Researching the Future of Business: Meet B Lab Global’s 2025 Research Fellows
At B Lab, we have the privilege of holding front-row seats to what is arguably one of the greatest global experiments in reimagining business—not just as a vehicle for profit, but as a force for good. Every day, we see companies striving to balance purpose and profit, shaping a future where businesses serve all stakeholders, not just shareholders. But meaningful change requires more than ambition; it demands evidence, insight, and rigorous inquiry.
That’s why we launched the B Lab Global Research Fellowship. Now in its second year, this fellowship brings together scholars dedicated to exploring the impact of the B Corp movement. From a pool of 43 creative and compelling applications, we selected four outstanding Fellows whose research will deepen our understanding of how business can drive systemic change. Their work spans corporate sustainability, stakeholder engagement, innovation, and social impact—each project offering critical insights that will help shape the future of purpose-driven business.
The Insights team is eager to collaborate with and learn from them throughout the year. Keep reading to meet each of our Fellows and explore the fascinating questions they’re tackling in their own words.
How Does Corporate Sustainability Commitment Shape Employee Perceptions?
Lorenzo Lesana, Ph.D. candidate at IESE Business School, is researching corporate sustainability commitment and stakeholder engagement. Alongside his advisors, Fabrizio Ferraro and Romain Boulongne, he is investigating how B Corp certification influences employees’ perceptions of their companies.
“B Corporations provide a unique setting to assess the organizational impacts of third-party sustainability certifications, and their role in shaping internal stakeholder views is a critical yet under-researched area. The central question guiding this study is whether B Corp certification affects employees’ perception of their company.” — Lorenzo Lesana.
Lorenzo’s study will also examine how employees prioritize different aspects of sustainability—whether they connect more with tangible local initiatives or broader global commitments. His work contributes to both academic research in strategy & organizational theory and the practical strategies businesses can use to foster internal engagement around sustainability.
About the Fellow: Lorenzo Lesana is a Ph.D. candidate in the Strategy Department at IESE Business School, Barcelona. His research focuses on corporate sustainability commitment, exploring the mechanisms companies use to signal their dedication to sustainability. He examines how different kinds of sustainability commitment tools—such as Green Bonds or third-party certifications—shape internal and external stakeholder perceptions. His advisors, Professors Fabrizio Ferraro and Romain Boulongne of IESE Business School, bring extensive expertise in impact investing, organizational theory, and sustainability.
Exploring the Interconnection Between Innovation and Impact in Certified B Corporations
Through this fellowship, Azucena “Sheny” Grady, a doctoral candidate at Texas Tech University’s Rawls College of Business, will explore three interconnected questions about innovation and impact in B Corps. First, how does the level of innovation within B Corps influence their capacity to generate and scale social and environmental impact? Additionally, how does a firm’s commitment to a multi-stakeholder approach influence the scale and scope of its innovative activities, and what are the implications of these dynamics on organizational performance? Second, which types of innovations (e.g., product, process, or organizational) have the strongest association with improvements in impact outcomes, as measured by B Lab’s Impact Assessment? Finally, how do the characteristics of a venture (i.e., sector, location, industry, etc.) and its founding team (i.e., gender, experience, education, etc.) influence its ability to generate and scale social and environmental impact?
Leveraging B Corp data, Sheny’s research will contribute to understanding how stakeholder-focused firms achieve both economic success and impact. It advances the social entrepreneurship and innovation literatures by providing empirical insights into how innovation drives both growth and meaningful societal impact. The study’s results will provide actionable recommendations for entrepreneurs, investors, and policymakers committed to fostering a more equitable and sustainable economy through social entrepreneurship.
About the Fellow: Sheny’s work bridges entrepreneurship, strategy, and sustainability. She has presented at major conferences such as the Academy of Management and the Strategic Management Society. Her advisor, Dr. Hechavarria, brings expertise in underrepresented entrepreneurial perspectives and adds an essential dimension to Sheny’s research, ensuring a nuanced understanding of how innovation can drive inclusivity and impact in the business world.
Transformative and Nature-Positive Businesses: New Corporate Frontier in the Era of Climate and Biodiversity Crises
In a world facing interconnected planetary crises such as biodiversity loss and climate change, transformative business models emerge as crucial vehicles to drive fundamental changes in socioeconomic systems. Mario Andrés Murcia López’s research is situated at the intersection of sustainable transition theories and transformative business model approaches, seeking to understand how companies can evolve from conventional sustainability to truly nature-positive paradigms centered on the climate-biodiversity nexus. Its main objective is to identify the distinctive characteristics and innovative strategies used by B Corp companies and those non-B Corp with sustainability reports, as well as determine the gaps they must overcome to evolve towards truly transformative models. This will provide a quantitative and qualitative framework to evaluate and guide the transition of companies towards business models that address climate and biodiversity challenges in an integrated manner, aligning with the principles of transformative change identified by IPBES (2024).
Expected contributions include significant advances in both academic and practical realms. Theoretically, the research will contribute to understanding the fundamental elements that characterize transformative business models, refining connections between conceptual aspects of transformative change and transformative businesses within the framework of transitions towards sustainability. Practically, it will provide organizations with guidelines for moving towards more transformative business models, identify critical gaps, and design strategies to move towards more nature-positive models. This will facilitate the transition of companies from traditional sustainability approaches to transformative paradigms that simultaneously address the underlying causes of biodiversity loss and climate challenges, generating economic value while actively contributing to solutions for planetary crises, including the acceleration of sustainable transitions at a systemic level.
About the Fellow: Biologist with a Summa Cum Laude Master's degree in Management and Development Practice, Mario is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Technological Innovation Management focused on companies' contributions to Sustainability Transitions, from the frameworks of Transformative Innovation, Sustainability-Oriented Innovation, and Transformative Business. His advisor, Dr. Sandra Vilardy, brings extensive expertise in socio-ecological systems mediation exercises at the interface between science and authorities and other decision-making actors, such as companies.
A Study of the Inclusive Transformation of B Corp certification Standards
Ph.D. candidate Alyssa Menz studies the corporate strategies, processes, and pressures that catalyze sustainable business models (and movements) and ultimately reimagine corporate purpose beyond profit. Along with advisors, Professors Suntae Kim and Todd Schifeling, Alyssa will examine B Lab’s recent standards transformation process.
While the core principles of the B Impact Assessment have remained relatively consistent across six prior iterations, Version 7 introduces significant updates. Against this backdrop we ask: 1) How were B Lab’s new certification standards developed? 2) How did the development process contribute to balancing tensions such as growth and rigor, inclusivity and relevance, and continuity and innovation? To answer these questions, we use a mixed-methods approach that draws on survey, interview, and archival data. Our research will contribute to academic literature on social movements, institutional change, and market alternatives. We hope our findings can inform future iterations of the B Corp certification standards, particularly in areas such as stakeholder engagement, evaluation, and integration. Ultimately, it will enable B Lab to set an example for other sustainability-related movements not only in terms of rigorous standards that ensure business sustainability but also in terms of the process of developing such standards.
About the Fellow: Alyssa is a management scholar with a background in environmental science, studying strategies to embed environmental and social impact into business models. Her research explores how corporations can better translate sustainability commitments into action, particularly in the B Corp, decarbonization, and American recycling contexts. Alyssa’s advisors, Dr. Todd Schifeling (Assistant Professor at Temple University) brings deep expertise in organizational sustainability and Dr. Suntae Kim (Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins Carey Business School) studies how innovation emerges from contexts of adversity.