Q&A: Roundtable on Creating Shared Value

(3BL Media / theCSRfeed) In December, executives from ten major corporations gathered at Goldman Sachs' New York headquarters in a conversation led by FSG's Mark Kramer and John Kania to discuss the innovative approaches and evolving practice each was taking in implementing shared value.

Shared value is the idea of creating simultaneous value for both business and society that was presented as the cover story in the January 2011 issue of Harvard Business Review by Michael Porter and Mark Kramer of FSG.

Stanford Social Innovation Review (SSIR), FSG, and the Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy (CECP) are pleased to present highlights of these intimate roundtable discussions in this new article featured in Stanford Social Innovation Review.

The article presents a rare opportunity to hear corporate executives, in their own words, articulate the paradigm shifts that occur when companies adopt shared value approaches, and how these decisions impact the balance between profitability and societal needs. Companies represented in the discussion included Alcoa, Cisco, Dow Chemical Company, Goldman Sachs, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, InterContinental Hotel Group and more.

Conversations among these companies that are actively engaged in shared value strategies suggest that there is great potential for shared value approaches to better address today's most pressing social problems, while still meeting shareholder and bottom line expectations.

Read the Stanford Social Innovation Review article and watch interviews with corporate leader attendees who describe shared value in their own words.