Going to sleep at night, in bed with a hot water bottle and a teddy bear, it is comforting to know that somewhere some academic is toiling away, advancing the frontiers of knowledge.
 
Associate Professor Ranjit Voola of the University of Sydney Business School has done this. He has announced that business must "unlearn" the purpose of business. According to reports, he said that business must stop its sole devotion to maximising shareholder value. Instead, business must make the “betterment of people’s lives” its key priority.
 
We must act immediately on this insight. If we do nothing to implement Professor Voola’s call to action then tomorrow, around the world, businesses will continue to feed, clothe, house, transport, entertain, equip, employ, service, tend, heal and protect billions of people. These businesses will be acting to generate profits for their owners and shareholders. This is intolerable.
 
Why should customers receive products and services that they want and need, at prices they can and do pay. Why should capital earn a return as a reward for the effort made and risks taken.  Scandalous indeed.
 
Such activity incentivises businesses to innovate and to produce better and cheaper products. This keeps their customers satisfied, their lives enriched. If we do not heed the Professor's call business will continue to do this.  Abominations like the smart phone, personal computer, diabetic pump and rechargeable battery will keep coming.
 
And what about those who invest in these businesses. One cannot allow them to invest in businesses that suit their preferences. It is better that they trust the managers to operate the businesses in ways that the managers alone choose to improve people’s lives.
 
The managers will also decide on whether to make a profit and how big or small it might be. Thus we will encourage more investors to invest in these businesses, over which they have no control, and which may not provide any return at all.
 
Putting this jesting aside, the only real way to “unlearn” the business purpose is to relearn and remind ourselves of that purpose. It is to deploy capital to legal, effective, accepted and desired ends. It is to generate expected returns to owners. It is to provide people with products and services that they need and that they want. It is to enrich society with innovation, productivity and progress.

Most of all, no better thing exists on the planet for “the betterment of people’s lives” than business itself.