MARK FLORMAN
Mark is a businessman and entrepreneur active in policy making. His mission has been focused on driving and measuring economic & social impact and harnessing human potential.
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There is increasing ubiquity in considering the ‘impact’ business has on people and places. Environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues are mapped by corporations, ‘social enterprises’ are abounding, governments are launching ‘social impact bonds’ and there is integration of ESG considerations into financial analyses by traditional investors. Even archetypal profit-focused investment banks, including Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, include ESG and impact activities in their business. The notion of the social impact of business has become so mainstream that government at the highest levels – including G8 leaders and even the Pope – advocate the creation of institutions to give greater attention to driving social impact.
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The voice of impact
‘Here’s how this often unfolds: seeking comparable, aggregate measures of impact, investors identify “what” measures they need and ask their investees to provide them. Investees typically don’t have access to these data, so they instead share sales or employment figures. The impact investor then converts these into “lives impacted” numbers and makes approximations of impact—such…
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The Age of Impunity
In the brief moments when it has been possible this week for the British press to consider anything other than ballots and political psychodrama, some might have noticed David Miliband, turning our sights to much bigger problems than Brexit. There are now 70.8m forcibly displaced people worldwide. Half of them are children. Less than 1%…
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Whose advice are you buying?
Whose advice are you buying? In 1992 I co-founded the UK’s third independent international advisory firm. I did this just as the City was entering its fastest period of growth, fueled by the Big Bang of ’86. I did this because I knew then, as I know now, that systems will burn when independence is…
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The good report
Early this months, two reporters – imprisoned in Myanmar for reporting on the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims – were released and pardoned. This was a long overdue step toward peaceful reconciliation for the state, as outlined by Kofi Annan and his Advisory Commission before he passed away. Kofi’s work championed press freedom as the…
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Winds of change
April has been the month where London saw climate grind capitalism to a halt. However fleetingly, however transient, numerous bodies glued in protest to the walls of London’s financial centres and the ominous silence of Oxford Street – transformed, this last fortnight, from an artery of consumerism into a post-apocalyptic camp for climate refugees –…
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The ageing roadblock
‘Beyond the pure politics and economics, experts in Finland say the debate on ageing needs to be rethought. Prof Vaarama says that it is wrong to classify all people aged over 65 as “old”. She argues true old age starts at 80-85. Before that, people could still be working and be consumers in the new so-called “silver…
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The human cost
In the midst of our data-age, true advocates of an evidence-based world view remain rare. Dr Hans Rosling is one. Economist Alan Krueger is another. He was, as Tim Harford chronicles in his moving obituary, ‘an authority on happiness and pain’, whose work spearheaded the ‘credibility revolution’ that would drag economics from the lofty heights…
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The skills scandal
A pro-business government also needs to be a pro-education government – specifically, pro the education that equips students with the skills of the present and the future. The yawning gap between graduates and unfilled job roles suggest the UK’s current system, like many around the world, is struggling to achieve either. The Institute…
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