As corporate leaders around the world face unprecedented challenges, many are learning that the old ways of doing business no longer match the demands of today.
Whereas in the past, company executives may have felt their obligations were primarily to serve customers or shareholders, in recent years greater emphasis has been placed on a larger range of corporate stakeholders, including employees, suppliers, and society at large.
The Hub, Columbia Business School's new think tank, aims to tackle the most pressing challenges facing society. Launched last September, the new initiative will initially focus on the intersection of business and society and is centered in the belief that solving the most vexing questions requires the collaboration of multiple stakeholders.
Housed on Columbia Business School's new state-of-the-art campus in Manhattanville, The Hub will be a center of activity featuring seminars, luncheons, and broader audience events. It will be a home for visiting scholars, business leaders, and policymakers to engage with the School's community and a mechanism for sharing our thought leadership with the world.
Every two years, the dean, in consultation with faculty and key stakeholders, will identify a theme to serve as the Hub's focus for the subsequent period.
"The idea is to bring together scholars, policymakers, and business leaders to address major issues now facing the business world, as well as society,” says Oded Netzer, Columbia Business School's vice dean for research and the Arthur J. Samberg Professor of Business.
One of The Hub's first events took place last October, when the School hosted the lecture “The Changing Face of Tyranny in the 21st Century: with Comments on Russia and Ukraine,” by Sergei Guriev, a specialist in political economy and the newly appointed provost at Sciences Po in Paris. Guriev discussed his recent book, Spin Dictators, which examines how autocrats use the affordances of democracy, such as the media, as tools of disinformation, along with observations on current events in Russia and Ukraine.
Find out more about The Hub at business.columbia.edu/hub.
