2021-2022 Annual Report

Letter from IBES

Dear Friends,  

We are honored to share the exceptional growth and impact of LMU’s Institute for Business Ethics and Sustainability (IBES). IBES is a center of excellence that promotes ethical reasoning and principled business leadership, with an emphasis on advancing sustainable development and the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).    

IBES has continued to support the College of Business Administration’s commitment to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by enhancing our interdisciplinary networks and initiatives by building partnerships and creating collaborative opportunities that support the embodiment of SDG #17 - Partnerships for the Goals. We are especially pleased to house the newly launched D.K. Kim Foundation Business for Good Program, which will incorporate the learning experiences from CBA’s mandatory Business for Good class into a curriculum for developing business solutions for low-income communities, with a focus on subsistence marketplaces, that will be disseminated to programs around the world. 

Additionally, IBES increased our global reach as one of seven institutions that designed and co-led a world-first, post-graduate course, Globally Responsible Leadership for Sustainable Transformation, administered by the GRLI. Promoting the adoption of sustainable transformation leadership methods, the course offered modules from LMU and Antwerp Management School, University of Limerick, Sasin School of Management, Catolica Porto Business School, Leadershape Global, United Kingdom and Colorado State University. 

We are grateful for the guidance from our Faculty Advisory and Sustainability Advisory Committees, who have helped us design programs and courses relevant to our business audience and student community. This year’s Business as a Force for Good Annual Ethics Symposium, Supply Chain and Sustainability: Directions, Decisions & Impact, reached over 380 people as they learned from procurement and sustainability executives from a variety of fields, who shared their organizational initiatives in supply chain sustainability. 

We are proud to share that CBA undergraduate student teams have won the Flourish Prize for Business as an Agent of World Benefit for 3 years in a row. The Flourish Prizes are awarded by AIM2Flourish, an initiative of the Fowler Center for Business as an Agent of World Benefit at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University, to student teams that tell the story of business innovations from for-profit companies that help achieve one or more of the UN Global Goals. One of this year’s teams, Food is Power (SDG #11) also won the IBES Promotion of Justice Challenge and was showcased at LMU’s 14th annual Undergraduate Research Symposium.  

IBES is also strengthening its research arm with the establishment of the Faculty Opportunity Fund, which distributes awards annually to faculty members whose research supports PRME Principle #4 and the work of businesses advancing any of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We supported two projects this year – Exploring Food Accessibility and Social Vulnerability in Atlanta, Georgia, and Green Innovation of Agri-Entrepreneurship and Unnoticed Government-Enterprise Relationships in Rural China – and plan to expand our support next year. 

Finally, we are excited that our alumni engagement has continued to grow as the virtual International Business Ethics and Sustainability Case Competition hosted our largest contingent of judges yet – 50 executive alumni judges who gave feedback to 25 student teams from four continents during our annual two-day program in April. 

We give thanks to our supporters and partners for making our work possible and look forward to our coming year. 

Jeff Thies,  Director
Chiray Koo, Assistant Director