Wayne Visser

Wayne Visser
Born	Wayne Visser (1970-12-17) 17 December 1970 Bulawayo, Rhodesia (Zimbabwe)
Residence	London, United Kingdom
Fields	Sustainability corporate social responsibility sustainable development futures studies

Wayne Visser is a writer, speaker, academic, social entrepreneur and futurist focused on sustainable development, corporate social responsibility and creating integrated value.

Biography

Wayne Visser was born in Bulawayo, Rhodesia, raised in Cape Town, South Africa and now lives in London, United Kingdom. His early career was spent as a management consultant, first as a Strategy Analyst for Capgemini and then as Director of Sustainability Services for KPMG in South Africa. In 1995, he established a Johannesburg chapter of The World Business Academy and in 1997, he co-founded the South African New Economics Foundation. In 2008, he set up the research sharing platform CSR International and in 2012 started the thinktank Kaleidoscope Futures. He is Vice President of Sustainability Services at Omnex Inc.^[1] and holds a Chair in Sustainable Business^[2] at the Gordon Institute of Business Science and has held various roles at the University of Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership, including Research Director and, currently, Senior Associate and Online MSt Tutor.^[3] He is also an Adjunct Professor of Corporate Responsibility at Deakin Business School.

Education

Wayne Visser completed his high school at Fairbairn College in 1987 and went on to study marketing and economics as part of a Business Science Honours degree at the University of Cape Town. In 1996, he studied at the Centre for Human Ecology, where he obtained an MSc with special commendation. In 2007, he qualified with a PhD in Business and Management from the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility at Nottingham University Business School where he researched what motivates of sustainability managers, using existential psychology as his lens of analysis.

Recognition

Fast Company claims that "anyone interested in CSR will eventually come across Wayne Visser. He is very active in the field, and offers a unique and candid voice on the topic."^[4] CSRWire USA calls him "one of the most prolific, creative and original thought leaders on CSR and author/editor of books on the subject".^[5]

• Top 100 Thought Leaders in Trustworthy Business Behavior (2013), ranking by Excellence and Trust Across America^[6]
• Top 100 Global Sustain Ability Leaders (2011 & 2012), rankings by ABC Carbon^[7][8]
• Top 100 Thought Leaders in Europe & the Middle East (2011), ranking by Centre for Sustainability & Excellence and Trust Across America^[9]
• Top 100 CSR Leaders (2009) and Top 20 Sustainability Leaders (2012), rankings by CSR International^[10]
• Global CSR Excellence & Leadership Award (2013), awarded by the World CSR Congress^[11]
• Outstanding Author Contribution Award at the Emerald Literati Network Awards for Excellence (2011),^[12]
• Outstanding Teacher Award of The Warwick Business School MBA (2010/11 & 2011/12) and Masters in Management (2011/12).

Contribution

Wayne Visser's research and writing promotes the idea of CSR as "corporate sustainability & responsibility" and calls for an evolution from CSR 1.0 to CSR 2.0.^[13] He also proposes going beyond creating shared value and corporate social responsibility to the practice of Creating Integrated Value, or CIV.^[14] His theory of CSR 2.0 characterises CSR maturity into five stages, from defensive, charitable, promotional and strategic CSR (all labelled CSR 1.0) to systemic or transformative CSR (called CSR 2.0).^[15] He identifies three failures of CSR 1.0 (incremental, peripheral and uneconomic), five principles of CSR 2.0 (creativity, scalability, responsiveness, glocality and circularity)^[16] and four DNA elements of CSR 2.0 (value creation, good governance, societal contribution and environmental integrity).^[17] The CSR 2.0 theory is summarised in his books, The Age of Responsibility^[18] and CSR 2.0.^[19]

Writing

Wayne Visser has written 21 books, including 14 non-fiction and 7 fiction, and published more than 200 chapters and articles. He writes a regular column on international sustainable business for The Guardian newspaper.^[20] His book, Beyond Reasonable Greed, was made into a film called "Lessons From The Wild: Leadership – Tusks or Fangs".^[21] His poem "I Am An African",^[22] from his anthology of the same name,^[23] was the basis for a dance theatre production at South Africa's 2012 National Arts Festival in Grahamstown.^[24] and an inspiration behind Heleen du Plessis's Cello for Africa CD ^[25]

Non-fiction

• Disrupting the Future: Great Ideas for Creating a Much Better World, London: Kaleidoscope Futures, 2014.^[26]
• CSR 2.0: Transforming Corporate Sustainability and Responsibility, London: Springer, 2013.^[27]
• The Quest for Sustainable Business: An Epic Journey in Search of Corporate Responsibility, Sheffield: Greenleaf, 2012.^[28]
• Corporate Sustainability & Responsibility: An Introductory Text on CSR Theory & Practice – Past, Present & Future, London: Kaleidoscope Futures, 2012.^[29]
• The Age of Responsibility: CSR 2.0 and the New DNA of Business, London: Wiley, 2011.^[30]
• The World Guide to CSR: A Country by Country Analysis of Corporate Sustainability and Responsibility, with N. Tolhurst. Sheffield: Greenleaf, 2010.^[31]
• The Top 50 Sustainability Books, with CPSL. Sheffield: Greenleaf, 2009.^[32]
• Landmarks for Sustainability: Events and Initiatives that Changed Our World, with CPSL. Sheffield: Greenleaf, 2009.^[33]
• Making A Difference: Purpose-Inspired Leadership for Corporate Sustainability & Responsibility, Saarbrücken: VDM, 2008.^[34]
• The A to Z of Corporate Social Responsibility: A Complete Reference Guide to Concepts, Codes and Organisations, with D. Matten, Manfred Pohl & N. Tolhurst. London: Wiley, 2007.^[35]
• Corporate Citizenship in Africa: Lessons from the Past, Paths to the Future, with M. McIntosh & C. MiddletonSheffield: Greenleaf, 2006.^[36]
• Business Frontiers: Social Responsibility, Sustainable Development and Economic Justice, Hyderabad: ICFAI University Press, 2005.^[37]
• South Africa: Reasons to Believe, with G. Lundy. Cape Town: Aardvark Press, 2003.^[38]
• Beyond Reasonable Greed: Why Sustainable Business is a Much Better Idea, with C. Sunter. Cape Town: Tafelberg Human & Rousseau, 2002.^[39]

Fiction

• Life in Transit: Favourite Travel & Tribute Poems, Lulu, 2013.^[40]
• Icarus: Favourite Love Poems, Lulu, 2013.^[41]
• African Dream: Inspirational Words & Images from the Luminous Continent, with B. Webzell, Blurb, 2012.^[42]
• String, Donuts, Bubbles and Me: Favourite Philosophical Poems, Lulu, 2012.^[43]
• Seize the Day: Favourite Inspirational Poems, Coventry: Yourpod, 2011.^[44]
• Wishing Leaves: Favourite Nature Poems, Coventry: Yourpod, 2010.^[45]
• I Am An African: Favourite Africa Poems, Coventry: Yourpod, 2008.^[46]

References

External links

• Wayne Visser's official website

As of this edit, this article uses content from "Biography Writer, speaker, Academic and Social Entrepreneur", which is licensed in a way that permits reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, but not under the GFDL. All relevant terms must be followed.