As the fundamentals of the business ecosystem have been upended in the COVID-19 era, too has our relationship to research and statistical data. The same technologies that have brought businesses and consumers closer together have complicated and altered the idea of a balanced and objective truth. As we continue to rely upon data and statistical research to point us in the right direction during an increasingly unstable time, we must examine the impact and consequences of this data and make sure it is being used for humane and sustainable solutions.

The ubiquity of social media and the ability to communicate with virtually anyone at virtually any time has drastically changed the ways we relate to one another. Education has become less about “discovering” new information and more about learning how to sift between good and wrong information. As we begin to think about new ways to communicate new ideas and strategies effectively, we believe that researching with impact is the best way to create a knowledge ecosystem that guides and supports the new and emerging business ecosystem that we envision here at ICSB.

What do we mean by a knowledge ecosystem? First, we recognize the importance of local businesses and consumers having the agency diagnose and solve the issues facing their communities. We reject the idea that there is a one-size-fits-all solution to the myriad problems facing the world today. We want to empower actors within the business community to have the framework to create new and innovative solutions to the issues they face now and in the future.

Secondly, we understand that people will use and rely on different sources of information in the era of social media and global connectivity. The purpose of ICSB and the educational resources that we provide is not to claim that we have all the solutions; instead, we believe we are building a community of driven, empathetic individuals who recognize the issues faced and believe that there are ideals and principles that we should prioritize in the re-making of our business world. That is why we think that researching with impact is crucial to our larger goals of promoting equity and justice within the business ecosystem and empowering atypical actors worldwide.

Why is it essential to emphasize researching with impact? We have seen the consequences of research for research’s sake, whether in the continued dismissal of atypical and marginalized individuals or the refusal to recognize the effects of unsustainable investment and production. Too often, the consequences of oppression have been used to justify the continuation of that same oppression. Women are not underrepresented in managerial and leadership positions because they are “too emotional” or lack the necessary experience. They are underrepresented because women have faced structural issues and oppression that have limited their ability to advance and be recognized within the formal leadership structure. The solution to this cannot merely be more research. Research is often presented after the fact to groups of people who knew the outcomes of that research would be far before they were given. It has to be research committed to uncovering the consequences of this past behavior and providing a framework for realistic and just solutions. There is a desperate need for accurate and impactful research that centers on justice and sustainability principles. We believe that organizations like ICSB are the blueprint for what the process of creating sustainable and impactful research will look like.

If you are interested in research with impact, we welcome you to submit to our 2021 World Congress call for papers to be held in Paris, France in person and online. We urge you to engage with essential topics in business research and the type of research necessary in and sign for our recreation of this world into one that focuses on equitable sustainability. We surely hope you will join us on this journey.

Start here: https://icsb2021.com/call-for-papers/

Article by:

Ayman El Tarabishy,
President and CEO, ICSB
Deputy Chair, Department of Management

crossroads (n) – a point at which a crucial decision must be made that will have far-reaching consequences

Over the past year, we’ve seen the entire world take a step back and reconsider the situation in which we find ourselves. It has been a year full of tremendous upheaval and uncertainty, but with this uncertainty has come an enormous possibility of change. The type of change that challenges us and calls us to create something more. Throughout history, there have been moments like these, diversions in the road that ultimately led to the betterment of the world and the people living in it.

One of the most impactful of these moments was the French Revolution. On July 14th, 1789, the storming of the Bastille marked a turning point in the French struggle for Liberté, Egalité, et Fraternité. Bastille Day is an annual holiday marking the significance of that day and the Fête de la Fédération that celebrated the unity of the French people on July 14th, 1790. The remarkable courage that the French people showed, by daring to imagine a world that was better than the one they found themselves in can offer us a guiding light in these unprecedented and trying times.

The French people found themselves at a crossroads when they decided to create a new and more equitable government form. They recognized that the decisions they made would impact countless people’s lives that would come after them. We face similar circumstances today. The volatility and uncertainty in the business ecosystem have forced us to reconsider some of our foundational approaches to entrepreneurship and development. The decisions we make in these upcoming weeks and months will have far-reaching consequences for an entire generation of consumers, investors, and entrepreneurs. So what can we learn from the decisions made by those on Bastille Day?

The storming of the Bastille represented a broadening of horizons and a genuine leap of faith. The French people’s situation was unprecedented, and they took advantage of that unusual nature to push progress forwards. But it would be a mistake to assume that all of that progress was equal.

One of the French Revolution’s landmark results was writing the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, a profoundly influential document. Inspired by the Enlightenment philosophers, the Declaration was a core statement of the French Revolution’s values. It significantly impacted the development of popular conceptions of individual liberty and democracy in Europe and worldwide. But the document had one major flaw. It prioritized the experience of men and disregarded the role and plight of women in the country.

Entre Marie Gouze, a French playwright and activist, became increasingly outspoken against the slave trade in 1788 and began distributing political pamphlets. Incensed by the exclusion of women in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, she wrote the Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen in 1791, where she challenged the practice of male authority and the notion of male-female inequality. Although it failed to impact the Revolution significantly, it remains a deeply influential and important document that shows the commitment to gender equality that existed amongst feminists at the time, while helping us see today that progress is not always.

Here at ICSB, we believe that centering women entrepreneurs and their experiences are vital in reimagining and reworking the current business ecosystem in a more just way. Like Marie Gouze, we need to stand firm in the truth that including and empowering women is not a suggestion or a recommendation, but a necessity. The challenges we face are enormous, but so is the potential that comes with overcoming those challenges. If reconstructing a humane entrepreneurship system in the face of a devastating pandemic is our charge of the Bastille, let us not make the same mistakes as those who came before us. Let us acknowledge, encourage, and follow the women throughout society for the sake of a better future.

We welcome you all to introduce our 2021 World Congress event next Wednesday, December 17th, at 10 am EST. The crossroads faced throughout this year forced us to make a crucial decision. It is the results of our decision that you will see scattered throughout the changes to the ICSB World Congress event. We are unbelievably excited for you all to join us on this journey together. All are welcome to join and can register by following this link: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/icsb-world-congress-2021-webinar-registration-132196131187

We want to thank our ICSB World Congres 2021 Hosts: IPAG Business School and École supérieure des sciences commerciales d’Angers (ESSCA).

https://www.essca.fr/en

https://www.ipag.edu/en

Article by:

Dr. Ayman El Tarabishy
President & CEO, ICSB
Deputy Chair, Department of Management, GW School of Business

Reflection on OECD’s International Compendium of Entrepreneurship Policies Report

The challenges we face are enormous, however, as is our capacity for change and growth. This current moment is an opportunity for real institutional change, but only if we face these challenges together.

This past Monday, we joined forces with the OECD to discuss how the entrepreneurial community grapples with the ongoing uncertainties caused by the pandemic. The webinar started with welcoming remarks from Céline Kauffman, Head of SME and Entrepreneurship policy Division, OECD, and Ayman El Tarabishy, President and CEO, of ICSB.

The global response to these issues will dictate the business ecosystem’s structure for decades, as mentioned by Professor Colin Mason, University of Glasgow, UK, and OECD report contributor. We remain steadfast in our belief that empowering entrepreneurs is key to facilitating a successful response to this ongoing crisis. Today, it seemed important to look at an array of currently unfolding strategies and propose a few of our own.

Across the world, countries are continuing to propose bold and innovative solutions to the myriad of financial issues that have come in the wake of COVID-19. Torsten Anderson, Deputy Director General at the Danish Business Authority, talked about the Danish success in strengthening their entrepreneurship support network and transition to an ecosystem approach. Ana Costa Paula, Head of Unit, Business Policy, Ministry of Economy and Digital Transition – Portugal, talked about the Portuguese focus on technological infrastructure and the benefits of strong start-up markets. We are all aware of Australia’s success by directly transferring large amounts of aid to small businesses to bolster their resiliency and ability to adapt, as outlined by Vicki Stylianou, Head of advocacy and policy at Institute of Public Accountants. Institute, Australia, and an ICSB Board member.

Although these approaches are uniquely tailored to each country’s specific situation, they have one fundamental similarity: they rely on broad policy interventions to strengthen small businesses and entrepreneurs’ ability to respond effectively to the evolving business ecosystem. Governments worldwide are shaping powerful and efficient ecosystems bypassing sustainable policies that aim to grow their humane and productive entrepreneurship capacity. Mr. Andrew McDonald, Chair, Small Business Investment Committee, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), stressed the importance of tailoring responses by stage of business and region.

The OECD’s International Compendium of Entrepreneurship Policies covered in the webinar session presented superbly by Jonathan Potter, Head of Entrepreneurship Policy and Analysis Unit. The OECD has a multi-layered approach to these policy interventions. The first layer is policy intervention for institutional conditions or conditions that deal directly with the business or employees. This usually involves easing regulatory barriers and changing your employees’ or consumers’ attitudes or behaviors. Addressing regulatory barriers is crucial, especially throughout the uncertain context within which we currently find ourselves. Small businesses are faced with a capital shortage and need to address their capacity and flexibility. Freeing them from unnecessary regulatory burdens will provide a crucial boost during a volatile time. The second layer is the most important one. Financial resources must get into the hands of small businesses and entrepreneurs to take advantage of other policy interventions like removing regulatory barriers. Big businesses have been prioritized to stabilize the economy as it suffered its worst economic shock ever. However, as we enter a recovery period and build back, investing in small businesses is the best way to revitalize and repair the global economy. The third layer of the Compendium builds on this idea. By providing holistic regional and national policy initiatives directly to small businesses, we hope to foster a sustainable and automated small business ecosystem that will evolve alongside a changing world and provide innovative solutions to whatever problems may arise.

These recommendations by the International Compendium are directly aligned with our entrepreneurial growth values through Humane Entrepreneurship’s lens. At ICSB, we believe that sustainable, humane, or “productive” (as referred to by the OECD) entrepreneurship is the best way to respond to the challenges we face as a global community. We believe that empowering atypical and non-traditional actors is necessary to unlocking our full potential, and we recognize the importance of education and community in achieving these goals. These conferences and gathering spaces, digital or material, are a window into the future of a humane and prosperous business world. The challenges we face are enormous, however, as is our capacity for change and growth. This current moment is an opportunity for real institutional change, but only if we face these challenges together.

Learn more about the OECD’s work and their recently published International Compendium of Entrepreneurship Policies here.

Today, we celebrate Women’s Small Business Saturday.

As an extension of small business Saturday, we want to highlight the critically important work that women have done and continue to do in the business ecosystem. We believe that this year’s Women-owned Small Business Saturday comes at the perfect time to highlight the potential and necessity of empowering women entrepreneurs and small business owners. Women make up the bulk of small business employees and have succeeded at creating a robust, innovative, and crucial small businesses ecosystem despite historical and current challenges to their participation in the business world. There are realistic, concrete solutions to these challenges that allow women a real place to transform the business world positively.

The first few solutions are mostly technical. Women have traditionally been excluded from capital markets and been forced to do much more with much less. Creating incentives for banks and other financial institutions to offer low-interest loans and additional capital to women entrepreneurs and investors will immediately increase women’s impact in the MSME ecosystem. There must also be networks between businesses so that this impact can be distributed and multiplied in a just and sustainable way. We believe strongly in the idea that women should make decisions for women. We believe creating an infrastructure of communication and support between women-led-MSMEs will provide ample opportunities for their impact to grow.

In a similar vein, the challenges women have faced have not been restricted to the workplace, and too many women have had to choose between their career and family life. There needs to be childcare support and other social services offered to women to compensate them for the disproportionate share of domestic and household labor that falls on them. This labor has been completely hidden within a system that does not incentivize or prioritize domestic caregiving as particularly valuable. Investing in these resources will alleviate some of the weight from the various social pressures that have hindered women’s advancement within the business ecosystem.

Although implementing the resources listed above would drastically improve the situation, it would not solve everything. For too long, women have not been taken seriously by their male counterparts. Entrepreneurship is a male-dominated sector. With the men disproportionately represented within the power structure, women have struggled to succeed, even in the circumstances in which they have adequate access to capital and other resources. We must lead the way in changing the culture of entrepreneurship to value and prioritize women’s experiences in much the same way we are trying to lead the way on prioritizing humane and sustainable entrepreneurship. These goals are not in opposition to one another. In many ways, they depend on each other to succeed. Although women’s historic mistreatment needs to be rectified, being forced to invest and innovate frugally has given women the unique perspective and skill set to thrive in an increasingly unstable environment. Men have traditionally valued expansion and growth over humane and sustainable investment. Empowering women, especially in leadership, is one of the most straightforward, most cost-effective ways businesses can improve themselves. We do not have to reinvent the wheel to create a more prosperous and equitable world. We have to recognize the value of those who have been overlooked for far too long and put those people in the best places to succeed.

Today, many of you may notice that the ICSB.org site has been painted red. In many cultures, the color red is said to represent life, passion, and courage. What better color exists to represent the lifelines that hold up our world, women? At ICSB, we are launching more women-led programs, centering more women-owned businesses, and curating all women’s opportunities to join together in an entrepreneurial community that we have all long-awaited. We recognize that there can not be we in the entrepreneurial community until we all step up and begin breaking down the barriers that continue to hold women back from their fullest potential. Women are core to our work in creating sustainable patterns of change and focusing Humane Entrepreneurship. Today and every day, we honor the Womenpreneurs who are core to every social, economic, and cultural structure. We say thank you, and we commit ourselves to create an environment for WE.

I want to share my colleague’s, Professor Analia Pastran, opening remarks for ICSB’s first-ever Women Entrepreneurship Conference held recently. They are remarkable remarks and well-timed.

Greetings to everyone! We are delighted to be opening the First ICSB Women Entrepreneurs Conference (WE).

I want to share with all of you how this activity started. After a Spanish webinar entitled “Women entrepreneurship, which challenges and barriers?” that I did with Dr. Ines Gabarret, Diah Yusuf from Indonesia called us telling us that we needed to repeat that experience in English, so we got another three bold women, Dr. María Fernanda Andres, Shoroke Zedan and Vicki Stylianou, and we began to dream big. We started a WhatsApp group on August 20, 2020, having our meetings every Thursday from NYC, Paris, Buenos Aires, Jakarta, Cairo, Melbourne. Six cities, six women, organize the First ICSB Global Conference of WE and daring to dream big!

After 65 years of the history of ICSB, this is the first global conference from women to women. This is a milestone! And as the US Vice President-Elect, Kamala Harris, said, “while I may be the first, I won’t be the last,” This may be the First ICSB Global WE Conference, but it won’t be the last.

From the beginning, we got the Chair of the Board of ICSB, Ahmed Osman, ICSB President and CEO, Dr. Ayman El Tarabishy, and of Incoming Chair of ICSB, Dr. Winslow Sargeant. Three men support women’s ideas and the new winds of change like the slogan HeforShe but trespassing the campaign and becoming a reality in our lives.

As women, our resilient attitude comes from the many validations we need to go through until our ideas are accepted. We are passionate and creative in solving these times’ challenges, and we are very optimistic about the future that we want for our communities.

That is why we need more Womenpreneurs around the world. That’s why we are organizing this Global Conference to showcase Women Empowerment’s concrete actions across the globe.

Many thanks for joining us in this movement: “Women Dare to Pursue Creative Solutions for Greater Global Impact.”

WE MOVE FORWARD.

View more about Womenpreneurs here

Dr. Ayman El Tarabishy
President & CEO, ICSB
Deputy Chair, Department of Management, GW School of Business

Prof. Analia Pastran
Co-Chair WE Conference
Founder & CEO Smartly Social Enterprise on the SDGs

Adjusting our metrics and measurements of success towards sustainability and humane investment, centering women, specifically through the expansion of womenentrepreneurs and women-led MSMEs.

This past week, members from around the business world gathered for the first ICSB Global Women Entrepreneurship (WE) Conference, a space designed for women that dare to pursue creative solutions for greater global impact. This conference comes at a crucial juncture, as MSMEs and entrepreneurs navigate an emerging and constantly changing business ecosystem. As we come together to reconsider and reimagine our world, it is clear that women play an increased and vital role in creating new, sustainable business practices. We hope that this conference, unique in its goals and ambition, will be the first of many such endeavors designed to take advantage of this historical moment and provide adequate resources and investments for women entrepreneurs and MSMEs.

Some of the themes we have stressed this year at ICSB have included sustainability, humane entrepreneurship and investment, flexibility, and resilience. Women have consistently been at the forefront of progress in all of these fields, and they have largely done so without significant investment from traditional business actors. We believe that resources like the WE Conference will help us all take advantage of the unique situation we find ourselves in by prioritizing and centering women’s experiences in the business ecosystem. Women have been working and innovating throughout history, even as the market has traditionally under-valued their labor. They have been forced to adapt creative and sustainable solutions with limited access to capital and no formal recognition within the system. Women overwhelmingly are the managers of their household, a chore far more cumbersome than most business management positions. They have experience in investing frugally to maximize services in the face of economic pressures.

Women have consistently met challenges with creative, quick thinking that has mostly prioritized sustainable, community-driven solutions to issues, which are precisely the values and experience we need to be centering at this moment. We can see this through the benefits that companies have brought in after hiring and promoting women executives, which have consistently been between a 15% and 69% increase in profits (Kathy Frey, WE Conference, 2020). Simply put, women are one of the top growth economies in an ecosystem looking for new growth opportunities.

With the dual challenges of the COVID-19 crisis and the looming instability that will accompany climate change, we have to begin changing how we view, understand, and carry out humane entrepreneurship and sustainable investment. Women have traditionally invested more of their finances in childcare and family development resources compared to men. Today, they spend on average 3x the time men do on domestic care and unpaid work. They have consistently been forced to produce more with less and have had to be sustainable and resilient to succeed. One of the most basic steps we can take to empower women in the business ecosystem is to have women decide for women.  Women’s autonomy is often overlooked because the struggles they face are hidden, a fact we saw throughout the world as many women were left out of stimulus packages passed in response to the COVID crisis. We must recognize that it is impossible to transition to sustainable, humane standards of entrepreneurship and investment without empowering and centering all women. Once we show women the support they deserve and are put in positions to influence and direct the activity in the business ecosystem, we will see improvements in every part of our society.

The process of transition to a business ecosystem that is more just, equitable, and profitable will not be an easy nor fast one. We have not been perfect here at ICSB, but we hope that this year’s WE Conference is the first of many such resources targeted towards women and their evolving role in society. As we adjust our metrics and measurements of success towards sustainability and humane investment, centering women, specifically through the expansion of women entrepreneurs and women-led MSMEs, will be crucial. We hope to bring attention to both educational and practical resources of which both aspiring women entrepreneurs and investors to take advantage. We want to be part of the process of change here at ICSB, and we hope our WE Conference is a blueprint for additional resources for women that creates space for them to thrive and be autonomous in the evolving business ecosystem. As Cecilia Tham declared at the WE conference, “Success is not defined by others, it’s how we want to be.”

ICSB congratulates and warmly thanks the WE Conference Chairs: 

• Shoroke Zedan, Partner, Envisage Consulting, Egypt
• María Fernanda Andrés, C-Level Executive / Chief Business Developer at Aceleradora Litoral, Argentina
• Inés Gabarret, Associate Dean at ESSCA School of Management, France
• Diah Yusuf, Founder at Indonesia Prima, Indonesia
• Analia Pastran, Founder and Executive Director of Smartly Social Entrepreneurship on the SDGs, USA
• Vicki Stylianou, Head of advocacy and policy at Institute of Public Accountants, Australia

Article by:
Ayman El Tarabishy
Deputy Chair, Department of Management, GW School of Business
President & CEO of ICSB