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In Shapeholders: Business Success in the Age of Activism, the former congressman, Fortune 500 executive, and university president Mark Kennedy argues that shapeholders, as much as stakeholders, have enormous influence on a business's fate, with significant power to determine a company's risks and opportunities, if not its survival. Many international, multi-billion-dollar corporations fail to anticipate activism, and they flounder on first contact. Kennedy zeroes in on the different languages that shapeholders and companies speak and on their contrasting metrics for what constitutes ethical business practice. He teaches executives to be visionary, to sidestep conflict effectively, and to find profitable - and probable - collaborations to diffuse political tensions. Kennedy's decision matrix helps corporations align their business practices with shapeholder interests, anticipate their demands, and assess the viability of changing moral and ethical standards so that together they can plan a profitable route forward.
List of contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction: From the Heart of a Businessman
Who Are the Shapeholders?1. Shapeholders
2. Social Activists
3. The Media
4. Politicians
5. Regulators
Seven Steps to Shapeholder Success6. Align with a Purpose
7. Anticipate
8. Assess
9. Avert
10. Acquiesce
11. Advance Common Interests
12. Assemble to Win
13. Pope Francis, a CEO Worth Emulating
Notes
Index
About the author
Mark R. Kennedy is president of the University of North Dakota, founder of the Economic Club of Minnesota, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He has served as treasurer of Macy's, a U.S. congressional representative, a presidential trade advisor under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, and director of George Washington University's Graduate School of Political Management.
Summary
Many companies fail to anticipate activism, and they flounder on first contact. Mark R. Kennedy examines the different languages that shapeholders and companies speak and their contrasting metrics for what constitutes acceptable business practice. Executives, he argues, must be visionaries who find collaborations to diffuse tensions.
Report
"This book provides top-level leaders a powerful approach to embracing unseen opportunities that lie in what at first appear to be threatening risks. Kennedy's credentials are indisputable - it's clear through the many personal experiences with activists from business and politics provides him the gravitas only real engagement can deliver. "Tim McMahon, Creighton University
