The result was an overview of eighty years of student life, as described by five individuals from diverse backgrounds, all of whom share an experience at ESCP: Léon Cligman (Class of 1938), Robert Clergerie (Class of 1958), Annick Devillard (Class of 1978), Carine de Boissezon (Class of 1998) and Christian Koller (Class of 2018).
We interviewed women and men; alumni who suffered through wars and those who have only ever known a united Europe; a German alumnus and French alumni, one of whom has spent her entire professional career in London; and some entrepreneurs. All of them were happy to look back at their time at ESCP, citing the importance of the school and its environment in building their career.
The interviews were conducted by Entouréo, founded by Thomas Delage (Class of 2014), a company that specialises in recording links between generations. In this series of interviews the selected alumni were asked the following six questions:
- What careers were popular when you graduated?
- A course that left an impression on you?
- What song marked your student years?
- What was student life like for you?
- How did you find your first job?
- What clubs and associations were you active in?
Following these interviews, interesting similarities and differences were observed, inevitably given such diverse life and career paths, although it is notable that the eldest alumni interviewed, Léon Cligman (Class of 1938), was at the head of Lacoste, while the youngest, Christian Koller (Class of 2018) has just begun his professional career with Lagardère Sports. Generations change, but a preference for certain fields remains.
As for the other alumni, Robert Clergerie (1958) founded a line of luxury shoes, Annick Devillard (Class of 1978) runs a marketing and communication agency in London and Carine de Boissezon (Class of 1998) has just been named Chief Sustainability Officer at EDF.
Over the years, our alumni have engaged with their times, whether by starting their own companies or by tackling the greatest challenges of the day, such as sustainable development. Talking about time, all of the alumni are committed to pursuing their work over time, with the perfect example being Léon Cligman, who is set to celebrate his 100th birthday in 2020 by opening his museum at the Abbey of Fontevrault, following his donation of 600 works of art from the personal collection he built over the years with his wife.
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