CIBC and Ivey: Learning from Future Business Leaders

Celebrating 5 years of partnership

In a rapidly changing business environment, staying close to new ideas is no longer optional. It requires intentional partnerships that create space for learning, experimentation and different ways of looking at familiar challenges.

That is the value behind CIBC’s 5-year partnership with Ivey Business School’s Digital Innovation and Strategy program and the CIBC × Ivey IDIS Case Competition. Since launching in 2021, the collaboration has connected hundreds of Ivey M.Sc. students with CIBC leaders across the enterprise, creating a platform for applied learning and fresh perspectives on real banking challenges.

For CIBC, partnerships with leading universities like Ivey are an important way to stay connected to emerging thinking, understand how future talent is looking at the world, and hear new perspectives on the everyday problems financial institutions are working through. The partnership has also created meaningful connections over the years, with more than 20 people hired into CIBC from the program — a reflection of the strength of the relationship and the quality of engagement between students and CIBC teams.

Each year, CIBC identifies challenge areas connected to the bank’s priorities and invites students to explore them through research, collaboration and dialogue with CIBC leaders. This year, teams focused on enterprise AI adoption, new banking opportunities and emerging disruptions that could shape the future of financial services.

Using AI as part of the learning experience

This year, the partnership also reflected a broader shift in how emerging technologies are becoming part of the way teams learn, collaborate, and communicate. AI was not only a subject students examined; it became part of how the experience was shaped.

Students were encouraged to use AI to help develop and present their thinking, including through short videos that made their ideas easier to understand and engage with. This gave teams an opportunity to experiment with new tools while considering how technology can strengthen storytelling, sharpen communication, and make complex ideas more accessible.

CIBC’s Enterprise Innovation team applied the same mindset to the delivery of the competition, using AI-enabled automation to support how ideas, materials and presentation inputs were organized throughout the program. Rather than treating AI as a separate topic, the team used it as part of the operating model — helping simplify coordination, improve consistency and support more effective collaboration behind the scenes.

Together, these examples point to a more practical definition of innovation. It is not only about identifying emerging technologies or discussing their potential; it is about building the confidence, habits, and capability to use them in meaningful ways. By integrating AI into both the student experience and the program delivery model, the competition became a live example of how new tools can enhance the way people work, learn and share ideas.

Fresh perspectives on real problems

The case competition gives CIBC teams an opportunity to look at familiar business challenges through a different lens. Students bring outside-in thinking, research, and a generational perspective on how clients, employees and future leaders may respond to change. The value comes from the conversation: hearing how students frame the problem, what they choose to prioritize, what trends they notice, and how they think about the future of banking.

The CIBC × Ivey IDIS partnership reflects the type of collaboration CIBC continues to value: partnerships that bring in new perspectives, create opportunities for applied learning, and help teams stay ahead of learning curves in a changing industry.

This year also reinforced that innovation is as much about how people work as it is about what ideas they generate. Encouraging the use of emerging technology, experimenting with new ways of collaborating, and applying AI to improve productivity are all part of building the muscles needed to adapt as the pace of change continues to accelerate.

As CIBC and Ivey continue to build on 5 years of partnership, the case competition remains a meaningful platform for learning from future business leaders, exploring real challenges, and strengthening CIBC’s connection to emerging ideas and technologies. Most importantly, it demonstrates the value of creating environments where new perspectives can be heard, new tools can be tested, and learning can happen in real time.

For more information, read Case study: Five years of digital innovation with CIBC Opens a new window.

CIBC and Ivey: 5 years of innovation and learning

Celebrating 5 years of partnership

Using AI as part of the learning experience

Fresh perspectives on real problems