Diego Ignacio Cáceres Saldaña

Imperial Business School

“Curious problem-solver drawn to complex systems and real-world impact.”

Hometown: Piura, Peru

Fun fact about yourself: I’m great at making ceviche, it’s my specialty and my favourite way to share my culture.

Undergraduate School and Degree: Universidad de Piura – BSc Industrial & Systems Engineering

Where was the last place you worked before enrolling in business school? Mastercard – Manager, Implementations

Where did you intern during the summer of 2025? NA

Where will you be working after graduation? NA

Community Work and Leadership Roles in Business School: NA

Which academic or extracurricular achievement are you most proud of during business school? I’m most proud of taking part in the Entrepreneurial Journey project, which has allowed a multidisciplinary team of us to develop an idea into a product from scratch. Working alongside the Enterprise Lab and wider Imperial community, the Entrepreneurial Journey spans a minimum of eight weeks and really gives intrapreneurs a chance to start their own ventures. We go from identifying a problem to conducting user research, building prototypes, testing assumptions and pitching to investors.

What makes it meaningful is that it’s still in progress. We’re learning in real time. We don’t have all the answers, and we often disagree. But learning how to align different perspectives and make decisions in uncertainty has been more valuable than any outcome. It has shown me that building something isn’t about having the perfect idea, it’s about resilience, communication and shared ownership.

What achievement are you most proud of in your professional career? I’m most proud of working on the interoperability project for the Immediate Payment System (IPS) in Peru. It was a complex initiative involving regulators, financial institutions, and technical teams. Aligning those stakeholders required constant negotiation and coordination.

Seeing the system go live was rewarding, but what mattered most was the impact. Small businesses were able to get paid faster. People relied less on cash. Everyday transactions became simpler for families. It reminded me that behind every integration call or timeline discussion, there are real people whose lives improve when payment systems work better.

That connection between infrastructure and daily life is why I consider it my biggest accomplishment.

Why did you choose this business school? I chose Imperial for its integration with science and technology. I didn’t want an MBA separated from technical depth. Being embedded in a STEM-driven ecosystem meant constant exposure to engineers, researchers, and founders. That environment sharpened how I think about AI and innovation, not as abstract trends, but as tools built and deployed in real systems.

Who was your favourite MBA professor? My favourite professor was Ileana Stigliani. I really enjoyed her practical teaching style and the way she structured the Design Thinking: Solving Complex Problems Through a Disruptive Mindset module. It felt more like a series of interactive workshops than a traditional lecture-based class, which made the learning much more engaging and applied. Her constant feedback throughout was also extremely valuable.

What was your favourite course as an MBA? Strategy and Leadership in a Digital World was my favourite module. As one of the personalization elements on the Full-Time MBA, this was a chance to deep dive into a specialised area and it was a really good mix of interesting, highly relevant lessons and an amazing professor. I liked that it was not just theoretical. It used frameworks, case studies and discussions to show how digital technologies, platforms, and ecosystems are reshaping industries in practice.

The class discussions with both the professor and my peers were also great, and they made the learning experience even richer by bringing in different perspectives and real-world examples.

What was your favourite MBA event or tradition at your business school? Taking part in the hackathons was a great experience. Spending an entire weekend building a prototype with students from different master’s programs was intense and fun. You quickly realize how differently engineers, designers, and business students approach the same challenge. It reflected Imperial’s culture: practical, collaborative and focused on building rather than just discussing ideas.

Looking back over your MBA experience, what is the one thing you’d do differently and why? While I have participated in many events and projects, I would have liked to have played a more active role in leading these from the start. An MBA is a unique environment, and there are numerous networking opportunities at Imperial – the diversity of backgrounds is incredible. Building that network around you is definitely an intentional decision and a brilliant way to amplify value for everyone involved. So, I would have wanted to lead on this more actively if I was doing things again.

What was the most impactful case study you had in business school and what was the biggest lesson you learned from it? We looked at a case on digital transformation failure, which particularly stood out to me. The company invested heavily in technology, yet the initiative collapsed due to cultural resistance and misaligned incentives. The lesson was clear: transformation fails when leadership underestimates human behavior. Technology is the easy part. Alignment is the hard part.

What business leader do you admire most? I most admire Daniel Ek, the founder and CEO of Spotify. His journey is a masterclass in global scaling, taking a disruptive idea from Sweden and successfully navigating the complex regulatory and cultural landscapes of the UK and the United States to redefine an entire industry. Beyond his strategic vision, I am deeply impressed by the ‘Spotify Model’ of organisation that he pioneered, proving that a massive global corporation can maintain the agility and innovative spirit of a startup.

What is one way that your business school has integrated AI into your programming? What insights did you gain from using AI? On top of the Full-Time MBA existing inside a world-class STEM institution where business and technological insights exist together, AI was integrated directly into coursework for analysis, modeling and research. More importantly, we were required to critique outputs. The insight I gained is simple: AI amplifies the quality of your thinking. Clear reasoning produces leverage, and shallow reasoning produces noise.

Which MBA classmate do you most admire? Mihir Bagdhadi. Mihir brings energy into every day of the MBA and he is always willing to help. What stands out most is his reliability – when he commits to something, he delivers. That consistency makes him someone who my peers and I trust the most.

What are the top two items on your professional bucket list?

Lead a large, complex organisation through a structural transformation

Found a company that solves a structural inefficiency in an emerging market (and actually helps people).

What made Diego such an invaluable addition to the Class of 2026?

“Diego Ignacio Cáceres Saldaña has been an outstanding member of the Full-Time MBA Class of 2026, consistently approaching challenges with both thoughtfulness and creativity. His background in fintech and experience implementing complex solutions that deliver real-world impact make him a valuable addition to the Imperial ecosystem. With strong technical foundations and a leadership mindset defined by collaboration and practical problem-solving, he is well positioned to make a meaningful impact in his future endeavours.”

Esma Koca
Primary Teaching Fellow
Imperial Business School

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