Thousands attended this year's 6th annual World Business Forum (WBF), which took place on October 6 and 7 at New York City's Radio City Music Hall. IESE has been a major sponsor of the event for several years. Among the top business, innovative and political luminaries presenting at this year's Forum were: legendary film director George Lucas, 2008 Nobel Prize winning economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, Saatchi and Saatchi's CEO and branding guru Kevin Roberts, and President William J. Clinton.

Each year, the world's top executives, business figures and leaders from around the globe gather at Radio City Music Hall in New York City for two days to debate and discuss global issues, advance their businesses and experience an incredible lineup of global leaders, brilliant minds, business icons and legendary CEOs.

IESE offered "Tough Times, Tough Strategies - Getting Your Company Back on Track," a focused executive program, in conjunction with the WBF. So when the program participants and its IESE faculty members - Prof. Paddy Miller, Johanna Mair and Pedro Videla - were not in class, they were participating in the WBF presentations and interviews. For example, Paddy Miller interviewed talent management expert Bill Conaty as well as George Lucas and management innovation pundit Gary Hamel. Johanna Mair introduced George Lucas to the audience and also interviewed Kevin Roberts. Pedro Videla interviewed Paul Krugman.

There were at times lively and insightful exchanges. During his one-on-one interview with Prof. Videla, Krugman said that while he believes the recession is technically over, he said "it's not going to feel like the recession is over because employment is still dropping, and it may be a long time before employment even stops falling and a much longer time before employment returns to pre-crisis levels."

Given the fragility of the economic recovery and the troubled employment market, Prof. Videla asked Krugman what the biggest mistake would be for economic policy makers right now.

"Rushing for the exit strategy... that would almost guarantee a double-dip recession," responded Krugman. He cited the mistake policy makers made in 1937 when they thought the Depression had ended, and they then pulled back on the monetary policy and the stimulus policy that had been put in place to secure the failing economy. This mistaken action, according to Krugman, led to a prolonging of the Depression. Krugman added that the current recovery does not yet have self-sustaining capacity.

During her interview with Kevin Roberts, Prof. Mair discussed the current state of brands. She commented on how companies are struggling to get consumers on board with brands.

"Brands are dead," responded Roberts. "Brands have become commodities. There is no differentiation in most categories... all dandruff shampoo clears up dandruff, all skin moisturizer makes your skin look soft...The diffentiator now is to move from a brand to a lovemark."

He went on to explain that consumers in these tough times will now ask when making a purchase: "does the brand offer value, does it offer priceless value, i.e. does it make my life better, does it give me some joy?"

All the WBF interviews conducted by IESE professors will be posted on IESE's website in the near future.