Engage to Change - Lloyds Banking Group Centre for Responsible Business
Starting as we mean to continue and doing things a little differently, the spicy aroma of Indian street food and the lively buzz of conversation greeted the guests who joined us in the Business School Atrium last Thursday as Lloyds Banking Group Centre for Responsible Business hosted its first ‘Curry, Chat and Corporate Change’ engagement event.
It was the first in a series of events designed to provide engagement opportunities for representatives from the University, local business community, practitioners doing great work in the responsible business space and senior representatives from Lloyds Banking Group. Participants for this first event included Liza Vizard, Head of Political Engagement and Colin Clements, EA to Group Director, Responsible Business and Inclusion, as well as a wonderfully supportive delegation from BITC. The format allowed a diverse range of participants to share thoughts and ideas about how to connect people, ideas and opportunities to inform, shape and energise the Responsible Business Revolution and also to underpin Lloyds Banking Group’s pioneering initiative - ‘Helping Britain Prosper.’
In the new Business School Lecture Theatre, which as Professor Cathy Cassell so aptly pointed out “has been designed for collaboration” and in a lively and engaging format, stimulated by insightful questions from the audience, thought leaders Professor Ian Thomson, Professor Cathy Cassell; Professor Isabelle Szmigin and Ross Gardner (Lloyds Banking Group) chatted about the key issues and challenges that lie ahead and the process of purposeful engagement and collaboration needed to address the causes of irresponsibility and enable businesses to harness their power and purpose to solve social, environmental and economic problems, not create them.
Ian Thomson, Centre Director, outlined his vision and emphasised the need to act now, saying:
“In collaboration with Research Centres across the University of Birmingham, other academic institutions, businesses and civic society and through research, educating the next generation of responsible leaders and knowledge partnerships, we want to become a leading international Centre for responsible business influence, innovation and impact. Building a vibrant cross-cutting community of scholars, we will explore how businesses, from sole traders, SMEs and social enterprises to supranationals, can be ‘responsibly rewired’, to add greater value to society.”
In a lively Q&A session, with topics ranging from responsible corporate role models, the causes of obesity, ethical consumption and financial regulation, to how do we monitor and measure responsible business change and how can businesses operationalise the UN Sustainable Development Goals to improve performance, the audience demonstrated their extensive knowledge of responsible business issues and their passion and commitment for supporting the Centre’s challenge-based research agenda.
With special thanks to Professor Lloyd C Harris, Head of Department of Marketing; Dr. Joe Sanderson, Head of Department of Management; Dr. Vivek Soundararajan; Lecturer (Assistant Professor) Strategy & International Business; Dr. Robert Charnock, Lecturer in Accounting; Dr. Jairaj Gupta, Lecturer in Finance and Dr. Amy Fraher, Senior Lecturer in Human Resource Management and Organisational Behaviour for their time and commitment and for sharing their responsible business research interests with our visitors.