"It is a genuine pleasure as incoming Dean to join a community of staff, students and alumni which increasingly sets the benchmark for business schools in the UK and beyond. It is also a privilege to follow Sue Cox as Dean, given her outstanding leadership of the School over the past 14 years. LUMS and Lancaster University more broadly owe much to her vision and drive, with this being reflected in the ongoing successes of LUMS. This success is reflected in multiple measures.

"In the recent Research Evaluation Framework, we have been ranked 1st in the UK for 'research power', a testament to the hard work of our academics and the development of the School. However, our research is not only world-leading, but is also grounded in the real world, and as such, we continue to work with small and medium-sized firms across the country. The Wave 2 Growth Hubs initiative, led by LUMS, has seen £32m of business support funding distributed and will have created in excess of 4000 jobs by 2017.

"Alongside outstanding research performance, LUMS has also consistently performed well in various league tables thanks to our excellent teaching. The Lancaster MBA was ranked 1st in the world for corporate strategy in the 2015 Financial Times Global Full-time MBA ranking and 9th in the world for non-US, 12-month MBA programmes by Forbes. We are currently 2nd in the country for Marketing according to the Complete University Guide, and in the last couple of weeks the Times/Sunday Times Good University Guide ranked us 4th for Accounting and Finance, 5th for Business Studies and 8th for Economics.

"These successes reflect the underlying character of LUMS. It is a school which blends cutting-edge research with real impact, while delivering outstanding programmes which transform students’ lives. Over the next few years, we will aim to continue this pursuit of excellence with a number of new projects. For example the new Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business, a cross-faculty initiative with LEC, will aim to bring a more environmentally-conscious approach to the boardroom.

"Our new building project, announced earlier this year, will allow us to provide a world-class environment to house our world-class teaching and research. Some of you will be new to LUMS, others may have been studying or working here for many years. Either way, I look forward to working with you over the coming years to take LUMS forward in its ambition to be one of the world’s leading management schools."