Valerie Keller
Executive Director, Global Markets at EY / Founder and Global Leader, EY Beacon Institute
Valerie Keller has deep expertise in leadership, purpose-driven transformation and innovation. She is global head of the EY Beacon Institute and an executive director of Ernst & Young LLP in its Global Markets group.
As a former chief executive officer, she has established healthcare facilities, housing developments and social enterprises. Valerie was also founder of Veritas and two U.S. coalitions focused on housing and healthcare system reform. She has advised U.S. Congressional Committees and facilitated public-private partnerships across businesses, government agencies and non-governmental organizations.
Valerie is a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader and recipient of JP Morgan Chase's 20 Under 40 and Change Agent Network's Humanitarian of the Year awards. She is an Associate Fellow of the University of Oxford Saïd Business School, where she designs and leads executive education programs.
Valerie serves on the Harvard Kennedy School Women's Leadership Board and the advisory boards of Global Thinkers Forum, World Policy Institute and Womanity U.S.
She holds an MBA with Distinction Honors from the University of Oxford and completed post-graduate work at the Harvard Business School and Harvard Kennedy School.
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Healing a fractured world by changing the rules of the game
Published on January 24, 2018
Valerie Keller
Valerie Keller
Co-founder & CEO, Imagine
5 articles
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In today’s fractured world, is it still possible for people who disagree to escape their echo chambers and find common ground? What about asking someone to see the other side of an issue they’re deeply passionate about?
It’s not just possible – it’s critical. We’re all human beings living in an infinitely complex world. But human beings wrote the rules of this game, so we decide when and how to change them. If we’re serious about charting a prosperous path for our shared future, we can choose to not just hear one another, but really listen.
The EY Beacon Institute sought to spark that open-minded approach to debate and discourse early this morning at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland. We invited six global executives to take on a core question facing society today: Beyond just profits, do businesses have a responsibility to the world around them? Or, should they follow the lead of William Henry Vanderbilt, who famously proclaimed in 1882, “The public be damned. I am working for my stockholders!”
Human beings wrote the rules of this game, so we decide when and how to change them.
This discussion was already part of the Davos buzz thanks to a powerful letter from BlackRock CEO Larry Fink that reverberated through company board rooms this month. Fink, who runs the world’s largest asset management firm with more than $6 trillion in assets, was direct and unequivocal: “Society is demanding that companies, both public and private, serve a social purpose.”
The EY Beacon breakfast wasn’t just another panel discussion. Challenging times call for creative measures, so we divided the executives into two teams for an Oxford Union-style debate. The motion before the debaters read: This house believes that in today’s transformative age, the business of business is not just business.
No one in the audience doubted that the speakers had strong views of their own. As a vice-chancellor of the University of Oxford, and CEOs and chairmen of Standard Chartered Bank, The Boston Consulting Group, Pearson, Gulf International Bank, and the Business and Sustainable Development Commission, the six leaders on stage collectively oversee hundreds of thousands of employees and billions of dollars in economic activity. But in the spirit of bridging divides with empathy and understanding, we asked each debater to make the case both for and against the motion.
As an indication of how far society’s expectations of business have evolved, not even the arguments against the motion reflected a cold-hearted capitalist view of the world. Instead, they took the practical perspective that society benefits the most if businesses focus on what they do best – making money and paying taxes – while leaving “government to the business of government.” As the same debater put it, “it’s purpose that got us out of bed this morning, [but] it’s profit that got us up this mountain.”
But the arguments for the motion won the day. Times have changed, the debaters agreed, with one reflecting that “the P&L is no longer a compass for modern life.” More fundamentally, as another speaker asked, “if we can’t make a difference in the world, frankly, why are we here?” A third debater put it most bluntly: “unless we change and do it rapidly, we won’t exist.”
If we can't make a difference in the world, why are we here?
From automation and AI to populism and political polarization, the world’s most complex issues are the most talked-about topics in Davos. But empathy and values – not technology – are what make us human. Even in this high-tech environment, the EY Beacon breakfast moved the conversation forward the old fashioned way: through the ancient technique of civil discourse and debate.
In some respects, the motion debated mattered less than the symbolism of the debate itself. In today’s divided and disrupted world, leaders must create space for civil conversations and respectful dialogue to heal the fractures between us. The more polarized our world is, the more trusted dialogue matters.
Feike Sijbesma, CEO of the Dutch life-sciences company Royal DSM, may have said it best when he urged us, “Ask yourself, what is your purpose? What is your contribution to society?”
That’s a question we can all ask ourselves. The fundamental challenge of how we live together as people on this planet – part of what Feike called the ‘global village’ – is how we relate to and trust one another. In fact, that’s what purpose-driven business is all about.
In 2018 and beyond, the business of each one of us will be to challenge our own expectations, harness opposing views, and build a more civil world. Human beings made up the rules of the game. We can change them, too.
At the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2018, from 23-26 January, global leaders will gather under the theme “Creating a Shared Future in a Fractured World.” What are the biggest issues being discussed today? Join us on betterworkingworld.ey.com. This insight is part of a series. To read more visit ey.com/wef.
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Jeff MowattStatus is reachable
Jeff Mowatt 1st degree connection1st
Director, People-Centered Economic Development UK
Valerie, Larry Fink wrote his letter about serving a social purpose in January 2018. A month earlier, here on Linkedin I wrote of 'A Purpose that Serves Society', describing how business for social purpose was put into practice. As I point out , there are many words but few deeds when it comes to supporting those in the trenches: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/purpose-serves-society-jeff-mowatt/?published=t
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Nv Reddy
Nv Reddy
Strategy Consultant (Business Development, Alliances, Bid management) at Baud Networks Company
congrats for highlighting a different plus angle to the CSR. i coined what i believed, practiced successfully in my small way. enable the disabled. smart charities. i wish u well in all your endeavors at IMAGINE. love to be associated in any way
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