Welcome to a special Thought Leaders episode with Prof. Dr. Laura Marie Edinger-Schons and Manuel Kreitmeir, in which we discuss and further explore the topic of New Work and Purpose, which was the theme of their recent openSAP course.  

I’m your host Elisabeth Riemann and I’m thrilled to welcome Laura and Manuel back to openSAP. Their MOOC joins a series of openSAP courses that have been produced jointly with academic partners, aiming at a balanced combination of academic theory and business practice. Several stakeholders ranging from politicians over startup founders to the corporate sector contributed to this course to complement theoretical inputs from Laura and Manuel regarding several aspects of new work, e.g. the digitalization of labor markets or corporate democracy, and practical mindfulness exercises to reflect on a personal level. The overall objective of the course is to provide though-provoking impulses and thereby create awareness for the topic of new work. 

When course production started at the end of 2019, our working environments and routines were shifting due to digitalization and we were asking ourselves “What does work mean to us?” “How do we want to work in the future?”, and “What is the purpose of business?” Nobody could have foreseen the dramatic and accelerated changes brought about through the COVID-19 pandemic, so we invite you to join in a timely discussion with Laura and Manuel as we all begin to reflect, evaluate, and re-consider our future of work. 

We’d love to hear your views and experiences so please share your feedback in the comments below. 

Did you miss out the course? You can now learn more about New Work and Purpose in self-paced mode: https://open.sap.com/courses/nw1-tl  

Professor of Sustainable Business, University of Mannheim, Germany

Laura Marie Edinger-Schons is Professor of Sustainable Business at the University of Mannheim. In her research, she focuses on how any kind of organization can contribute to sustainable development as defined in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. ​ 

Laura’s work has been published in many academic journals, including the Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Psychology, and Journal of Business Ethics.​ 

Co-founder of Digital Social Innovation Lab, University of Mannheim, Germany

Manuel Kreitmeir is the chairman of Social Entrepreneurship BW and co-founder of the Digital Social Innovation Lab at the University of Mannheim.​ 

Manuel is an advisor for social entrepreneurship to the United Nations at the diplomatic council and works with the European Commission to facilitate the social economy. He is a social entrepreneur and co-founder at Ohana Social Enterprise, a B2B platform for coffee and tea farmers.​ 

Additional Downloads:

• Download transcript as PDF file.

References & Recommendations  

• openSAP MOOC: New Work and Purpose  
  • Available now in self-paced mode https://open.sap.com/courses/nw1-tl  

• Frithjof Bergmann New Work 
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Work  
• Frithjof Bergmann (2019) New Work New Culture – Work We Want And A Culture That Strengthens Us 
  • ISBN-10: 1789040647 
  • ISBN-13: 978-1789040647 

• Corporate Democracy 
  • Overview of our guest speakers in week 3 “Corporate Democracy” of our openSAP course (login required)  
    • https://open.sap.com/courses/nw1-tl/items/2lNv5q4ATe1UEDi1vNUP9A) 
  • Scherer, Andreas Georg, and Guido Palazzo. 2011. The New Political Role of Business in a Globalized World: A Review of a New Perspective on CSR and Its Implications for the Firm, Governance, and Democracy. Journal of Management Studies 48 (4): 899–931. (John Wiley & Sons) 
  • Website #DEMOCRATIZINGWORK 
    • https://democratizingwork.org/ 

• Mindfulness 
  • Dr. Björn Pospiech´s introduction to mindfulness in our openSAP course (login required) 
    • https://open.sap.com/courses/nw1-tl/items/3XGGJsyIam590SEvpCBbm4 
  • Dr. Björn Pospiech at the Strong People Institute GmbH [German only] 
    • https://strongpeople.institute/so-sind-wir/die-menschen-dahinter/bjoern 

• Reading recommendations 
  • Laloux, F. (2014). Reinventing organizations: A guide to creating organizations inspired by the next stage in human consciousness. Nelson Parker. 
  • Schumacher, E. F. (2011). Small is beautiful: A study of economics as if people mattered. Random House. 
  • Palazzo, G., & Scherer, A. G. (2008). Corporate social responsibility, democracy, and the politicization of the corporation. Academy of Management Review, 33(3), 773-775. 
  • Matten, D., & Crane, A. (2005). What is stakeholder democracy? Perspectives and issues. Business Ethics: A European Review, 14(1), 6-13. 
  • Turnbull, S. (1994). Stakeholder democracy: redesigning the governance of firms and bureaucracies. The Journal of Socio-Economics, 23(3), 321-360. 
  • Crane, A., Driver, C., Kaler, J., Parker, M., & Parkinson, J. (2005). Stakeholder democracy: towards a multi‐disciplinary view. Business Ethics: A European Review, 14(1), 67-75. 
  • Edinger‐Schons, L. M., Lengler‐Graiff, L., Scheidler, S., Mende, G., & Wieseke, J. (2020). Listen to the voice of the customer—First steps towards stakeholder democracy. Business Ethics: A European Review, 29(3), 510-527. 
  • Harrison, J. S., & Freeman, R. E. (2004). Is organizational democracy worth the effort? The Academy of Management Executive (1993-2005), 49-53. 

Social Media 

• Follow Laura on LinkedIn 
• Follow Manuel on SAP Community and on LinkedIn 

The course New Work and Purpose was managed by Florian Schwerer.  

Social Media

Twitter: @FlorianSchwerer

LinkedIn: https://de.linkedin.com/in/florian-schwerer-890a31152

Hosted by Elisabeth Riemann – Senior Knowledge Consultant & Product Manager, openSAP

Social Media

Twitter: @ElisabethRiema1

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/elisabeth-riemann-213838131

The post Thought Leaders Episode 6: New Work and Purpose first appeared on openSAP Invites.