Highlights
The Social Purpose of the Firm
- 14 FEB 2023
What’s more important – Purpose or Profits? Or do they go together? BiGS launched the Social Purpose of the Firm (SPF), a new course for all first year MBA students investigating these questions. Over two days, 11 faculty members from across the School taught five new cases involving companies ranging from Microsoft to Sweden’s Northvolt electric battery maker, raising questions about the role business plays in addressing environmental and societal issues.
The BiGS Fix
- 15 MAR 2023
Wondering about how to measure carbon emissions? Curious how to improve your corporate diversity initiatives? Then check out The BiGS Fix. We provide you with actionable intelligence to drive the next generation of capitalism. Every week, we will share a free and regular flow of ideas from Harvard's community in accessible, relevant, streamlined, and shareable formats.
The BiGS Idea Video Series
- 31 MAR 2023
The BiGS Idea Video Series brings you the latest faculty research on business and society. This series of short videos aims to provide business leaders with strategies and best practices to make progress on climate change and inequality.
Capitalism is under attack. From across the political spectrum, critics have decried business’s role in increasing economic inequality, driving environmental destruction, and sustaining systems of racial injustice.
The Institute for the Study of Business in Global Society (BiGS) brings together a community of scholars, students, and practitioners to examine those areas where business and society interact and occasionally collide, and to explore how business can help address some of society’s greatest challenges.
Accounting for Climate Change
- DEC 2021
Corporations are facing growing pressure—from investors, advocacy groups, politicians, and even business leaders themselves—to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from their operations and their supply and distribution chains. About 90% of the companies in the S&P 500 now issue some form of environmental, social, and governance report, almost always including an estimate of the company’s GHG emissions.
Slavery and Capitalism
- MAR 2022
The birth of “Modern Economic Growth” constituted a watershed in human history, allowing societies to escape the Malthusian impasse and permanently raise living standards. While the new growth regime had lifted billions of people out of extreme poverty over the last two centuries, the total distribution of economic gains—both between and within countries—had been far from equitable.
2022 Edelman Trust Barometer: The Geopolitical Business
- MAY 2022
The latest version of the Edelman Trust Barometer shows that there is a “new values mandate for business to be an ethical participant in society.” The report found that geopolitics is now a key issue for business to address and that, while trust in business is rising in the West, those gains are only seen among those in the top quartile of income.
To Drive Diversity Efforts, Don’t Tiptoe Around Your Legal Risk
- JUL 2022
Many DEI initiatives are scuttled because DEI leaders and legal teams feel themselves to be at odds over questions of acceptable risk. DEI leaders see lawyers as guardians of the status quo, whereas legal experts, trained to anticipate the worst, believe they are protecting the company from legal risk. In most situations they’re confronted with a risk-reward calculus that’s easy to quantify.
The BiGS Fellows are scholarly researchers who will join the School to work on specific projects related to issues of business and society. They will provide intellectual leadership and research support that will accelerate the process of knowledge creation at HBS and leverage the expertise of our faculty. For the 2022 – 23 academic year, the fellowship is dedicated to scholars whose work focuses on issues of race, diversity, inclusion, and inequality.
Initiatives
Much of BiGS’ ongoing work is conducted by faculty associated with the School’s distinctive
Initiatives – interdisciplinary groups of researchers who come together around specific topics
relating to business innovation and societal equity. Initiatives connect this work
to their extensive networks of leading practitioners, working with them to develop
and test smart solutions to some of society’s most pressing issues.
Projects
Research Projects allow faculty to pursue more specific topics at the intersection of research and practice. They typically result in publications, conferences, and other forms of knowledge dissemination.
Students and practitioners can engage with the topics that BiGS focuses on through a number of courses and cases already in place.
New MBA Course Asks Students: What’s More Important—Purpose or Profits?
- 14 FEB 2023
- |
- Harvard Business School
All first year students last month completed a short new course on the Social Purpose of the Firm (SPF), organized by the Institute for the Study of Business in Global Society (BiGS).
Events
Doing Business in a Divided World
- 21 OCT 2022 |
- Detroit, MI
A conversation between CEOs and civic leaders from the midwestern region, hosted in conjunction with the mid-US research office, exploring the changing demands being placed upon for-profit firms, and the expanding role that business leaders are playing in addressing complex societal issues.
BiGS Seminar Series
- Faculty Seminar Series
A monthly faculty seminar presenting cutting-edge work at the intersection of business and society. The seminars are open to all Harvard faculty, as well as to interested doctoral students or faculty members from other institutions. In 2022 – 23, the seminar will focus on novel business solutions for addressing climate change (fall semester) and economic inclusion (spring).
Stay in Touch
Are you interested in the intersection of business and society? Register for updates
on new research and new programs as BiGS grows.