CPRT Expert Dialogue: The Business Resiliency Case for CPR

As businesses seek to balance shifting expectations from stakeholders ranging from investors and legal counsel to customers and employees, they’re increasingly exploring how a principled structure for political activities can help increase business resilience and sustainability. In her recent work developing more than 30 case studies on corporate sustainability, Angeli Patel has discovered three indicators of resilient businesses across industries: 1) they opt to face challenges head-on rather than wait until a moment of crisis; 2) they’re curious about and engaged with their customers, investors and employees; and 3) they bring all decisions back to long-term goals rather than immediate challenges. In this conversation, we’ll discuss how corporate political responsibility factors into sustainability and can be a tool companies use to enhance these indicators of resilience. 

In our next Expert Dialogue, we are delighted to speak with Angeli Patel, Executive Director of the Berkeley Center for Law and Business, to discuss:

• What is the business case for corporate political responsibility?
• What have you learned from your recent work at the Center looking at business resiliency, and how might CPR play into that? 
• Why is it difficult to act on CPR, if the business case is so strong? 
• Where is the firmest ground for companies to stand, and how can your insights from resiliency help? 

Angeli Patel is the Executive Director of the Berkeley Center for Law and Business. Previously, she was an attorney in the Sustainability & ESG Advisory Practice at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP in San Francisco where she advised clients on the governance of climate and social risks, and a Lecturer at Berkeley Law. Prior to her legal career, Angeli served at the White House Office of Management and Budget under the Obama Administration and served as a policy advisor at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on consumer privacy.

The Corporate Political Responsibility Taskforce (CPRT) Expert Dialogues are in-depth, recorded conversations with academic experts, stakeholder advocates, and business practitioners to provide our members and other CPR champions with the expertise and context they need to develop principled, proactive CPR strategies.

Find more information on the CPRT website or contact Elizabeth Doty at [email protected].

This dialogue is designed for leaders in government affairs, diversity, equity and inclusion, and sustainability, as well as academic experts and stakeholder advocates. We invite those interested in a constructive, non-partisan, principles-based discussion.

The CPRT is strictly non-partisan and does not advocate, promote or support any political party or candidate. While speakers and participants in the Expert Dialogues may express their views freely, the CPRT does not endorse particular organizations, individuals, parties, policies or legislation.