Hi, I'm Dr Mary Johnstone-Louis and I am the Programme Director of the Ownership Project
here at Oxford Saïd Business School, and I wanted to share with you a little bit about my background,
why we do what we do here with the project, and why particularly the project is of interest to me.
So, my career has really looked at a very simple problem, which is how do leaders build strategy
around the issues that concern us all, whether that means the environment or issues around
gender, or supply chain, and the human rights issues that come up in those areas; what is the
way in which the issues that really affect all of our societies come into the strategic frame
for leaders. I've done this through everything from fieldwork in rural Bangladesh all the way to
work looking at Avon ladies in South Africa, and how some of these women are really proving
to be incredibly resilient, innovative, and very entrepreneurial members of their communities and
so always looking at the ways that business can be part of a solution. The way that I landed on
the Ownership Project is several years back, from a scoping exercise that I did,
along with a team here at the business school to understand,
around the landscape of entities that are trying to present new metrics, new tools, new ways of thinking about
business as a force for good if you will. What are the influencing strategies that these
organizations use, where are they perhaps duplicating efforts
or where can their efforts be made even more powerful through collaboration? And what was really striking to me,
as I did that mapping with my previous experience of both fieldwork and research in mind
was to see the - I would say - almost overemphasis on the role of executive teams,
on CEOs, really on those very visible leaders as those who can really change organizations
and it begged a question. Which is, how can those who are in executive leadership take responsibility for
and deliver on corporate commitments over the long term, particularly when many of these commitments
have to do with issues that are actually across generations? For example, issues around the environment,
issues around, for example, biodiversity loss, that realistically will require cross-generational commitments
by a large number of organizations in order to see change.
So, with the team here at the School, we began to ask the question of who else within the corporate landscape
might be uniquely positioned to think strategically and really think in a very long-term kind of manner
around the responsibilities and the purpose of a company? We settled on owners,
and it's been a really exciting journey to see through this project how owners begin to think about
what their role is within their company, within the companies that they invest, how they also
begin to think about the role of their history or legacy in terms of shaping the future
of the industries which are undergoing rapid transformation. It's really brought us into, I would say, an even deeper focus
on how ownership and governance come together to really deliver on the commitments
that we see even increasing today around corporate engagement with issues around public goods
and social and environmental impacts. So, it's been a really exciting journey, I would say
that a journey is just beginning, so do please be invited to join our LinkedIn group
to follow the conversations that we have, both at a level of research and with owners who are in these day-to-day decisions,
and also do sign up for our newsletter. We'll be sharing our findings really as they come out
and it's a very exciting time for us as a team. So thanks for listening - really glad
that you could join, and look forward to sharing more about what we're learning on ownership
and responsible ownership, here at Oxford Saïd.