Call For Case Studies of B Corp Certified Family Enterprises

Co-Editors: PramoDITA Sharma, Marta Widz, Mark Green and  Caroline Seow

 

Description

Part of the Elgar Cases in Entrepreneurship, this book will feature family enterprises that have embraced the high standards of accountability and transparency by passing the B Impact Assessment and becoming Certified B Corps. Each case will highlight the sustainability journey of family enterprises that choose to use their business operations and investments towards tackling global grand challenges like climate change, loss of biodiversity, escalating income inequality and rising poverty.

 

Launched in 2007, today there are over 8,000 Certified B Corps, from 160 Industries, across ninety countries. B Corps range from the smallest and youngest companies, to the largest and oldest.

 

To become a B Corp, companies take the B Impact Assessment (BIA). While there are many credible accreditation frameworks available, what sets the B Corp certification apart is that it evaluates an entire company on metrics that include worker engagement, community involvement, environmental footprint, and governance structure, rather than a specific product or aspect of a company.

 

The journey to becoming a B Corp is educational, aspirational, and focused on improvement. But as B Corp family enterprises will attest, it also requires investment of time and resources. In addition to attaining a minimum verified score of 80 points, B Corp certification requires companies to change their constitution to reflect a Purpose Clause and a Directors Clause to consider their impacts on all stakeholders. B Corps pay an annual fee based on their revenues and need to recertify every three years.

 

Family enterprises are well-known for their frugality and penchant for privacy. So, it is curious why a growing number of these enterprises are voluntarily subjecting themselves to B Impact Assessments (BIA) to become B Corp certified. And, why many undergo this assessment every three years.

 

Cases of Family Business B Corps featured in this book will address questions like, but not limited to, the following:

 

  • Why some family enterprises choose to become Certified Benefit Corporations?
  • How do business leaders decide whether all or part of their business portfolio should become B Corp Certified?
  • What does the B Corp journey entail?
  • What process is used by the proponents of B Corp assessment (BIA) to persuade the less enthusiastic stakeholders within the family enterprise?
  • What is the impact of B Corp certification on the internal operations and culture of a business?
  • What impact, if any, do the B Corp (certified) companies see on their key stakeholders like employees, customers, suppliers, investors, and others?
  • How does the B Corp certification support the strategic decision making of a business?
  • How do B Corp certified companies support each other to magnify their positive impact?
  • Why some family enterprises choose to go through B Corp re-certification every three years while others don’t?

 

 

TimeLine
  • July 2024 One-page case study proposal to be submitted.
  • 15th August 2024 Selected proposals invited for full case submission.
  • 15th January 2025 Full-case and Teaching Notes due.
  • 15th March 2025 Revisions invited.
  • 15th June 2025 Revised submissions due.
  • 15th July 2025 Final decisions communicated with authors. Revisions may be invited.
  • 15th August 2025 Final case submission due.
  • 15th February 2026 All materials including editors’ introduction submitted to the publisher.
  • 2026 Case Book Publication.

 

Practicalities

 

One-page (single spaced) case proposal must indicate the following:

 

     Basic information

  • About the company – Name, age, size in revenues, number of employees, industry, location of headquarters and operations, product-market scope, year(s) in which it became a B Corp., overall B Impact Score(s).
  • About the family – Generations involved in business in management, board, ownership. Please indicate which generation cumulatively owns more than 25% of shares.

     Brief description of the case.

  • Notable features of the family enterprise that attracted you to write this case.
  • Key question/s you expect to address in your case.
  • Data collection plans. Please indicate the work completed and whether you have secured approval to write the case and conduct interviews with key family and non-family members.
  • Names and affiliations of each contributor. Indicate the experience each author has in working with family enterprise and/or writing of teaching cases.

 

Authors of selected proposals will be invited to submit a 5-20 double-spaced pages Case Study and Teaching Note, guidelines for which will be shared with invited authors.

 

Resources to inspire ideas:

 

All submissions or questions must be sent to PramoDITA Sharma at [email protected]