Purpose Center Purpose Center
We aim at unleashing human potential by placing purpose at the heart of leadership, for a more responsible economy.
As such, the Purpose Center directly serves HEC Paris' mission to shape the leaders of tomorrow who understand that their obligations go beyond the bottom line and contribute to the greater good in society.
Confronted with burning questions, humankind and its multiple forms of economic organizations must renew its roots and practices.
We bear a wide scale responsibility to act collectively and urgently to face today’s challenges in a world that is increasingly interdependent socially, economically and environmentally.
In this context, the expectations of all stakeholders have evolved. The role of companies needs to go far beyond creating mere financial value. Economic performance goes hand-in-hand with positive social and environmental contribution, and businesses can only be successful in the long term if they also enable all of their stakeholders, community and the environment to thrive.
This new environment urgently calls for a new type of leadership. Recognizing its pivotal role in the imperative repurposing of business, HEC Paris has chosen to wield its influence. S&O Institute’s mission is to prepare tomorrow’s leaders to create a future where businesses strive to create such a long-term value. By placing Purpose and Leadership at the heart of the firm of tomorrow, we promote the leadership spirit that will contribute to redesigning a responsible and inclusive capitalism to face the challenges of the 21st century.
Unleashing human potential by placing purpose at the heart of Leadership
We aim at exploring the potential of organization’s purpose and at articulating it with individuals’ purpose and search for meaning.
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In collaboration with the Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation , the S&O Purpose Center is publishing The Central Role of Culture in Purpose-Based Business report, the fruit of the 2024...
For the fifth time in as many years, new HEC Paris students began their undergraduate (L3) studies in the French Alps of Chamonix. Between August 21-24, 375 students from across France, as well as from...
Sustainability is the way to stay profitable in a world of changing priorities. Amid the growing urgency for businesses to adopt responsible practices, HEC Paris has overhauled its Sustainable Transition...
The HEC Sustainability & Organizations Institute (S&O) hosted the 2024 Purpose Day in the stately Hôtel de l’industrie, a stone’s throw from Paris’mythical Deux Magots and Café Flore. “Purpose at Work”...
Extra-financial reporting, ESG indicators, extra-financial performance, responsible leadership: these are the themes of the new Mazars and HEC Paris "Purposeful Governance" Chair, supported by the Purpose...
Inaugurated in 2021 and supported by the Joly Family Chair on Purposeful Leadership , this atypical course offers a unique experience between an alumnus or an alumna and a student in the final year at HEC...
How can you engage in an impact-oriented work and contribute to the ecological and social transformation of your country? To democratize impact careers around the world, HEC and Ticket for Change are...
"Taking up the challenge of an effective, efficient and sustainable Purpose (“Raison d'Être”)" was the theme of the 2nd “Grand Forum de la Raison d'Être” organized by The Why Project on April 21 at the...
Philanthro-Lab was the appropriate setting for HEC Paris’ first-ever Purpose Day. The five-hour event was devoted to the research projects conducted by the S&O Purpose Center and Purposeful Leadership...
For the second consecutive year, the S&O Institute's Purpose Center is renewing and expanding its program for HEC Paris majors and MSc students. This atypical course is based on a "companionship" approach...
HEC’s 2022-2023 academic year kicked off with talks by a host of outstanding guest speakers largely devoted to the world’s most pressing environmental and societal issues. In the context of geopolitical...
From August 21 to 24, all the new students from the Master in Management were in Chamonix for the "Purpose and Sustainability" seminar. The objective? To enable them to understand the challenges of the...
The book "En quête de sens: dialogue entre dirigeants et futurs dirigeants" (In search of meaning: dialogue between leaders and future leaders), published on March 16 by Dunod, is a choral work in which...
Unilever CEO since 2019, Alan Jope has stamped his leadership qualities on the consumer goods business by facing head-on the world’s social and environmental challenges. The charismatic Scotsman was the...
For the first time in its 32-year history, the Case Centre, a leading independent case-publishing platform, has rewarded not one, but two, HEC academics in the same year for their outstanding case work in...
People have been banding together since the days they were hunting mammoths, and this natural inclination to work collectively has never ended, says Julien Jourdan, Associate Professor of Management &...
For the second time ever, HEC’s first year L3 students began their school career with the off-campus “Purpose & Sustainability” seminar. 370 freshmen converged on the Alpine village of Chamonix for a...
Six months ago, we launched a slightly crazy project: to redefine the values and purpose of our school, with the help of the entire HEC community, before the end of the summer. Professors, students...
Far more than a token nod to more conscientious behaviour, Purposeful Leadership will be a way for businesses to survive the coming decades and make positive changes to the world, affirms HEC Paris...
HEC Paris invited Best Buy’s Executive Chairperson Hubert Joly to the first in a series of online seminars, organized by the Society & Organizations Institute (S&O). In a wide-ranging Q&A led by S&O...
Sodexo CEO Denis Machuel helped bring down the curtain on the three-month freshman course in a closing ceremony featuring 381 students, 18 tutors and a top academic team from the S&O Center. The event...
A year after creating the Joly Family Endowed Chair in Purposeful Leadership, HEC Paris launches its three-year sense and leadership program, destined for the entire HEC Grande Ecole 2019 intake. A...
The second of the three-tiered Purposeful Leadership program featured 10 business leaders who shared with HEC’s first-year students their professional and personal quests towards purpose. In a high-wire...
Best Buy Chairman and CEO Hubert Joly and his Alma Mater signed an agreement on July 4, creating HEC’s first-ever personally endowed Chair, devoted to purposeful leadership. The 1981 graduate, who was...
In a rousing introduction to Hubert Joly at the Matins HEC, H&C editor-in-chief Arthur Haimovici described Best Buy’s CEO as being responsible for developing “a new model for the retail industry in the...
Key questions guiding Purposeful Leadership
- Why do we work ? What is the purpose of a company or an organization ?
- How can we find meaning in our work ? Is a noble purpose solely in the realm of philanthropy or Corporate Social Responsibility, or can we make this the core focus of a company and all its activities ?
- What principles and practices can guide the actions of today’s leaders ?
- How can we create an environment in which individual members of an organization can be themselves and blossom personally and professionally ?
- Can Purposeful Leadership result in superior business and financial performance ?
Funded with the support of Hubert Joly H81, Former Executive Chairman of Best Buy, the Joly Family Endowed Chair In Purposeful Leadership is a first and significant step to positioning the school as a recognized center of global excellence for the study and dissemination of Purposeful Leadership.
I believe that leadership is about purposeful, authentic, human service.
"En quête de sens. Dialogue between top leaders and young talents”
Authentic and compelling testimonies of current and future leaders describing their journey to foster coherence and embodiment of their purpose, at their level and at the level of the company
Read moreS&O - Purpose Center Contacts
HEC Faculty affiliated to the Center
