Professor DeKrey said no EMBA programme had achieved a 50:50 ratio but gender parity was important because of the growing involvement of women in the workforce.

'We want to be the stimulation for the change, and it is changing naturally anyway. In Asia, especially in Hong Kong and China, women have much freer opportunities than other places. The parity is healthy and it will predict parity through the executive ranks. Certainly, an institution such as ours should be at the front of that trend.'

Further collaboration with other partners of the Kellogg School of Management around the world are also needed to further expand local students' international networks. Partnership or stand-alone Kellogg programmes are held in cities such as Chicago, Toronto and Tel Aviv.

The connectivity with overseas institutions also gave local students access to a broader, more globalised curriculum, Professor DeKrey said. The Kellogg-HKUST programme is already an attractive option to overseas students, many of whom fly into the territory at weekends for courses on Asian investment or regional knowledge.

Over the years, curricular changes have been made in response to the changing market environment, resulting in the provision of courses on innovation, family business and China field trips. The curriculum will continue to evolve but, with that, increased attention will be paid to the issue of leadership, according to Professor DeKrey.

Among the celebration activities for the 10th anniversary of the programme will be the launch of a book put together by him and a colleague, Professor David Messick, entitled Leadership Experiences in Asia.

The book fills a gap in the Asian market, where there is a dearth of leadership books. It consists of contributions from Kellogg alumni and papers written for classwork by past students of the Kellogg-HKUST programme.

An expert on the leadership issue, Professor DeKrey expressed in it his views that there was no single personality type for leadership positions, but that finding the match between the person and the organisation should be what matters most. The proceeds of the book will go to a scholarship fund for heads of non-governmental organisations to enrol in the EMBA programme. The participation of non-governmental organisation leaders had contributed to the culture of the course, said Professor DeKrey. Among the few NGO leaders who had taken the course was Thomas S.T. Chan, the CEO of World Vision China, who graduated in 2001.

Should the book be well received, similar attempts might be made in future to put the ideas of students and top business figures in print, Professor DeKrey said.

'EMBA programmes should be doing more for society than for just the students in the programme. If we can produce content that is of use to leadership beyond our own small group of students, that, I think, is very healthy. Not all people can have access to the classroom, so if we can bring some of that benefit and spread it around, we are expanding our reach and doing more good.'