It’s good for business for business to be good

January 23, 2012

Speaking at the 2^nd annual Pears Business Schools Partnership lecture, Sir Andrew Witty, Chief Executive Officer of GlaxoSmithKline, made a powerful case for businesses to connect more strongly with society and its values and reap the business benefits of doing so.

He spoke (on 18^th January) before an audience of over three hundred business leaders, academics and students at Cranfield School of Management, with the speech broadcast live to business schools in Denmark, Spain, Belgium, Brazil and France, and followed up with an extensive Q&A session.

The Pears Business Schools Partnership is a collaboration between Cranfield School of Management, London Business School, Saїd Business School and Pears Foundation to promote sustainable and responsible business in society by engaging and inspiring the next generation of leaders.

Its aim is to inspire future leaders to make a positive difference through corporate responsibility, social entrepreneurship and intrapreneurship, sustainability, core business practice, and individual philanthropy and other innovative models for change.

It is achieving this through the annual lecture – delivered by a leading business figure who is innovatively using the power of business to make a positive difference – and through the publication and teaching of illustrative case studies on the positive value businesses and business leaders are contributing to society.

 The main points Sir Andrew raised in this year’s lecture were:

• Now is an important time to consider the intersection of business with society
• Trust in the private sector has eroded and corporations have become more de-humanised over the past twenty years
• Businesses need to put the individual at the heart of everything they do – from their staff to customers, suppliers and shareholders – and align themselves with their values as people
• Businesses which take corporate responsibility seriously and take the long term view are likely to be more successful and sustainable
• By acting on their values, businesses have a stronger licence to operate, a more authoritative voice on key issues and promote a longevity that a sole focus on quarterly earnings does not
• Senior business leaders need to take responsibility for setting the tone and leading by example in terms of corporate responsibility
• The UK needs to positively re-balance its economy, growing the private sector with a focus on manufacturing. If we want the next Apple to be British, businesses must engage on the values of the people they are trying to attract

 He ended his speech with a challenge to current business leaders and the potential future leaders he was addressing at Cranfield and beyond:

“We must stand in front of the mirror and ask ourselves – what’s the most we can do to make a positive difference, to do better, be responsible, to keep challenging and demanding better?

“One person can make a difference by accepting the responsibility of doing the best they can do, for the business and wider society.”

Speaking after the lecture, Trevor Pears, Executive Chair of the Pears Foundation, said:

“It was great to hear a business leader speak so refreshingly and openly about both individual responsibility and the positive role that businesses can and do play in society. This Partnership is about inspiring the next generation of business leaders to make a positive difference both to their businesses and the world. Basically, we want more people like Sir Andrew running businesses!”

The development of the Pears Business Schools Partnership followed research undertaken for Pears Foundation by Theresa Lloyd, founder Director of Philanthropy UK and author of Why Rich People Give (2004). Theresa’s work drew on interviews with Deans, MBA programme directors and careers directors in a number of business schools, in the UK and internationally, together with input from the MBA Association and the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC). A number of reports and networks were also reviewed. The analysis indicated that a key constraint to incorporating issues relating to individual social responsibility, and linking this to corporate social responsibility, into the core curriculum and teaching materials on MBA courses is the lack of a sufficient number and range of appropriate and relevant high quality case studies. The importance of providing inspirational role models was also evident. These business schools were chosen because of their positive response to and focus on this area, in which there is growing interest.

The third annual Pears Business Schools Partnership lecture will be delivered in 2013 at Saїd Business School, Oxford.

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