Witold Henisz

Witold J. Henisz is the Vice Dean and Faculty Director of the ESG Initiative and Deloitte & Touche Professor of Management in Honor of Russell E. Palmer, former Managing Partner, at The Wharton School, The University of Pennsylvania. He received his Ph.D. in Business and Public Policy from the Haas School of Business at University of California, Berkeley and previously received a M.A. in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

His research examines the impact of political hazards as well as environmental, social and governance factors more broadly on the strategy and valuation of global corporations. This work analyzes best practices in corporate diplomacy to win the hearts and minds of external stakeholders as well as the measurement and valuation thereof. His most recent work focuses on the application of alternative data to the measurement of non-traditional political and ESG risks and opportunities and their financial and operational impact on multinational firms as well as the performance of the asset managers that invest in them. His research has been published in top-ranked journals in international business, management, international studies and sociology. He served as a Departmental Editor at The Journal of International Business Studies and as an Associate Editor at Strategic Management Journal. He is a Fellow of the Academy of International Business.

Witold has won multiple teaching awards at the graduate and undergraduate levels including being named Iron Prof, 2019 and an Aspen Institute Ideas Worth Teaching Award Winner, 2020 for his elective courses that highlight the importance of integrating a deep understanding of political and social risk factors into the design and valuation of an organization’s global strategy. These courses incorporate multiple cases that he has authored as well as capstone KEROVKA crisis management simulation for which he served as the academic co-Director. He led the redesign of the required global management content in the Wharton core curriculum. He teaches extensively on the topic of ‘Corporate Diplomacy: Building Reputations and Relationships with External Stakeholders’ as well as ESG integration in open enrollment and custom executive education programs.

He is currently a principal in the consultancy PRIMA LLC whose clients span multinational firms, asset managers, intergovernmental organizations and non-governmental organizations including Anglo Gold Ashanti, Dundee Precious Metals, EastWestRail, Eaton Vance, Engine No 1, Gabriel Resources, Lockheed Martin, Rio Tinto, Shell Corporation, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the International Finance Corporation and the World Wildlife Fund. He previously worked for The International Monetary Fund.