Nicolette Gopaul

HEC Paris

“Problem solver, change-agent, strategist and storyteller; passionate about driving social transformation through scalable solutions.”

Hometown: Johannesburg, South Africa

Fun fact about yourself: I participated in mentorship programs that empowered hundreds of students from underprivileged South African communities to gain admission to top universities to study for degree programs; many students were the first in their families to pursue higher education. A year after the program ended, I received a message from a former mentee that read, ‘I believe in myself because you believed in me first.’ In that moment, I realized mentorship isn’t just about providing guidance; it’s also about having courage, standing in our truth and rewriting our narratives to promote inclusivity and self-belief. Seeing a young girl step into the fullness of her potential is the kind of impact that is extremely rewarding for me.

Other fun facts about myself includes my passion for writing historical romance novels and I adore horse-back riding. The writing fuels my creativity whilst riding horses teaches me the importance of patience, resilience, and trust.

Undergraduate School and Degree:

• University South Africa: BA (Health & Psychology) (Cum Laude)
• University South Africa BA(Honors) – Psychology (post graduate) (Cum Laude)
• HEC Paris – Masters Business Administration (post graduate) (graduate June 2025)

Where was the last place you worked before enrolling in business school? First Rand Group (South Africa): Senior Business Analyst.

At First National Bank, I was part of a core team responsible for optimizing high-value financial transactions and enhancing operational efficiency. I led initiatives to implement automated systems that played a key role in developing financial control frameworks that reduced revenue leakage. I managed complex financial architectures that honed my leadership and project management skills, ensuring accuracy, compliance, and risk reduction as a strategic outcome. I led a team of individuals, managed high stakes projects, designed robotic architectures, created system generated reconciliations to identify revenue leaks, built on business requirement specifications and ensured that projects were implemented with highest efficiencies. These experiences have equipped me with the ability to drive innovation and resource optimization which are skills that are equally valuable in both corporate and humanitarian financial management.

Where did you intern during the summer of 2024? Instead of pursuing a traditional internship, I chose to capitalise on my summer of 2024 by gaining a deeper understanding of the multicultural landscape by travelling through Europe, which broadened my global perspectives. I believe that the exposure to a diverse range of cultures, histories, and various ways of life challenges my own assumptions and preconceived ideas of the world. Traveling enables me to foster a deeper sense of empathy, to enrich my understanding of the shared human experience, and to appreciate our individual differences. I strongly believe that travelling enhances my problem-solving abilities, encourages me to navigate unfamiliar territories, and is essential for my personal growth and effective leadership.

On the conclusion of my travels through Greece, Italy, Germany, Austria, France, Switzerland and the Netherlands, I returned to my home country of South Africa to work on my capstone thesis titled project ‘EmpowerHer’. This required extensive field work, research, conducting interviews and collecting data to draw my hypothesis and deduct my observations. I spent most of my time within these communities, conducting hands on research. The project tackles menstrual health challenges in Tembisa township in Johannesburg, by providing sustainable menstrual products and educational resources to reduce school absenteeism and advance gender equality. Through this project, I collaborated with stakeholders, and led community engagement efforts to drive systemic change. This hands-on experience deepened my understanding of social impact, sustainability, and resource management in underserved communities.

Where will you be working after graduation? After graduation, I plan on pursuing a non-conventional career that blends my passion for entrepreneurship, sustainable development, corporate social investment and mental wellness. Drawing from my background in psychology, I aim to found my own company that consults and collaborates with organisations that focus on improving mental health within African communities. My goal is to develop projects that not only foster emotional well-being, but empowers communities to break the cycles of poverty and inequalities through self-actualisation. Areas of focus include mental healthcare such as depression disorders tackling suicide, and psychosocial disorders. Additional areas of focus include abuse against women and children, and gender equality through education parity.

Furthermore, I have secured my position for a Ph.D. in Psychology, focusing on clinical research. I will explore mental health interventions, and their impact on developing societies. In addition to the research, I will be engaging in clinical training, data analysis, and aspire to contribute to publications in academic journals. I also plan to collaborate with other researchers and mental health professionals, attend conferences, and participate in workshops to stay at the forefront of advancements in psychological science. My end goal is to qualify as a practising psychologist and to use that platform in my own social entrepreneurial venture to effect change in marginalised communities. As a passion project I also aspire to be a published novelist, using my passion for writing books as the platform to define narratives.

Community Work and Leadership Roles in Business School: During my time at HEC, I assumed multiple leadership positions that allowed me to drive meaningful impact. As the President of the Public Speaking Club, I helped students refine their communication skills, fostering confidence and leadership through various workshops, events, debates, skills-building activities and coaching activities. As the VP of the Sports Business Club, I organised initiatives that connected students to industry leaders whilst exploring the entrepreneurial side to sports.

From an academic perspective I was honoured as an HEC excellence scholar for my outstanding achievements, and won the HEC Capstone Award for my work on social transformation in marginalised, rural communities in Africa.

Which academic or extracurricular achievement are you most proud of during business school? My capstone project. This was a thesis that I had conducted in a rural community in South Africa. The EmpowerHer project tackles barriers that contribute to school absenteeism, gender inequality, and limited opportunities for girls from marginalised communities. Many girls lack access to sanitary products, private facilities to manage their menstruation, and proper menstrual education, reinforcing stigma and perpetuating cycles of poverty. To combat this, EmpowerHer implements a dual-solution approach: providing reusable, eco-friendly menstrual underwear to ensure uninterrupted school attendance and delivering comprehensive menstrual health education platform for girls to have access to learning materials pertaining to their menstruation and biology.

The initiative directly supports multiple United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—SDG 1 (No Poverty) by reducing financial strain on disadvantaged families; SDG 3 (Good Health & Well-being) by improving menstrual hygiene and mental wellness; SDG 4 (Quality Education) by minimizing menstruation-related school absenteeism; SDG 5 (Gender Equality) by breaking cultural taboos and empowering girls to graduate equally with boys; and SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities) by providing resources to marginalized communities.

By equipping girls with essential products, education, and confidence, EmpowerHer fosters dignity, psychological safety, and long-term empowerment, serving as a scalable model for broader implementation across South Africa and beyond. I am proud of this project because I can see the change that it will create and I plan to scale it to various communities. I am further proud that I won the MBA Capstone Award, recognising my thesis for its leadership qualities and high standard of excellence.

What achievement are you most proud of in your professional career? One of my proudest professional achievements was spearheading the introduction of robotics and automation in financial systems at First National Bank during a time when many were still apprehensive about these technologies. By effectively managing change, fostering collaboration, and demonstrating the tangible benefits of automation, I helped streamline operations, improving efficiencies and significantly reducing revenue leakage. Additionally, I played a key role in designing a work-from-home policy for my department, which was drafted two years before the COVID-19 pandemic. At the time, remote work was not widely embraced. However, this initiative laid the groundwork for a seamless transition when the pandemic struck, ensuring business continuity and employee well-being. These experiences reinforced my ability to anticipate industry shifts, drive large-scale transformation, and implement sustainable solutions that balance technological innovation with human-centered change management.

These experiences shaped my leadership style by reinforcing the importance of foresight, adaptability, and human-centered innovation. I learned that true transformation requires not only technical implementation, but also an ability to engage stakeholders, anticipate future challenges, and drive solutions that balance efficiency with people-first thinking.

Why did you choose this business school? I chose HEC Paris for two very significant reasons. First, the school maintains a strong, competitive level of academic excellence combined with an entrepreneurial focus. This aligned perfectly to my career aspirations as I see myself excelling as a social entrepreneur. The entrepreneurial program provided me with technical business acumen and the ability to learn about driving large-scale and sustainable change. HEC’s focus on entrepreneurship, particularly through their Creative Destruction Lab program, provided me with the opportunity to work closely with start-up companies and their founders, learn in a hands-on ecosystem, and focus on innovation and drive solutions in the climate-change space. All of these fed into my passion for social impact projects.

Secondary to the academics, HEC has an attractive, expansive, and influential network of alumni from all across the world. Alumni include global leaders, entrepreneurs, policy-makers, and individuals who also identify as change makers in their industries. This network has played a significant role in expanding my perspective and opportunities. Through the alumni network, I was able to identify stakeholders to collaborate with, mentors, and industry leaders who can influence and assist me with defining my personal leadership style.

Who was your favorite MBA professor? If I had to highlight one, I would say Professor Laurence Lehmann-Ortega. She was my professor in my Entrepreneurship specialization. I remember being very inspired by her personal career growth, journey as a leader in her industry, and a career-driven woman. She co-authored books, made significant contributions to the field of strategy, won multiple awards, and earned a PhD – all while being a dedicated mother.

I found myself inspired by her journey. I appreciated how she used her real-world experience in guiding established companies to re-invent their business models, and brought this knowledge into the classroom. She created a balance between academic theory and practical application. Her teaching style was innovative, which made the classes interesting and kept students engaged. She went over and above to organise field trips to ensure that we had exposure to corporates and brought in an artist to conduct a real-time painting, which was intended to inspire students about making innovative decisions. Her efforts were appreciated by our entire class and it was a pleasure to have a seat in her classroom.

What was your favorite course as an MBA? I don’t have one particular favourite course, as I learned so many new principles and concepts across all my classes. If I had to choose one that made an impact on me, I would choose Operations Management. It was the first time that I had taken a course like this. It was challenging, forced me to think outside the box, and pushed my personal boundaries. I appreciated this as it forced me to grow. This course provided me with a strategic and analytic lens to understand how businesses can optimize their efficiencies and streamline their processes to drive sustainable growth in various areas of operations.

I appreciated the real-world applicability, learning about cases first-hand; understanding supply chain optimisation, process and design, and quality control; and making data driven decisions to maximise the revenue generating capacity of a firm. The course was filled with simulations and problem-solving, which is where I thrive and learn the most. The simulations keep it interesting and engaging, but also afford opportunities to apply classroom theory to real-world problem-solving. The principles that I learned in this course are also applicable to helping me execute my project ‘Empower-Her’ to achieve a scalable, and impact driven solution – to ensure that I consider resource efficiencies and supply chain as critical components to delivering sustainable menstrual healthcare solutions.

What was your favorite MBA event or tradition at your business school? One of my most memorable events of the MBA, had to be the ‘MBA Olympics’ as we know it, namely the MBAT Tournament. The event embodies the spirit of teamwork, leadership, and created a global camaraderie that brought students from all across Europe and UK together.

Being the largest inter-MBA sports tournament in Europe, the MBAT brought together students from every top business school to compete in a range of activities and sports. It represented resilience, and collaboration and promoted cultural diversity among students. It provided an opportunity for us to diversify our friendships, expand our knowledge, push ourselves out of our comfort zones, and truly portray the extent of our capabilities as students. The MBAT plays a significant role in cultivating future leaders. It is an opportunity to step outside the classroom and engage in teamwork from a different perspective.

We were given the opportunity to participate, volunteer and ensure that the entire event was student-led. I believe that the MBAT really pushes students to develop leadership qualities that translate outside of the classroom. The MBAT truly embodied the spirit of HEC. It proved that HEC is a business school that values team work, leadership, and diversity and promotes excellence. It indicates that HEC values tradition, holistic development, cultivating a global network, and mirrors the schools culture of innovation, inclusivity and ambition. I was grateful for having the opportunity to participate and to volunteer in the MBAT.

Looking back over your MBA experience, what is the one thing you’d do differently and why? Reflecting at my MBA experience, I would spend six months or longer, prior to starting the MBA, to learn French. Whilst the program is international and conducted in English, being fluent in French would have further enriched my experience in assimilating to the local environment. I feel as if it would have helped me enrich my connections with local individuals and help further my career aspirations to remain in France after the MBA was completed. I believe that fully immersing oneself in the local culture is imperative to building relationships and integrating into local life. Although the university offered French classes after school, it was really challenging to learn a new language whilst trying to assimilate all the MBA information. I would encourage the university to advise students to pre-enroll in three-month French courses before starting their MBA as this could help lay the foundation.

What is the biggest myth about your school? One of the myths that I encountered was that HEC was a finance-focused and strategy-focused business school with a strong pipeline to primarily investment banking and consulting employment opportunities. Although the school has an excellent reputation in these fields, I found that the school is diversifying into entrepreneurship, marketing, and sustainability, which are crucial tends. HEC further fosters dynamic and multi-disciplinary environment, where students can pursue tech and entrepreneurship and engage in social impact. The Creative Destructive Lab program and Sustainability specialisation, provides examples of how there are opportunities to expand into a wide range of relevant industries.

What did you love most about your business school’s town? I loved that Jouy-en-Josas was nestled into a quiet and peaceful environment that provided the perfect setting for learning and development without distractions. I loved that the town was surrounded by nature and forests that provided opportunities for hiking, biking, and taking strolls in the forests. One of my highlights was getting accepted into one of the oldest and most prestigious equestrians in France namely Club Hippique, which was founded in 1900’s. It was based in Versailles, but being in this proximity allowed me the opportunity to discover and join the school. Here, I learned show jumping, dressage, and taking horse rides in the Versailles forest. If I wasn’t based in Jouy-en-Josas, I would never have this magnificent opportunity to advance my equestrian skills and learn in such a magical environment.

What is one way that your business school has integrated AI into your programming? What insights did you gain from using AI? At HEC Paris, AI was integrated into our learning experience through various models such as data science, data modelling, and data camp, where AI tools were leveraged to enhance our analytical skills. We were encouraged to use AI to research our Capstone thesis, along with ideation, refinement, and verification of data. We were taught about the importance of responsible AI use, ensuring that work is not plagiarised but is of our own quality and merit. We were encouraged to accelerate and use AI to add meaning to our work, but not to use it as a substitute for original work or independent thought. There were subjects, such as finance assignments and exams, where the use of AI was not permitted due to ethical reasons. All of our work was processed through AI detectors to ensure academic integrity.  The important aspect was finding the balance between responsible use of AI in learning new concepts and the innovation and integration of students’ original ideas, thoughts, and work.

Which MBA classmate do you most admire? My classmate, whom I sat next to for two terms, Arjun Shivach is someone whom I deeply admire. He is an inspiring leader who really embodies resilience and hard work as his core ethical principles. He worked a full-time job throughout the MBA, balancing lectures with the demands of a high-pressured position. However, this didn’t stop him from stepping into the fullness of his potential.

He led the LGBTQ+ club as their president, championed diversity, inclusion, and organised inspiring events that fostered a sense of community in HEC. He further excelled in his course work, and was always ready to help tutor and guide his friends who needed additional assistance with their course material. Arjun became an expert on various topics and classmates would approach him for assistance. He always helped with a smile on his face. He became a reliable friend to many. Arjun secured second place in the Foundation Bernard Andre Parent Prize for his research on future marine fuels in the shipping industry. This spoke to his drive for sustainable innovative solutions and creative thinking. Arjun really balanced leadership, ambition and academic excellence and was a true role model to many students.

What are the top two items on your professional bucket list? My professional bucket list includes launching a scalable, social impact organisation that focuses on mental wellness, education equality, and gender equality in communities across Africa. I hope to find innovative ways to incorporate technology to drive sustainable change. I am passionate about transformation and grass-roots community development, which I hope to incorporate in my venture. I hope to align profits to purpose, to ensure that I can continue to be a change agent in my community. This would enable me to be a thought leader in social innovation, speak in global forums, participate in panel discussions, and contribute to empowerment and transformation through creating narratives and telling peoples stories.

My second bucket list item includes being published. I hope to write academic research articles that contribute to psychological well-being, and social impact. I hope to have my research published in a respected journal and am able to influence policy, and academic discourse. Furthermore, I hope to become a published novelist ensuring that my creative works which are fiction novels are published. I love using story telling as a tool for advocacy, creating narratives and sharing stories that empower, educate, transform, and drive conversations around social change. My ultimate dream would be to turn my stories into productions in the space of film and documentaries.

What made Nicolette such an invaluable addition to the Class of 2025? 

“It is my distinct pleasure to recommend Nicolette Gopaul for the Poets & Quants Best & Brightest MBA Award. As her professor in the core Marketing Strategy course at HEC Paris, I have had the privilege of witnessing firsthand her exceptional intellect, leadership, and commitment to making a meaningful impact both in and beyond the classroom.

Nicolette embodies the very essence of a “Best & Brightest” MBA student. Her multidisciplinary background—spanning psychology, finance, technology, and social development—sets her apart as a unique and dynamic leader. She seamlessly integrates her deep understanding of human behavior with her strategic acumen, allowing her to tackle complex business challenges with an innovative, human-centered approach. Her contributions in class discussions were always insightful, often bridging academic theory with real-world application in ways that elevated the learning experience for her peers.

Beyond her academic excellence, Nicolette is a dedicated changemaker. Her work in digital transformation, financial modeling, and AI sustainability demonstrates her ability to drive innovation while maintaining a strong ethical and social consciousness. Her leadership extends into her extracurricular engagements, including her role in the Creative Destruction Lab (CDL) program, where she provides strategic insights to early-stage ventures in sustainability, climate, and AI. Additionally, as President of the HEC Paris Public Speaking Club, she has empowered fellow students by fostering confidence in communication—an essential skill for any aspiring leader.

Nicolette’s commitment to social impact is particularly commendable. Her work with the Sizanani Foundation in South Africa, mentoring and providing psychological support to underprivileged children, highlights her deep-rooted sense of purpose and responsibility toward creating a better world. This intrinsic drive to bridge business with meaningful social change is a rare and invaluable quality.

Her leadership, analytical capabilities, and unwavering dedication to making a difference make her an outstanding candidate for this prestigious recognition. I have no doubt that she will continue to be a force for positive change, and I strongly support her nomination without hesitation.”

Anne-Sophie Chaxel
Associate Professor of Marketing, Academic Coordinator for the MBA Specialization on Strategic Marketing
HEC Paris

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