teams presented their findings to MELISSA Kikizas and Thrace Group, proposing portfolios of AI projects and five-year transformation roadmaps tailored to each company.
The program was custom-designed and delivered by Alba's International Office, in collaboration with Henley Business School and the two client companies.
