Master's lecture, Grow the Pie: How Great Companies Deliver Both Purpose and Profit

Purpose is one of the corporate buzzwords of 2021, with the politicians, the public, and even investors themselves calling on businesses to serve wider society. But it seems unrealistic to think about purpose in a pandemic when companies are strapped for cash, and companies also have a responsibility to their shareholders. Is there a trade-off between purpose and profit, or is it possible for companies to achieve both? This talk will critically examine the case for purposeful business, using rigorous evidence and real-life examples to show what works – and, importantly, what doesn’t. It will discuss practical ways for businesses of all sizes to put purpose into practice, and how investors and citizens can play their part. Professor Alex Edmans will draw on his new book, “Grow the Pie: How Great Companies Deliver Both Purpose and Profit”, which was named to the Financial Times Business Books of the Year for 2020.

Alex Edmans is Professor of Finance at London Business School. Alex has a PhD from MIT as a Fulbright Scholar, and was previously a tenured professor at Wharton and an investment banker at Morgan Stanley. Alex has spoken at the World Economic Forum in Davos, testified in the UK Parliament, and given the TED talk “What to Trust in a Post-Truth World” and the TEDx talk “The Social Responsibility of Business” with a combined 2 million views. He serves as Mercers School Memorial Professor of Business at Gresham College, giving a four-year programme of lectures to the public, and on Royal London Asset Management’s Responsible Investment Advisory Committee. Alex has appeared on Bloomberg, BBC, CNBC, CNN, ITV, Sky News and Sky Sports, and written for the Financial Times, Harvard Business Review, and Wall Street Journal. At Wharton, he won 14 teaching awards in 6 years; at LBS, he won the Excellence in Teaching award for best professor across all programmes. He has been named to Poets and Quants Best 40 Professors Under 40 and Thinkers50 Radar.