The debate over whether a trade-off between purpose and profit a) still exists, b) has been tempered or c) even eliminated has been building for some time. It is powered by both public demand that our corporations deliver more for society and well documented global imperatives such as environmental degradation, technological transformation and growing wealth inequality.
Jenny Scott and Jyoti Banerjee have co-authored a paper that draws together academic evidence, polling research and data points over more than 20 years to build the case that businesses whose strategies are actively driven by a purpose that optimises value for multiple stakeholders, perform better than those that do not.

Fronesys founders played influential roles in the development of the integrated reporting movement, a corporate reporting mechanism that now has around two thousand listed companies as its adopters, and which is now part of the mainstream of corporate reporting. So, perhaps, now is as good a time as any for Jyoti Banerjee to look back and assess the outcomes and impacts, as well as the what-might-have-beens, of this new form of corporate reporting.

Oxford University Press has just released a new chapter from the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Food, Water and Society: Integrating Multi-Capital Thinking in Business Decisions. The new chapter, contributed by Fronesys partner Jyoti Banerjee, explores how we need to change our understanding of value. Here is Jyoti’s account of what you can expect in this new publication.

Jyoti Banerjee, partner at Fronesys, highlights that by adopting the principles of integrated thinking and reporting, universities can move away from a focus on reporting short term financial metrics to a multi-stakeholder approach which offers compelling narratives about their value.

The global system of corporate information is at an inflection point.
On the one hand, the landscape for corporate information is witnessing a sea change, with wide-ranging global digital trends transforming the flows of corporate information, in the way this information is produced, distributed and consumed.
On the other hand, the 20th century presumption that the annual report is the dominant life-form for the communication of corporate information looks less appropriate in the 21st century. Corporate reporting is already changing, driven by the need to move away from backward-facing reports that focus on financial activity alone and are devoid of any explanation of how organisations create (or destroy) value.
Does anybody care? What should be done about it? Jyoti Banerjee considers the options.