The University of Manitoba campuses and research spaces are located on original lands of Anishinaabeg, Ininiwak, Anisininewuk, Dakota Oyate, Dene and Inuit, and on the National Homeland of the Red River Métis. More
University of Manitoba
Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada, R3T 2N2
We seek to become a nationally recognized research centre dedicated to understanding and helping businesses enhance social impact and nurture community, care, and compassion. This includes fostering culture change in capitalism by promoting business models that address social and ecological crises facing humanity. To achieve this far-reaching agenda, the Centre draws together and provides a support system for scholars from multiple disciplines within Asper and across the University of Manitoba.
Discover the vision driving the Chiu Centre for Business Serving Community and its commitment to advancing business as a force for social good. Click to watch.
What does it really mean for business to serve community? This video unpacks the core idea behind the concept and how it shapes the Chiu Centre's approach to research and impact. Click to watch
The Centre is designed to be open-ended, so long as its activities are consistent with the overarching goal of working to create culture change in capitalism via promoting business models that foster community.
Develop and support multi-disciplinary research that enables examining the multi-facets of business models that enhance social impact. This includes awarding annual "Chiu Centre Research Fellows" with small grants that can be used for research purposes or for course buy-outs. Similar grants or funding may also be awarded to graduate students whose work is closely aligned with the Centre's.
Every year, University of Manitoba faculty and instructors are invited to apply for a Chiu Centre Research Fellowships. These funds support research that examines and promotes business as a force for connection, equity, and social good, from social impact entrepreneurship to technologies tackling today's toughest social and ecological challenges. Each year, up to five fellows receive funding to turn their research into real-world impact.
We are pleased to announce the recipients of the inaugural Chiu Centre Research Fellowships. Selected from a highly competitive pool of applications spanning 13 departments across the University of Manitoba, this year's fellows represent the breadth and boldness of research that sits at the heart of our mission: business serving community.
Each fellow is advancing scholarship that addresses important social and ecological issues is ways that promise to strengthen community and go beyond conventional business thinking. Their work spans Indigenous food sovereignty, menstrual health in India, biodiversity action, wildfire resilience, and community-driven retail, reflecting the Centre's commitment to research that is both rigorous and transformative.
Dr. Kiran Pedada Department of Marketing, Asper School of Business
This research examines the role (new) micro-entrepreneurs can play in addressing misinformation and providing appropriate sanitary products in rural India where, due to stigma and misinformation, approximately 20% of girls drop out of school after their first menstruation. With 900 million people living in rural communities, this study has the potential to enhance community and help tens of millions of people improve their socio-economic well-being by determining the best practices of micro-entrepreneurs.
Dr. Nahid Masoudi Natural Resources Institute
This research examines new forms of local business enterprise that can help to address the growing risk wildfires pose to communities in places like northern Manitoba, which cause great financial and social devastation. This study will examine how the risk and costs of wildfires can be lowered by creating local businesses that reduce the “fuel” that fires have access to. Such businesses can remove dead vegetation, trees, dry grass, or even combustible building materials via pruning, thinning, and, where appropriate, prescribed burning. In addition to reducing the risk and costs of wildfires, this strengthens communities by creating local jobs and economic activity.
Dr. Raphael Ayambire Faculty of Architecture, Department of City Planning
This study seeks to translate findings of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) “Business and Biodiversity Assessment” (BBA) to help businesses become agents of a just and sustainable future rather than drivers of ecological decline. The IPBES BBA is a landmark methodological assessment which outlines how all businesses depend on and impact biodiversity, yet current economic and governance conditions misalign what is profitable with what is beneficial for nature and society. Businesses must learn to play their part as members of an ecological community of mutual care.
Dr. Miyoung Suh Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences, Department of Food & Human Nutritional Sciences
This research explores how a smart vertical farming system can grow into an Indigenous-led social enterprise that strengthens food sovereignty, health, and economic resilience. By combining community ownership, cultural governance, and market strategy, the project tests how functional "medi-foods" can improve health outcomes while generating revenue that's reinvested into community well-being. The result: a replicable business model for Indigenous-led food enterprises — one that's culturally grounded, economically viable, and scalable to northern and underserved communities across Canada.
Dr. Harsha Kamatham Asper School of Business, Marketing Department
This funding will support the early-stage development of community-guided research on retail entry, food access and consumption behaviour, and community well-being in Indigenous and remote Northern communities. The project will provide the foundation for a larger research program on business models that support food access, community self-determination, and culturally responsive retail systems in Northern Canada. The research will be guided by the University of Manitoba’s Researching in Good Ways and Working in Good Ways frameworks.
Develop longitudinal data sets of leading-edge business models that address social and ecological issues facing society. This may include collecting data (e.g., interview, survey, archival) that are informed by and made available to researchers from a variety of disciplines. By studying exemplary business models over time, researchers can get a deeper understanding of the characteristics and processes that enhance social impact. It is expected that students will participate in collecting, coding and sometimes analysing data.
We are developing a longitudinal dataset of businesses that place people and planet ahead of profit, exploring how they build financial well-being (enough for everyone), political well-being (voice for everyone), and social well-being (mutual care over isolation). Over the past seven years, the project has collected interview data from more than 100 organizations, informing scholarly publications, graduate theses, textbooks, and the award-winning documentary Beyond Profit: Seeking Sustainability. With new funding from the Chiu Centre for Business Serving Community, the study will continue for years to come, building a rich, evolving dataset for researchers to study how these organizations grow and adapt over time.
In addition to the published research related to the longitudinal dataset (see above), the Centre also supports other scholarly and creative work, including publications in scholarly and practitioner journals, occasional books for scholars or practitioners, textbooks for courses in social impact entrepreneurship, and video-based materials. Here are two publications related to the work of the Centre
The first publication associated with the Centre is a management textbook that describes three approaches to management, including the “Social and Ecological Thought” approach closely linked to the vison of the Centre, which is being used at business schools around the world (notably Canada, the USA, and Philippines)
Two students embark on a quest in search of sustainability in business, exploring questions of profit maximization and corporate social responsibility.
An Official Selection at the 2023 Canada Shorts Film Festival. Winner at the 2024 Environmental Film & Screenplay Festival.
Host events, seminars, panels and guest speakers featuring research on business serving community for faculty, students and the larger community.
Bruno Dyck has a long-standing interest and commitment to multi-disciplinary research related to business serving community. He is a management and organizational theorist, holds the Norman Frohlich Professorship in Business Sustainability, and is known for his research and writing on business that places people and planet ahead of maximizing profits.
Research and Adminstrative Lead
Student Research Assistant
Membership is open to any faculty member or graduate research student at the University of Manitoba who demonstrates an interest in one or more of the following areas:
Members are responsible for contributing to the advancement of the mission and vision of the Centre.
The inaugural members are listed below, but this list is expected to grow as the work of the Centre becomes known.
Name | Title | Faculty/Department |
|---|---|---|
Chi Liao | Associate Professor | Accounting & Finance |
Derek Johnson | Professor | Anthropology |
Harsha Kamatham | Assistant Professor | Marketing |
Iain Davidson-Hunt | Professor | Natural Resources Institute |
Jesse Hajer | Associate Professor | Economics |
Kiran Pedada | Assistant Professor | Marketing |
Lei Lu | Professor | Accounting & Finance |
Luming Wang | Associate Professor | Marketing |
Martin Entz | Professor | Plant Science |
Minelle Silva | Associate Professor | Supply Chain Management |
Mohammad Eslami | Associate Professor | Supply Chain Management |
Mohammad Khan | Associate Professor | Social Work |
Nahid Masoudi | Associate Professor | Natural Resources Institute |
Nathan Greidanus | Associate Professor | Business Administration |
Rajesh Manchanda | Professor | Marketing |
Rong (Ratchel) Zeng | Assistant Professor | Business Administration |
Sean Buchanan | Associate Professor | Business Administration |
Sijie Sun | Assistant Professor | Marketing |
Suzanne Gagnon | Associate Professor | Business Administration |
Thomas Falkenberg | Professor | Curriculum, Teaching & Learning |
Yik Au | Associate Professor | Accounting & Finance |
The advisory board is being created and will be comprised of representatives from across the University of Manitoba, corporate and non-profit sectors, and the broader community.
Chiu Centre for Business Serving Community
Drake Centre, Asper School of Business
181 Freedman Crescent
University of Manitoba (Fort Garry campus)
Winnipeg MB R3T 5V4 Canada
