Interview: Joel Gehman, co-founder and vice president of B Academics
Reflect on the milestones, memories, and best moments as we celebrate our 10 year anniversary! Hear from one of the B Academics co-founders and current vice president, Joel Gehamn, about the expansion and adaptation of B Academics. Stay tuned for a new article each month for the remainder of the year as we celebrate our journey together.
Read 10 Year Anniversary Interview #1: The Founding of B Academics for the beginning of the B Academics story.
When did you first get involved with B Academics?
I first became involved with B Academics before it was really even B Academics. I was a new assistant professor, then based at the University of Alberta. I had joined in Fall 2012, and another assistant professor, Matthew Grimes, started at the same time. We were both on the tenure clock and thought it would be fun to start a project together, but we needed a research setting that would appeal to both of our interests – his in entrepreneurship and mine in sustainability.
Before my PhD I had lived in the Philly area, and I was vaguely aware of B Lab and B Corps. In early 2013, the two of us began reading about what was happening in the movement and started thinking about possible research topics. One of the things that really caught our attention was the wide variability in the way that B Corps communicated their certification status on their websites.
By May 2015, our research had progressed into a working paper entitled: “Category Promotion: How B Corporations Respond to the Competing Demands of Fitting In and Standing Out”, which I presented at the Alliance for Research on Corporate Sustainability conference in Chicago. It was there that I met Rosanna Garcia, who wondered if I would be interested in presenting my research at North Carolina State University.
That visit ended up happening in April 2016. By that point, our paper had received a second R&R at AMJ (later published as “Hidden Badge of Honor”). So it was a great opportunity to try out our latest thinking. It was also a packed two days with a guest lecture in one of Jessica’s classes, a public event and reception at HQ Raleigh and a bunch of other meetings. Already at this point Jessica and Rosanna were working on organizing an event alongside the Champions Retreat, which ended up being held in Philly in October 2016.
Why did you decide to further your involvement with B Academics?
I consider my involvement in B Academics to be entirely serendipitous. It started with Rosanna’s initial interest in my research on B Corps and the invitation to visit North Carolina State University, and then Jessica’s enthusiasm and energy was contagious. Somehow I became committed to helping with B Academics without really knowing what I was saying yes to. This was a bit intentional on my part. I’ve long tried to say “yes” to things and see where they lead. In the case of saying yes to Rosanna and Jessica, it has meant that some 10 years later, I have had the good fortune of being part of what I see as a really novel and interesting experiment. Early in this process, critical efforts came from so many others: Maria Ballesteros-Sola, Summer Brown, Maria Emilia Correa, Kristin Joys, Fiona Wilson, Garima Sharma, Calvin Chung and many others.
What are the three most important milestones you remember of B Academics and its contribution in advancing the state of academic study into business as a force for good?
For me, some key milestones include: meeting Rosanna and visiting North Carolina State University, the early Champions Retreats in Philly, Toronto and New Orleans. It was through these events that virtual meetings turned into collaborations and friendships. It was also at one of these meetings someone really challenged us: saying that if we didn’t create a legal entity, this would all fizzle out. That in turn led to the decision to incorporate as a non-profit in late 2019. From there we had to formalize roles and responsibilities, raise money, run elections, build a website, find a membership platform, open a bank account, and on and on.
What inspired the Global B Academics Paper Development Workshop: “Nuts and Bolts of Research on B Corps: Empirical Methods and Research Design” and what was the impact?
After several years of convening B Academics events alongside the Champions Retreats, a number of us who were actively researching B Corps decided to organize events at the Academy of Management (AOM) Annual Meeting, which is the largest academic society for management professors.
Our first such event was held at the 2019 AOM Annual Meeting in Boston. That event was called “Putting B Corporations Under the Microscope: Exemplars and Future Directions.” It was organized by G. Sharma, E. Landry, J. Thomas, J. Gehman. Presenters included: K. Qiao, S. Fan, A. Beveridge, G. Sharma, L. Tracy, J. Thomas, J. Pollock, R. Honeyman, E. Landry, R. Garcia, and Chris Marquis served as the Discussant.
Following that event, some of us decided to plan another event for the 2020 AOM Annual Meeting. As originally conceived, the organizers included: A. Beveridge, K. Cao, J. Gehman, E. Landry, G. Sharma; and the panelists included: Originally, the event was scheduled to be held in Vancouver. However, as with so many other events, the conference ended up being held virtually because of Covid. One of the silver-linings of holding it virtually was that the sessions were recorded. So, you can take a trip back memory lane and watch some of the videos from that session. Part of my role was moderating the panel, which included Kendall Park, Michael Conger, Suntae Kim and Nancy. Kurland. In addition the panel, we had a kickoff from Jessica Thomas, a keynote by Ben Anderson co-CEO of B Lab and an update on the new standards from Dan Osusky. We also had breakout sessions, some with B Corps telling their stories and others where academics presented research in progress.
Stay tuned for article #4.
Upcoming Events
