Develop
Leadership development of the caliber typically reserved for C-suite executives. A 10-week hybrid journey combining evidence-based behavioral science, contemplative practice and field-based experiential learning in Bhutan.
Abroad Wisdom Academy · For Emerging Leaders
Executive Education Meets Living Wisdom
A 10-week hybrid certificate combining virtual learning with an immersive residency in Bhutan, the world’s living laboratory for human-centered leadership. $5,000.
Proud to support leaders from:
The Next Generation of Leadership
Leadership in the AI era cannot be learned from a slide deck.
Knowledge, analysis and execution are being automated at unprecedented speed. What remains irreducibly human, like discernment, self-regulation, authentic presence and moral courage, cannot be taught through an online module or a conference room seminar.
The Abroad Wisdom Academy pairs ten weeks of evidence-based virtual development with an intensive residency in Bhutan, the world’s living laboratory for human-centered leadership. Emerging leaders step out of the daily noise and into an environment that measures success by human flourishing, returning with grounded clarity and the capacity to lead through complexity.
What would change across your teams if your highest-potential leaders learned to lead with both strategic rigor and genuine wisdom?
Retain
A tangible investment in high-potential leaders. Sponsoring a rising leader into an international fellowship says there is a long-term future for them here, and that the organization cares about who they are becoming, not just what they produce this quarter.
Recognize
A visible honor for exceptional performance and high potential. Sponsoring your top contributors into this fellowship recognizes their work and capabilities with a life-shaping milestone: an unforgettable international residency and a formal certificate in Wise and Compassionate Leadership issued with the Royal University of Bhutan.
How It Works
From your desk to the Himalayas, and back.
Weeks 1–4
Preparation
Four live online sessions with Abroad and Bhutanese faculty, so you arrive ready to learn, not just to look.
Week 5
Bhutan
Teachings with faculty from the Royal University of Bhutan, time with monks and wisdom teachers, and an exchange day with Bhutan’s next-generation leaders.
Weeks 6–10
Integration
Five live online integration sessions that bring what you learned back into your work and your team.
At the end, you receive a certificate in Wise and Compassionate Leadership, issued by the Royal University of Bhutan and the Abroad Wisdom Academy.
In Partnership With
Royal University of Bhutan
Dorje Phagmo Foundation
Why Bhutan, and why now
Business schools teach frameworks. Abroad provides rare access to living wisdom.
Some things can be taught in a classroom. Others are learned by sitting with the people who carry them. Through relationships built over more than a decade, Abroad brings emerging leaders into direct conversation with wisdom keepers, scholars and Bhutan’s own leaders, in valleys and monasteries where these traditions are still lived every day.
Wonder and awe are not a departure from executive education. They are the conditions under which human beings remember how to listen deeply, question their assumptions, and lead with visionary courage. In the age of artificial intelligence, pairing intellectual rigor with ancient wisdom is not an indulgence. It is a necessity.
Faculty
Executive faculty meets living wisdom.
Drawing on world-class research in emotional intelligence, self-compassion and behavioral science, paired directly with the cultural and spiritual stewards shaping Bhutan. Faculty from the Royal University of Bhutan and Abroad’s Wisdom Faculty join executive education professors and coaches from Harvard, the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and UT Austin.
Together they teach the capabilities AI cannot automate: authenticity, compassion and wisdom.
Dasho Chewang Rinzin
Vice Chancellor, Royal University of Bhutan
Dr. Dorji Wangchuk
Former Press Secretary to the King of Bhutan · Former Dean, Royal Thimphu College
Dr. Dechen Dorji
Environment, Asia Wildlife, World Wildlife Fund US
Lopen Lungtaen Gyatso
Mindfulness, Former President, College of Language and Culture Studies, Royal University of Bhutan
Dr. Jeffrey Hull
Harvard Medical School faculty · Former Executive Director, Institute of Coaching
Justin Milano
Founder & CEO, Abroad
Dr. Kristin Neff
Self-Compassion, Pioneering researcher, University of Texas at Austin
Dr. Shauna Shapiro
Mindfulness, Professor, Santa Clara University
I have taken many leadership programs in my life but it was Abroad’s Bhutan Quest that truly made me see beyond the horizon and clarified why I was brought on this planet.
Benedict Perez
1 / 5
91
A score few organizations in the world ever reach.
Net Promoter Score, from 100+ participant responses. Above 70 is considered world-class.
Program Tuition
A complete ten-week executive immersion.
Tuition
$5,000
Per leader, double occupancy in a shared twin room.
Single occupancy with private room: $6,250
Tuition is in USD. Excludes international flights to and from Paro, Bhutan.
The Program
- The full 10-week certificate program
- Nine live online sessions, four before and five after
- Faculty, teachings and experiences
- One-on-one sessions with an Abroad Fellow
The Residency in Bhutan
- Boutique hotels throughout your stay in Bhutan
- All meals
- All in-country travel
Giving Back
- 10% of your investment allocated toward the regeneration of Bhutan’s wisdom, education and nature
For Organizations
A Flagship Ritual for the Leaders Who Shape What Comes Next
Each year, send your most promising leaders into the Himalayas to learn from living wisdom and return with visionary clarity. Reserved annually, the program becomes an honored milestone, something rising talent aspires to earn and carry forward.
A first-of-its-kind developmental architecture that gives your rising executives what slide decks cannot: embodied wisdom, proven self-regulation, and an enduring global peer network.
Circle of 6
6 emerging leaders each year
Your leaders join our open seasonal cohorts, learning alongside peers from leading organizations and bringing an outside perspective home to their teams.
Investment
$30,000 a year
Circle of 10
10 emerging leaders each year
Distributed across cohorts or sent together. Lock in multi-year tuition and establish an enduring annual tradition across departments.
Investment
$50,000 a year
Private Cohort
Up to 30 leaders from your organization
The full ten-week program and Bhutan residency reserved exclusively for your organization. Shaped around your strategic horizon, building deep trust, mutual accountability, and a shared leadership language across your rising bench.
Investment
$130,000
Your most promising people return with ten weeks of development, a certificate, a cohort of peers, and an experience they’ll carry into every team they lead.
Executive Leadership Immersions
Looking to support your senior leadership team? Abroad also offers executive immersions ($10,000 per leader), pairing our signature Quests with extended online integration sessions. Speak with our team during your consultation to discuss designing a complete leadership pathway across both tiers.
For Individual Leaders
Invite your organization to invest in you.
Many organizations invest in programs like this for the people they’re developing. Here’s how to start the conversation:
01
Find the right person
Your manager, head of Learning & Development, or Chief People Officer.
02
Make the case for impact
What you want to grow as a leader, and what that would mean for your team.
03
Share the essentials
A 10-week certificate program, a week in Bhutan, and a $5,000 tuition investment covered by your organization (flights booked separately).
04
Suggest a group
The experience is stronger, and the case is easier, when a group of colleagues goes together.
05
Send them this page, or connect them with us.
Giving Back
Where 10% goes
Every place includes a contribution to the people and institutions who make this program possible.
Dodedhra Monastery
Sustaining a monastic community Abroad has worked with for a decade, where compassion lives.
Her Eminence Dorje Phagmo Rinpoche
Supporting her work caring for nuns, elders and future generations.
The Royal University of Bhutan
Supporting education for Bhutan’s next generation of leaders, who become your friends for life.
Nature
Offsetting the carbon impact of your flights and travel. This is regenerative study abroad for adults.
