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Over the past decade, a growing movement has challenged the idea that businesses exist solely to maximise profits. One expression of that movement is B Corp certification, which assesses companies not just on financial performance but also on their social and environmental impact. On this episode of #ConsiderThis Melisa Idris speaks with Professor Christopher Marquis, Sinyi Professor of Chinese Management at Cambridge University, and the author of ‘The Profiteers; How Business Privatises Profits and Socializes Costs’ as well as ‘Better Business: How the B Corp Movement is Remaking Capitalism’.
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00:11Hello and good evening. I'm Melissa Idris. Welcome to Consider This. This is the show
00:15where we want you to consider and reconsider what you know of the news of the day. Now
00:19over the past decade or so, there's been a growing movement that has challenged the idea
00:24that businesses exist solely to maximize profits. Now one expression of that movement is the B Corp
00:32certification which assesses companies not just on financial performance but also their social and
00:37environmental impact. And joining me on the show today is one of the leading scholars examining
00:42this question, Professor Christopher Marquis, who is the Sydney Professor of Chinese Management at
00:48Cambridge University. He's also the author of The Profiteers, How Businesses Privatizes, How
00:54Business Privatizes Profits and Socializes Costs, as well as the book Better Business, How the B Corp
01:01Movement is Remaking Capitalism. Thank you so much for joining me on the show, Chris. It's good to
01:06have you. You're in town for an event, the B Corp Asia Summit 2026. I understand it's the first one
01:12here in Malaysia. So I thought what we can do is really begin by challenging or looking at why this
01:20movement is growing. There has been, I think, an acceptance for most of our economic, modern economic
01:27history that businesses are judged by that one key metric of profit. Why do you think now we're seeing
01:35this model being increasingly questioned today? Yeah, I think there's a couple reasons. So one,
01:42you know, if you look around, I think there's tremendous climate change issues, lots of issues with
01:47inequality around the world. These have really increased tremendously in the last decades,
01:52particularly the last 50 years, which you mentioned, you know, modern economic history. And really,
01:56it's only been since 1970 or so, where companies have been pretty myopically focused on shareholders.
02:04You know, the shareholder primacy models, it's called. Before that, companies were not perfect,
02:08certainly, but there was much more of a community ethos, taking care of employees. And I think,
02:15you know, both the damage that's occurring right now to the environment, plus, I think a lot of
02:19younger people are thinking about the alternatives that might exist and actually looking for companies
02:25that are, you know, so-called doing well by doing good. Okay. And talk to me about the certified
02:32B corporations. Yeah. Yeah. So a lot of companies, it's very easy to say that you're doing,
02:38you know, doing the right things and being environmentally friendly, being, you know, having social impact.
02:43But actually, if you are not, if you don't measure that and actually have some third party verify that,
02:52you know, there could be a lot of questions. And so this is a movement. Companies can be certified for
02:57their, you know, social, environmental, you know, variety of stakeholder considerations. This is a
03:04movement that started in the United States, but is now very, very global. The global headquarters is now
03:09in Amsterdam and Europe. I think there's about 10,000 certified B corps around the world.
03:15You know, the US, Europe, UK, Latin America is a very big area of focus historically. And in the last
03:23number of years in Southeast Asia, in East Asia, there's been increasing movement as well.
03:28Okay. So let's talk about how to measure more specifically. Let's get into the nitty gritty of
03:36that. I'm just wondering when we talk about getting, being a certified B corporation, what does that mean?
03:45Because you mentioned a little bit earlier that, you know, it could just be that companies are getting
03:49better at communicating their social responsibility. Yeah. So, so greenwashing, you know, is, is, is,
03:56is a really big problem in our world. I mean, companies are becoming much more sophisticated
04:01at fooling us into thinking that they're, you know, doing the right thing, but actually it's just a
04:06veneer. And so for the B corp certification, you know, companies have to go through a very rigorous
04:12assessment of across, you know, how they treat their workers, their impact on the environment,
04:18you know, their supply chains, their corporate governance, making sure that that's actually
04:23focused not on shareholders, but actually on a broader set of stakeholders. This then is assessed
04:29by a third party, actually by, you know, a lot of the folks actually are run out of business here
04:35in Malaysia, uh, called two cert. Uh, and they, you know, have to show that they're actually doing
04:41these things, uh, not, they can't just say, say it. So, so it is verified. They have to go past
04:48a
04:48level. There's a certain level, um, the companies have to go and it varies based on the industry that
04:54you're in. You can imagine a manufacturing company has very different types of ESG considerations than an
05:00investment bank, uh, also the size of the, of the company and also the, the area in the world they're
05:05from. So companies in Southeast Asia have very different considerations than maybe a company in
05:10Europe or America. Are there limitations to this certification? I mean, are there things that
05:15the certification can tell us about a company's social impact and are there things that it can't
05:22tell us? Yeah, I think in the past, uh, so the, the B corp certification actually is right now
05:29undergoing a major change. And so in the past, uh, it was a situation where companies had to get a
05:36total score across all these different areas. And if they got 80 or above, they would be, they could
05:41be certified. So this could actually match, like maybe if they weren't doing great for their workers,
05:46that, you know, this could be covered up if they were doing really, really well, uh, for, for their,
05:50in their environmental, um, impact. However, this is actually changing right now. They're just
05:56introducing a new certification to actually advance beyond those potential issues where a company,
06:01there'll be a minimum threshold in seven different areas. Uh, you know, you know, workers,
06:07environments, um, you know, the way they engage with the government, things like that. Is that
06:10better? Is that more? I think it's, I think, I think it's much better. And I, and I think not
06:15that
06:15the previous system was bad per se, but, you know, actually understanding how companies are engaging
06:22in social and environmental performance is an evolving field. And I think that the B-Lab,
06:28the NGO that has been behind this has really been pushing forward these ideas, both to the public,
06:35to the public sector, to investors. And so, you know, it's advanced quite a bit and now this is
06:41taking it to the next level. So would we, could we expect an update from your book, Better Business,
06:46since so much has changed with the B-Lab movement? So I may, I, so I may update the book,
06:51I guess,
06:52but I, but I'm actually, I mean, it's, I've, I've also really changed my thinking, uh, as well.
06:58In what way? Um, similar to, to, um, to the, to be, how the B-Impact assessment has changed.
07:05I think in the past, uh, companies were assessed on their stakeholder performance. And so sometimes
07:12a company, if they did some very, very prominent thing in the environment, maybe some regenerative
07:18agriculture project, this they could point to and say, we're doing this great thing,
07:22but don't look over here at these bad things we're doing. Right. And so actually my book,
07:28The Profiteer, as you mentioned, actually takes the perspective that we really need to be
07:32thinking about company's business models and, um, and what sort of damage they do. So it's very easy
07:40to point to selective positives, like doing, doing some employee volunteering or doing some,
07:45you know, installing led lights or some pretty minor things. Uh, but really when we're thinking
07:52about company's responsibility, we should be thinking about what is their core business and
07:57how does that core business impact the planet, impact the people.
08:01Right. And can businesses have a core business model that isn't extractive, that isn't about
08:10using and taking and destroying. I think it's a very, it's a huge challenge because I, you know,
08:17I think, you know, producing products, uh, you know, clearly where you're getting that sort of energy
08:23and materials somewhere it's, it's having, uh, people produce it in factories. So, so I think naturally
08:32producing things probably is going to have a negative environmental impact. I think the important thing
08:37is companies thinking about how to, how to actually minimize that, extend the life of their products.
08:44Like just a contrast I can give you is cell phones. You know, we all have phones. People get phones
08:50all
08:50the time. Uh, you know, um, you know, Apple, Samsung, you know, they have their annual release days,
08:56very little changes, but they are trying to stimulate consumer demand. I know Apple in the past,
09:03I think that they had some lawsuits and they had to fix this, you know, their, their, their products
09:08actually intentionally got sort of slower as they got older because they wanted people to upgrade.
09:13What did they call that? Planned, planned obsolescence.
09:16Yeah. Yeah. This was from, I think it was from the U S auto industry in the 1940s and fifties,
09:21where actually companies like GM and Ford, they actually made their products intentionally bad. So
09:27people would have to buy new ones. And I, it's not so, it's not so, so blunt now, but I
09:32think the
09:33companies, I mean, they need this churn of people buying and they create consumer demands through,
09:39you know, through their advertising, through these minimal product changes. Uh, and so an alternative
09:45to this is a company, uh, cell phone company in the Netherlands called Fairphone. So they make phones
09:52and their core goal is to have you keep the phone as long as possible. So they do this by
09:57actually
09:58making it repairable. So, you know, you, you, you have your iPhone and it's like all glued together.
10:04It's like crack it open, cannot crack it open. So they have things you can take it apart. It's modular.
10:10Uh, you can repair it. You can take it to places to repair it very easily. And they actually have
10:15a business
10:16model then where people have their phones for a long time and they're selling the different modules
10:22and components and various other things. And so they're actually value that they're trying to bring
10:27is longevity of, uh, of the phone. So Chris, how do we know that a business is really think rethinking
10:35its business core business model, as opposed to just communicating, getting better at communicating
10:41their social impact? Yeah. I mean, clearly obviously greenwashing. I mean,
10:44companies have been so sophisticated nowadays in greenwashing. And I must say, so, so first of all,
10:48I think this is where the value of a third party certification like the B Corp certification helps
10:52because you've actually had a third party that has looked sort of under the hood at the company's
10:57claims and ensured that they are, you know, to some extent real. Uh, but I think also, um, we as
11:05consumers
11:05in the general public and policymakers really need to put much more scrutiny on companies' business models.
11:12And actually, and what that means for the environment, for society. So, so for example,
11:18you know, think about cell phones, which we all, you know, sort of have, you know,
11:22it has become acceptable for companies to just create minor variations in their products and have
11:29these big marketing pushes, stimulate demand, encourage people to buy new ones when really
11:35there's not been that much of a difference. You know, Apple, for instance, I think was, you know,
11:39sued a number of years ago, uh, because for, for their products, they were actually intentionally
11:45slowing them down such that people had to buy new ones. Uh, so they're both, you know, encouraging demand,
11:52making their old phones less, um, you know, you know, less viable. Uh, and this is actually a huge
11:58problem in our consumer society. And a lot of companies are actually starting to, you know,
12:03find a new way around that. So for instance, in the cell phone industry, there's a company,
12:07Fairphone out of the Netherlands, and they actually focus on longevity and actually wanting their
12:13consumers to have the phones for the longest period of time. And to do this, they, um, they create a
12:19much more modular structure. So, you know, the phones are not all glued together. You can actually
12:24replace them, change things themselves. The screen, you know, how many times have we, you know,
12:29broken the screen of our phone. You don't need to take it to the Apple shop or some other retail,
12:34you can actually fix it yourself, new battery, a new camera. These are all modular that people
12:40can actually change them or, or a repair business can change them much easier than, than like an
12:45Apple or a Samsung phone. So I think this is an example of a company that is really thinking
12:49for the future and trying to not just stimulate more consumer demand, but create more value for
12:57consumers because they're able to keep their phones longer. They're able to actually change
13:01them. But if you as a business are not trying to create demand, not trying to get more people
13:06to buy more product, how do you maximize shareholder profit? How do you, uh, be, become a business or
13:14stay in business? So, I mean, clearly businesses, they need profit to survive, but I think that the level
13:21of profit that has been, you know, sort of expected now is totally egregious. If you look at things like
13:28CEO pay, you look at Elon Musk becoming the first trillionaire, um, it's really in the last 50 years,
13:35the average CEO to worker pay has, has gone from 20 to close to 400, uh, you know, and so,
13:44so there,
13:44you know, the markets are actually demanding. I mean, actually the board of directors are demanding CEOs
13:50are paid more. Why? Because those people on the board, they're CEOs and they want actually their
13:55board to make, give them more pay. And so the way the system is constructed is to actually, you know,
14:01have more and more people buy, uh, things. But many business like Fairphone, as an example, are thinking
14:06about, uh, broader sets of stakeholders that they're trying to deliver value to, not just
14:12give more money to the CEO and actually deliver more money to the shareholders. And so, so they think
14:17about, okay, let's actually, you know, have, have great programs for workers. Let's actually, you know,
14:23like Fairphone also, they do all kinds of work, um, to make sure the minerals for the phone are very
14:32fair, um, you know, sort of fair trade and certified, not, you know, human trafficking and labor, which a
14:38lot of sadly, uh, those mineral minerals, um, are. And so, so, so, so that's just an example of a
14:44company
14:44that is optimizing across many different fronts, not just this one number of, you know, short-term
14:50share price. So based on your, your research into these companies, are they likely to be smaller
14:55companies as opposed to the bigger MNCs that have such terrible impact on the world? Um, I'm wondering
15:03how much scale we can replicate with this? Yeah, good question. I think that, you know, this is
15:10something, so there's a couple, I guess, a couple of different ways to, to answer this. So it is not
15:15just small companies. Uh, so more and more larger companies are adopting some of these. So Danone is
15:21an example of a company that has become a B Corp, not a perfect company exactly, you know, but, but
15:28doing
15:28a lot of things in their supply chain around regeneration, you know, they've had this longstanding,
15:33you know, mission of, um, you know, double value of, of being sort of both delivering economic value,
15:39but also, uh, social value. So that's an example of, of a large company, uh, that is, that is also
15:45focused on, on these ideas. Now Fairphone is not, is not small. Um, yeah. So I think that part of
15:53the
15:53issue with the short-term shareholder primacy idea is that, you know, the public markets really are
16:00focused on this sort of short, short-termism. However, the number of public companies in the
16:06world is not that vast. Actually, the majority of businesses in the world are not public companies,
16:11and they're run by, you know, family businesses that actually care about long-term value in their
16:16community. They're run by entrepreneurs that actually want to have a purpose beyond just delivering,
16:22you know, shareholder value or becoming the next Elon Musk, actually having a, creating a, you know,
16:28community, uh, within their, within their business that actually means something more than just
16:32the amount of money. And do you think consumers respond to this well? Do you think consumers are
16:38more and more now voting with their wallets? I think there is some evidence that consumers are
16:43interested in it more and more. I mean, I am someone who is, is a prime example that I really
16:47think a lot
16:47about, uh, purchases that I make and make sure that the businesses are, you know, run very well, but I,
16:53I might be an exception. I think that if you think about the different levers that actually can be,
16:58can really drive this, I think policy is a very important lever. So many of these ideas,
17:04I think sort of proof of concept happen through business and then policymakers can actually take,
17:10take these and run. So many of the B Corp accountability ideas get embedded, have been embedded
17:15in legislation. Um, there's a new type of company of benefit corporation that is, makes companies not
17:21legally liable to their shareholders. There's the corporate sustainability reporting directive in the EU,
17:26which is, which is also built on decades of work on sustainability. I think investors are another,
17:32there's increasing interest of investors, long term impact. They know that, you know, short,
17:38if you just focus on the short term, you're actually might be creating problems in the long term and
17:42they want to have that long term focus. You know, consumers are also important. I do think that,
17:46but I do think that sort of policy and investors are more important levers to make change in this than
17:55consumers.
17:56Talk to me about whether companies ought to be, uh, because you mentioned a little bit earlier that,
18:02you know, sometimes companies don't do everything perfectly. And I do wonder about that. Um, should
18:07companies begin this journey without needing to be perfect, without needing to get everything done,
18:14right? Should they be commended and rewarded for beginning? I do think that, I think it's important,
18:19yeah, to encourage, to have pathways for companies to, to, to do this. It's, it's a real challenge
18:26because, you know, how, how do you separate sort of ambition from greenwashing basically? And, you know,
18:32a lot of the companies that come to Cambridge for executive training, this is actually what, you know,
18:36they're starting off in their sustainability journey and we're teaching them and working with them to
18:42try to implement, um, you know, more sustainable programs, but you know, you got to, you know,
18:47you have to start somewhere and it's usually going to be baby steps. And sometimes the leaders of the
18:53company might not be as supportive of it as the people who are in the, in the trenches, so to
18:59speak.
18:59So, so I do think, um, yeah, I do think that it's really important to be encouraging those baby steps,
19:06but also, you know, you have to hold them accountable if they don't deliver after a while.
19:11Can you talk to me about that, about leadership of companies, um, and how important is it that the
19:17top it's, is it, should it be coming from top bottom or bottom up? You know, I think, uh, so
19:23I think
19:23both are really, really important, but because this is a change that is fundamental to the organization,
19:32if you don't have top level buy-in, I think it's really, really hard to do it. Uh, that said,
19:37you know, the people who are, who are in the trenches, the grassroots are the ones that really
19:42know how to get the job done. And so it's really important to engage the entire organization and so
19:48many of the companies that I've, and leaders I've talked to, this is one of the things that,
19:53that they found the most powerful about becoming a B Corp. It's actually a system that engages the
19:58top and the bottom. And it's like a, it's, it's a mechanism for cultural change really,
20:03and to align the business around a set of shared goals. Right. Well, if you're going to change your
20:09core business, you need to know at what point do you change and you'll have to engage every level
20:14of your, of your company for that. Exactly. And it's, and it's an issue of culture and alignment.
20:19So I think in many cases, this is a problem that green, companies at Greenwash have, you know,
20:24maybe they're, they're saying things outside, but actually doing different things inside.
20:28Well, if you actually want to make that change, you need to find ways to align what is happening
20:33on the inside with what the company is saying on the outside. It sort of sounds easy, but, but actually
20:39anyone who's been in a large corporation and had to do change, it is really hard to change the vested
20:44interests, the cultural norms that exist, existing policies and procedures. And, you know, this is
20:51another reason why I think the B Corp system is valuable because it provides a bunch of benchmarking
20:58and other, uh, other tools, uh, to show companies how they can actually make that change.
21:04Chris, at the start, you said that this is a global movement, that it's around the world.
21:08Can you talk to me about the differences that you have observed between, uh, systems across
21:14the Western world and here in Asia? Are there different ways in which companies approach,
21:21um, I guess, corporate impact and responsibility?
21:25Yeah, that's a really good question. So I, I think it's an earlier stage here, uh, in Southeast Asia.
21:31And so it's a lot more, like smaller scale entrepreneurs that are passionate about these
21:37topics themselves. Uh, you know, they believe in, you know, contributing to the, you know,
21:42environmental good of, you know, of Malaysia, for example, whereas, um, there's more in a context
21:50like the UK or Europe or America, but, and those are frequently large, a little larger companies. I think
21:55that the, the movement in these ideas have spread a little bit, uh, a little bit deeper so that over
22:01time the company, either companies grow or larger companies start. So what would get the momentum
22:06growing in, um, kind of more new regions like Southeast Asia? I think part of it is time to, to
22:12be honest.
22:13Uh, you know, I started studying, so I've been studying sustained and writing about sustainable
22:17business for about 25 years now. And the B Corp specifically, I started when there were about 200
22:22B Corps in the world, mostly very, very small companies. You said now there's 10,000 over.
22:28Now there's over 10,000. So, um, and then, and you know, it was my students and this is like
22:33so many
22:34things in my research life. I learned from my students, what is actually the next, you know,
22:39sort of the frontier because they are the ones who are in touch with that. So yeah, my students were
22:44raving about this B Corp idea. And so I started studying it and yeah. So over time they, they, you
22:51know,
22:51a lot of the early B Corps have grown. And also once they start growing in their industry,
22:56some of the competitors start looking and saying, okay, this B Corp thing, you know,
23:00what is this? And so, so to me, I think time is one of the most important elements, uh, because,
23:08um, because I do feel there's a lot of, you know, entrepreneurial energy. I mean, here at the
23:12conference, I mean, there's 500 people that have come, uh, from Southeast Asia, a lot of people
23:18in Malaysia, because they're passionate about this topic and want to make a difference. And
23:25in today's day and age to take a couple of days out to spend, you know, in a, in a
23:31conference room,
23:32it says a lot. So, so how do we make sure that, um, that this movement doesn't go the same
23:38direction
23:39as what we're seeing with ESG? Yeah. I mean, in the past few years, we've seen such a political
23:43backlash against, um, ESG and corporate activism. I mean, what do you make of that?
23:48First of all, how do we stop B Corp from becoming that? Totally. I think that's a really super
23:52important point. And I think it's been a challenge for the world that, um, yeah,
23:57there's been a huge global pullback from, you know, sustainability, ESG, you know, we've seen it
24:01at Cambridge, definitely the programs that I lead on the topic, uh, have had a slight decline in
24:07enrollment because, because of this. Um, I mean, I think the U S I'm, I'm a mayor, even though I
24:11teach
24:12in the UK, I'm, I'm American. Uh, so I feel like I can say a little bit about, about the
24:15U S I mean,
24:16the U S there's been a tremendous backsliding because of the political environment, uh, when that's,
24:22that's spread a bit over the world. I think that the B Corp idea is slightly different. And I think
24:29a
24:29little bit more robust against that because it's actually a certification in a community.
24:35So ESG is sort of an idea that, uh, uh, instead of, uh, concepts that like financial,
24:43you know, um, investors will, will apply in metrics to, to their investments or, um, or
24:50governments set up, you know, rubrics to, to report on. But the B Corp idea is a community of
24:57companies, all of which are passionate about the same general goals, sort of business as a force
25:04for good. And there, because of this community aspect to it, I think this is something that
25:10really, uh, sustains it and makes it very, very valuable. I should say it's valuable to maintain
25:16it. But so many of the companies that I've talked to say, it's so help their business because they
25:22can much easier, find like-minded partners. You know, one, um, you know, a number of years ago, I, I,
25:29I interviewed, um, CEO and he said, you know, one of the most valuable things from the B Corp
25:36certification is just in our, you know, supply chain of partnerships. You know, if I find out
25:41a company is a B Corp, I've cut out many hours of due diligence because I know that they, you
25:47know,
25:47have the same values, they have the same policies and procedures. So, so I, I, I think that, you know,
25:53because of this community element and network, it's, it's robust to some of these, you know,
25:58challenges to just, uh, not to go on, to go on about, about this, but another thing that I think
26:03is really important is that it's actually a very important, um, you know, sort of counter movement.
26:08So, so to speak to this backsliding, I think that, you know, a lot of times companies are now getting
26:15targeted for their ESG or their diversity, uh, or, or whatever. But if you can stand together
26:21with like-minded peers, it's a much more powerful demonstration why these ideas are important.
26:28That's the community that you're talking about. Great. Thank you so much for being on the show
26:31and telling us a little bit more about this. I really appreciate your time. Thank you.
26:34That's all the time we have for you on this episode of Consider This. I'm Melissa Idris,
26:37signing off for the evening. Thank you so much for watching and good night.
26:50Thanks.
26:53There.
26:54There.
26:55There.
26:56There.
26:56There.
26:57There.
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