August 5, 2025

Dear Friends and Colleagues, 

We’re excited to share that the ESG Initiative is now the Impact, Value, and Sustainable Business Initiative (aka Wharton Impact), a new name that reflects our deepening focus on how sustainable business must deliver both broader societal impact and financial value. 

This name change represents a strategic shift to meet growing stakeholder demand for rigorous insights into how business activities affect natural, human, and social capital –  and how these impacts influence risk, opportunity, and sustainable business performance. 

Continuing a Legacy, Advancing the Future 

Since its founding, the Wharton School has pursued Joseph Wharton’s original mission to use the power of business to “solve the social challenges incident to our civilization.” Through the ESG Initiative, we embraced that mission by bringing issues like climate change, political risk, social equity, and corporate ethics from the sidelines into the mainstream of business education and research. 

Our work has shown how shifts in natural, social, and human capitals (like climate change, human rights, and employee satisfaction) can materially affect strategy and valuations. And yet, as interest in ESG surged, so too did skepticism. Misaligned metrics and methodologies combined with virtue claiming, creating gaps between rhetoric and reality. 

Wharton Impact is our response. This reorientation centers evidence-based research, practical insights, and educational programs that connect measurable impact to financial value and, as a result, sustainable business. From pricing transition risks and identifying impact “unicorns,” to advancing governance practices that drive ethical leadership, we’re working to empower stakeholders including shareholders to navigate a more complex, interconnected world. 

Our work focuses on when, where, and how these issues are financially material–the same standard used by markets, the SEC, and the courts. We believe impact data is simply another form of information that investors should use to make better decisions. Recent bipartisan legal analysis highlights that not only is such analysis consistent with fiduciary duty, it may be a fiduciary requirement. 

What to Expect 

We are building on a strong foundation. Wharton Impact will continue to scale the work of the Climate Center, the Impact Investing Research Lab, the Political Risk and Identity Lab, the Opportunity Lab, and the Zicklin Center for Governance and Business Ethics. 

We’re expanding our research capabilities through an impact data warehouse of over 30 datasets measuring how companies impact natural, social, and human capitals. With over $3 million in funding, largely from industry partners, we’ve already supported 41 faculty, 37 doctoral students, and 18 research fellows exploring questions at the intersection of impact, value, and sustainable business. 

Our educational reach also continues to grow. We offer 30+ undergraduate and MBA courses that students can assemble into our major or concentration. Over 400 Penn students apply annually to our experiential programs in consulting (Wharton Impact & Sustainability Consulting – WISC) and impact investing (Wharton Impact Venture Associates – WIVA). Our global student competitions reach nearly 600 students at 60 peer institutions, and our open-source Impact case studies power learning at universities worldwide. Finally, we’ve served over 30,000 learners through our executive education offerings.  

Scholars, students, and practitioners will continue to draw on our research and pedagogy to shape strategy, innovation, valuations, investment flows, and policy.  

Join Us in Shaping What’s Next 

As Vice Dean and Faculty Director of Wharton Impact, I’m honored to support our faculty, students, alumni, and industry collaborators in advancing this work. This is a truly collective effort, and I am fortunate to work alongside faculty co-directors Arthur van Benthem, Exequiel (Zeke) Hernandez (on leave), Katherine Klein, William S. Laufer, Sarah E. Light, Mary Hunter (Mae) McDonnell, Damon Phillips, and Tyler Wry, along with Managing Director Sandra Maro Hunt and a dedicated team of staff, scholars, and partners across Wharton and beyond. 

Whether you’re a researcher, practitioner, policymaker, or student, your involvement is critical to our success. We invite you to subscribe to our newsletter and let us know how you would like to get involved, whether by mentoring student teams, judging competitions, participating in events, collaborating on applied research, enrolling in executive programs, or supporting our work through philanthropic investment. 

Thank you for being part of this journey. The Impact, Value, and Sustainable Business Initiative is not just a new name, it’s a renewed commitment to align broader corporate and investor impacts with financial value in support of sustainable business. 

Best Regards, 

Witold (Vit) Henisz 

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Vice Dean & Faculty Director, The Impact, Value, and Sustainable Business Initiative
Deloitte & Touche Professor of Management, in honor of Russel E. Palmer, former Managing Partner
The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania