Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business Redefines Social Innovation in New Report

BEIJING, Dec. 13, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Working with partners across the international business sector, global think tanks, multilateral organizations and academia, China's leading business school, Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB) publishes a report on "Fostering Social Innovation to Address Humanity's Challenges." Social innovation, as CKGSB defines it, is the collaboration among businesses, governments, multilateral institutions, non-profit organizations and civil society to develop and deploy effective and innovative solutions to humanity's most challenging issues. 

Drawing on the multitude of perspectives and best practices, the report offers practitioners and organizations a holistic understanding of how social innovation can be applied across sectors, why it matters and what global thought leaders are doing to enact change, which could offer potential solutions to some of the world's gravest socioeconomic and environmental issues.

"What makes social innovation so powerful to help us achieve the SDGs is that it allows us to address the inter-linkages that exist across the goals," wrote Siddharth Chatterjee, Resident Coordinator in China of United Nations, in the report. CKGSB Founding Dean Xiang Bing wrote, "Particularly in light of climate change and the ramifications of the COVID-19 pandemic, it has become more urgent and imperative for business schools to play a catalyst role in advancing cooperation among the different stakeholders."

As a publication advocating for social innovation, the report includes 23 articles from contributors across a range of organizations, including the United Nations, the World Bank, ExxonMobil, PWC, Arup, Accenture, United Way Worldwide, Caixin Global, The Economist, Unilever, the University of Cambridge and CKGSB. The first section of the report features professors from CKGSB and partner schools as they provide research and analyses with frameworks for implementation. The second section showcases viewpoints of various international institutions that have been devoting themselves to solving issues that go beyond national boundaries by working with educational institutions, such as CKGSB, to create greater synergy. The third section showcases businesses, one of the major building blocks to combating societal issues and one that CKGSB believes can be shaped by transformative business leaders with a global vision, sense of social responsibility, innovative mindset, and ability to lead with empathy and compassion. Finally, the report ends with two case studies led by CKGSB utilizing socially innovative ways to improve access to basic services in remote communities and alleviating poverty in some of China's most deprived areas.