Dear Delegate,

Dear EURAM Friend,

In 2001 as a post-doc, I attended the first EURAM Annual Conference in Barcelona, and truly enjoyed the spirit I felt and the community I met. This was a game changing moment for me as early career scholar: I had suddenly found my academic home for the future, but at the same time, I had no idea in which direction my academic journey would develop. Never had I imagined to or aimed for becoming President of our Academy. In those early days, I deeply enjoyed organising sessions or tracks, later supporting the 2005 EURAM Annual Conference at my university in Munich, getting involved in and later organising the EURAM Doctoral Colloquium. From 2006 until 2012, I served as EURAM Vice President with a constant focus on talent development with the vision to motivate and mobilise young doctoral researchers and early career scholars to join EURAM and to experience in similar ways the fruitful exchanges, the freedom to shape future developments and the openness, diversity and inclusiveness of our EURAM community.

Today, EURAM can build on the highly successful work of all its engaged members and presidents of the last 20 years.  Our community,  can take this important role to be the most welcoming, supportive and open community for young talented, early career and established management scholars. As many, if not all of us, face unexpected pressures from the pandemic, from its consequences that change our personal and institutional environments and national economic contexts, EURAM can be our caring community and ever-inspiring academic home. As a community we can jointly support careers and set the needed and fruitful counter point to the often all too competitive institutional environments.

As our Academy now celebrates its 20^th Anniversary, let’s stand together and jointly shape the next 20 years of EURAM always following the EURAM mission as a professional community of engaged management scholars and reflective practitioners – open, inclusive, international and cross-cultural.

This year’s online format is an innovation, however not an intended one, but the result of an adaptation to new circumstances. I am sure that we all would have preferred to meet our colleagues in person and to find out where Guinness is best served in Dublin’s numerous pubs! As EURAMers we are flexible. We moved the conference from June to December, from onsite to online, from personal to digital. Still, we will make our community experience a joint success. We all know, it is the people who make our community! Thank you in advance to all participants for all your contributions to make this 20^th EURAM Annual Conference a fruitful experience, for bringing your spirit, energy, research questions and results, your flexibility and ability to navigate even in troubled waters.

Together with all EURAM Executive Committee members,  I am deeply grateful to all those who are making this happen, allowing us to network, exchange, debate, agree or disagree on the various research findings presented. I would like to take the opportunity to thank more particularly: all the Strategic Interest Group Chairs and their teams, the Track Chairs, Symposia Panellists, Vice Presidents, Doctoral Colloquium Chairs, DEKON – our Professional conference Organiser, Speakeasy –  our virtual host, our wonderful team in the Brussels HQ office and … the Organising Committee, the Conference Programme Committee from Dublin Trinity College Dublin, the EURAM 2020 Online Task Force, all supporters! Let me personally thank Eythor Ivar Jonsson who joined the EURAM Executive Committee in this crazy time as Vice President for Conferences, and Andrew Burke, Trinity Business School, who stayed with us as the Conference Chair for a wonderful “Digital Dublin” experience.

Of course, let us not forget the more than 2000 reviewers of reviewers whose timely and professional involvement help individual scholars grow and who support the quality of our debates!

Let us enjoy the 20^th EURAM Annual Conference and shape the future of the next 20 years of EURAM. What we do and do not do will decide about the future of our Academy. EURAM therefore needs each one of you in whichever role you have played so far or might decide to play in the future. Let me know anytime, should you wish to become more involved in volunteering to deliver services and activities to our community. As soon as Speakeasy opens its platform, delegates can set up meetings with colleagues, so let me know if you wish to book a time with me and share a coffee, tea or glass of beer.

I very much look forward to seeing you all online in December.

Kathrin M. Moeslein, EURAM President