Prof. Melsa Ararat

Melsa Ararat is a corporate governance and sustainable business scholar and practitioner whose work bridges research, regulation and investor practice in emerging markets. After an international executive career spanning Türkiye, East Asia, Japan and Europe, she founded the UK-based advisory firm ILLAC Ltd in 2003. The same year she joined Sabancı University as Professor of Strategic Management and founded its Corporate Governance Forum, which she directed until 2022. The Forum’s research and policy projects, recognised for their social impact and for linking research with practice, played a key role in the faculty’s international accreditation. She supported Türkiye’s Capital Markets Board in drafting the national Corporate Governance Principles and, through a report prepared for IFC, helped lay the conceptual foundation of the Borsa Istanbul Sustainability Index. From 2009 to 2020 she led IFC’s Emerging Markets Corporate Governance Research Network, and from 2015 to 2021 she served on the Board of Governors and Awards Committee of the International Corporate Governance Network (ICGN). She founded and director CDP’s Türkiye operations (2009–2023) and served on the board of the UN Global Compact Network Türkiye, co-chairing its Gender Equality Task Force (2019–2022). She was also the founding Director of Business Against Domestic Violence Project, which brought more than 100 companies together. She currently chairs the 30% Club Türkiye campaign, which she initiated, sits on 30% Club’s Global Strategy Committee and also on the High Advisory Board of the Human Development Foundation (İNGEV), SSE Investor Group Advisory Board  and WEF affiliated Chapter Zero Türkiye. A visiting professor at the University of Groningen from 2014 to 2020, she has published widely on how governance and business policies shape firm performance and societal outcomes. She joined Özyeğin University Business School in 2025 and is based in the Netherlands.