From November 1-4, 2001, Columbia’s Social Enterprise Club headed south to the campus of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School for the 2001 Net Impact Conference.
The conference—entitled "Redefining the Bottom Line"—attracted nearly 800 students from over 50 business schools to discuss strategies for the private sector to assess the social and environmental effects of business activities in addition to standard measures for financial performance. The conference began on Friday with a keynote address from Jeffrey Swartz, President and CEO of Timberland. (Swartz was also recently awarded the Botwinick Prize for Business Ethics by Columbia Business School.)
Swartz discussed the difficulties of maintaining financial performance while simultaneously reducing environmental damage and increasing positive social impact. While no easy answers emerged, Swartz effectively framed the tensions that business managers must confront when pursuing profitability while striving to be responsible corporate citizens. After the keynote speech, a panel discussion followed which focused on defining sustainability and the responsibility of corporations to promote sustainable business practices.
Panel members included Al Hammond from World Resources Institute; Stuart Hart and Jim Johnson from Kenan-Flagler Business School; Lynelle Preston from Hewlett Packard’s e-Inclusion Initiative; and Paul Tebo from DuPont. In keeping with the commercial savvy of the Social Enterprise Club, the panel discussed opportunities for entrepreneurs and corporations to succeed financially by providing environmentally sustainable solutions to some of the world’s current social and environmental problems.
Later in the evening another social entrepreneur, Bill Shore of Share Our Strength (www.strength.org), shared his vision for public-private partnerships that take aim at the social problems of our time. In the case of Share Our Strength, Shore created an organization that could recruit large corporations and professionals—such as chefs, accountants, artists, public relations experts, writers and event plannerss—to tackle hunger in the US. Shore also told of his experiences with Community Wealth Ventures, a related organization designed to provide strategic counsel to corporations, foundations, and non-profit organizations.
On Saturday, Columbia students were able to choose from five different panel discussions: Business Strategy for a Sustainable World, Models for Sustaining Natural Resources, Integrating Conscientious Business & Profitability, Strengthening Community Frameworks and Doing Well By Doing Good. These panel discussions addressed areas such as social venture capital, cause-related marketing, sustainable product design, affordable housing, and philanthropy.
The conference officially concluded on Saturday evening with William McDunnough, an internationally renowned designer and one of the primary proponents and shapers of what he and his partners call The Next Industrial Revolution. Most of the Social Enterprise Club agreed that this was the highlight of the conference. "It took humans 5,000 years to put wheels on luggage" is McDunnough’s familiar refrain. The underlying moral of the story is that sometimes rather obvious innovations take thousands of years to develop. McDunnough — an architect, designer and environmental philospher — believes that businesses have yet to understand the very fundamental relationship between business and the environment.
Companies that come to understand their environments will be more financially successful and will be at the forefront of the next industrial revolution. To this end, much of McDunnough’s professional career has focused on demonstrating the success of business decisions that incorporate sustainable business practices. McDunnough and his partners have designed environmentally-friendly buildings for Nike and Ford which draw upon local assets such as abundant sunlight. Experience has shown that these buildings can pay for themselves over time with reduced energy costs and ready access to supplies of recycled waste water.
Other projects range from reformulating manufacturing processes to eliminate the use of toxic inputs to redesigning familiar commercial products to reduce waste. Experience has also shown that companies can position their environmentally sustainable products to leverage competitive advantages. Selen Ucak, MBA 2003, agrees.
"Being in business school, I am always conscious of the tension between maintaining high environmental and social standards and running a business," stated Ucak. "Listening to Bill McDunnough was a refreshing change from the usual pessimism that environmental and social responsibility reduces profitability. I was inspired by the idea that environmental responsibility and profitable business can coexist and thrive."
The intersection of business, social change and environmental responsibility, however, is familiar ground for members of Net Impact. Net Impact, which began as Students for Responsible Business in 1993, is a national organization of MBA students dedicated to "using the power of business to create a better world."
The Social Enterprise Club, Columbia’s local affiliate of Net Impact, sends representatives to the national conference and provides career resources and exposure to professional areas such as: social ventures, international development, philanthropy, corporate social responsibility, and non-profit management. For all of the Columbia students who attended, the national conference is an annual highlight and a tremendous opportunity to meet students from other schools and to discuss the role of business as an agency for change.
Myka Reinsch, Social Enterprise Club VP of Finance, enjoyed being "in a situation where social responsibility was the primary theme. For a weekend, at least, [MBA students’] business perspective and profit motive was a given, and social responsibility was the main focus." Students interested in learning more about Net Impact and the conference are encouraged to visit www.netimpact.org.
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