Before starting LIS, I was genuinely excited. I was eager to dive deeper into sustainability from an academic perspective, particularly through the lens of an English-speaking institution in order to get a new intellectual and cultural perspective. But I was also curious, and slightly confused, about what “interdisciplinarity” actually meant in practice. I had a vague sense that it meant mixing subjects, but I wasn’t sure how that would apply to a field like sustainability, which I viewed primarily through environmental, scientific, or policy-related lenses.

However, after the first two weeks of classes, I started to feel quite lost. We had classes in culture, law, and systems thinking, all intellectually stimulating, but I struggled to connect them to what I thought I had come to study: sustainability. I wanted tangible frameworks, detailed examples of climate policies or energy transitions, and conversations about the ecological crisis. Instead, I found myself studying cultural theory or legal systems, which at the time seemed too abstract, or even off-topic. I remember questioning what I was doing there and why emlyon wanted us to do this academic exchange.

It’s only later that I started to shift my perspective. The turning point came not from a class, but from a book I happened to pick up in the shared space: Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein. The title alone resonated deeply. I’ve always had a “generalist” academic path, and not always by design. People around me, friends and family mostly, often said I should have specialized earlier. Many of my peers chose a specific direction early on, such as data analysis, luxury marketing, or market finance. Meanwhile, I kept exploring. I did business school without focusing on a particular track, then explored international relations and media studies. More recently, I decided to dive into sustainability with a new master, which I believe is the most important and urgent challenge of our time.

Reading Range helped me make sense of that path. Epstein explains that generalists, people who explore multiple fields, are often better equipped to solve complex and unfamiliar problems. Their diverse experiences allow them to draw connections across domains, spot patterns others might miss, and think more creatively. That idea clicked immediately with how I had been feeling. I realized that my frustration at LIS wasn’t really about the content, but about my expectations. I was expecting a linear and technical course on sustainability. Instead, I was being trained to think more broadly and to integrate knowledge from many fields.

This book helped me see the value of interdisciplinary learning in a completely different light. Instead of asking myself how this class is related to sustainability, I began asking what lens this discipline offers that could be useful in tackling sustainability challenges. Suddenly, everything started to make more sense and I was able to make links. Cultural analysis is essential to understand how societies frame environmental issues. Law structures the possibilities of action and defines the responsibilities of institutions. Systems thinking reveals the interdependencies and unintended consequences within environmental and social systems.

This shift in mindset also helped me revisit subjects I had previously encountered in my academic journey, but now through a new lens. I had studied cultural studies and semiotics at university in France, explored legal frameworks in business school, and had a first introduction to systems thinking during an Erasmus exchange at Trinity College Dublin. These disciplines were not new to me, but the way LIS framed them, as interconnected and as tools for understanding complexity within a broader system, gave them new relevance. They were no longer isolated areas of knowledge, but integral components in thinking systemically about sustainable transformation.

I also realized that this approach wasn’t only intellectually useful, it was also empowering. I stopped seeing my generalist path as a liability and started seeing it as an asset. I was no longer trying to catch up with the so-called experts in a field, the objective is to learn how to become a connector, someone who can navigate between fields and spot ideas that might otherwise stay siloed.

This insight also shaped the way I engaged with our group project. As a team, we had to work on a shared sustainability issue, urban mobility, but from the perspective of different European cities. We came from different academic and cultural backgrounds, and we each brought different strengths. My role became that of the “Super-Flexi-Hero” because I naturally took on several responsibilities and wanted to support everyone. I helped coordinate discussions, conduct research, and contributed to the data, media, and tech aspects. That adaptability reflected my own interdisciplinary mindset. I also chose to focus on Paris because I grew up in the suburbs and have personally experienced the tensions around mobility, exclusion, and unequal access to public transport. That personal connection helped ground my academic analysis in lived reality.

In our project, interdisciplinarity wasn’t just a theoretical concept, it was a necessity. To understand urban mobility, we needed to combine spatial analysis, policy review, social justice frameworks, and political theory. We drew on maps, regulations, news articles, personal experiences, and even AI-based document analysis. Our findings revealed how policies can unintentionally reinforce social inequalities, how political coordination shapes long-term success, and how urban design influences everyday behavior. These insights only emerged because we were able to bring different perspectives together.

This group experience reinforced what I had learned through my personal reflection: that sustainability is not a single discipline. It is a complex and dynamic field that sits at the intersection of the social, political, economic, and environmental spheres. To work effectively in this field, especially in roles like sustainability consulting, which I’ll be starting in September, you need more than technical expertise. You need a broad understanding of systems, an ability to communicate across disciplines, and a mindset that is comfortable with ambiguity and complexity.

Consulting, for me, represents the next step in applying what I’ve understood at LIS. I chose it precisely because it allows me to maintain a wide lens, working across different sectors, clients, and issues. I want to help organizations navigate the transition toward more sustainable models, and to do that well, I believe it’s essential to approach problems from multiple angles. That means drawing on law, culture, ethics, data, communication, and understanding how they all fit together.

One last insight I’ve had during this journey in London is that interdisciplinary the way we define ourselves, not just as experts in a narrow domain, but as learners and connectors. It has given me a new appreciation for my curiosity, my adaptability, and my desire to explore. I think during these two months I’ve learned how to embrace a way of thinking and working that is more open and flexible.

To conclude, my experience at LIS has shifted my approach to learning. What started as confusion and disappointment evolved into confidence and clarity. I now see interdisciplinarity as not only relevant to sustainability, but essential, both in theory and in the way I plan to work moving forward.