It is vitally important for businesses to have a holistic understanding of the many issues surrounding and shaping sustainability, from competitors to government and political factors, to economics and ecological science. This integrated textbook for MBA and senior-level undergraduates offers a comprehensive overview of the issues of sustainability as they relate to business and influence corporate strategy. It also features a wide range of cases and an extensive discussion of tools to incorporate sustainability issues into strategic decision making, helping instructors and students to build and then apply a solid understanding of sustainability in business.
This book explores the role of businesses in delivering positive societal and financial outcomes as they seek to bridge the gap between short-term organizational behaviors and long-range sustainability commitments. By addressing the inevitable data challenges associated with the strategic integration of a sustainability mindset, it enables faster adoption of social, environmental and governance metrics that generate lasting enterprise value. Inspired by the experience of practitioners that have successfully influenced the learning behaviors of complex organizations, this book helps readers drive systemic innovations as they leverage sustainability initiatives in a programmatic and intentional manner. Features: Defines a toolkit to generate sustainable business value by focusing on the organizational design underpinning sustainability-oriented initiatives. Provides a multidisciplinary lens on shaping the impact dialogue through applied frameworks. Discusses the need to analytically identify an organizational learning curve before developing impact targets and framing sustainability commitments around them. Combines theory and practice in a practical style by presenting a variety of real-life applications at a global level. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.
Environmental sustainability is increasingly important to organisations, whether for regulatory, financial or ethical reasons. Business and Environmental Sustainability looks at the environmental aspect of sustainability for all organisations pursuing competitive advantage. The book provides theoretical foundations from science, economics, policy and strategy, introduces three environmental challenges (climate change, pollution and waste) and looks at how corporate functions can address these. This textbook provides a thorough foundation by introducing readers to the science, reasoning and theory behind environmental sustainability and then delves into how these ideas translate into principles and business models for organisations to use. Next, it covers environmental challenges from climate change, pollution and waste, and then goes on to examine the different corporate functions (from supply chain management to human resources) to illustrate how environmental sustainability is managed and put into practice in organisations. Finally, a set of integrative case studies draws everything together and enables the reader to apply various analytical tools, with the aim of understanding how companies can not only reduce their environmental footprint but can positively contribute to environmental sustainability. Written by an award-winning lecturer, Business and Environmental Sustainability boasts a wealth of pedagogical features, including examples from a range of industries and countries, plus a companion website with slides, quiz questions and instructor material. This will be a valuable text for students of business, management and environmental sustainability and will also be suitable for broader courses on corporate responsibility and sustainability across environmental studies, political science and engineering.
It is now clear that human activity has influenced how the biosphere supports life on Earth, and given rise to a set of connected environmental and social problems. In response to the challenge that these problems present, a series of international conferences and summits led to discussions of sustainable development and the core dilemma of our time: How can we all live well, now and in the future, without compromising the ability of the planet to enable us all to live well? This book identifies the main issues and challenges we now face; it explains the ideas that underpin them and their interconnection, and discusses a range of strategies through which they might be addressed and possibly resolved. These cover things that governments might do, what businesses and large organisations can contribute, and the scope for individuals, families and communities to get involved. This book is for everyone who cares about such challenges, and wants to know more about them.
Sustainability has become a topic of global relevance: Corporations and other economically acting organizations increasingly need to realize economic, environmental and social objectives in order to survive. Supplementary to "classical" environmental management, realizing corporate sustainability requires comprehensive approaches which allow the integration of social and economic aspects. Such concepts can be found e.g. in international excellence models mainly based on a TQM thinking but also in the field of human factors in organizational design and management. Understood as systems approaches, they include the interests of all relevant stakeholders with a mid- or long-term time perspective and are thus highly linked with the principles of sustainable development. In this book internationally leading scientists discuss the issue of sustainability from their perspective, resulting in an innovative view on different management approaches under the umbrella of corporate sustainability.
This collection of essays is based on presentations given at the 4th conference in an annual endowed series held at Duquesne University, USA. It addresses emerging concerns and pivotal problems about our planet’s environment and ecology. The contributions gathered here highlight the inter-relation of topics and expertise regarding science and philosophy, ethics, religion, global issues, and generational perspectives. The book concludes with an ethical analysis of the multiple and over-lapping challenges that require urgent attention and long-term resolution. It will appeal to scholars and students in a variety of disciplines and fields that deal with the earth’s survival and flourishing.
How do universities tackle wicked sustainability challenges faced by society? The Wicked Learning Workbook is a toolkit for setting up and running an interdisciplinary master-level course in the context of real-world problems such as food waste and loss. The book offers a new pedagogical approach that we call 'wicked' because it is unorthodox, ambitious, and tackles complex problems that won’t go away. The pedagogy is also international at the course level rather than the conventional exchange semester, enabling institutions to embed international approaches to their core teaching. The Wicked Learning Workbook speaks directly to academics who are looking for solutions that provide stimuli for research and teaching while giving students an innovative, international learning experience. The approach develops student understanding of the UN Sustainable Development Goals as broad-scale societal issues which are difficult, if not impossible, to ‘solve’. An important outcome of this approach is the laboratory-style classroom that creates opportunities for faculty, students and companies to co-create solutions that are immediately implementable. The resulting methodology is based on industry–university collaboration (such as IKEA and Nestlé). The methodology is of interest to corporate leaders pursuing sustainability goals and business transformation. Achieving sustainability requires cross-boundary, cross-disciplinary, experimental approaches that allow for scalability. Wicked problems can only be tackled with wicked solution approaches.
Around the turn of the millennium it had become painfully evident that development aid, charity or "global business-as-usual" were not going to be the mechanisms to alleviate global poverty. Today, there is little dispute that poverty remains the most pressing global problem calling for innovative solutions. One recent strategy is the Base of the Pyramid (BoP) concept developed by Prahalad and Hart, which relies on entrepreneurial activity tapping into the previously ignored markets of the economically most disadvantaged. It is a process requiring innovations in several disciplines: technological, social and business.This book covers a number of areas. First, much of the current BoP discussion emphasises targeting products to the needs of the poor. But do we actually know what the real needs of the poor are? This book takes a bottom-up human-centred approach and examines examples that truly engage the poor in BoP product and service development. What types of needs assessment methodologies are indicated considering the cultural differences in BoP countries? Are the existing methodologies adequate? Do they need to be redefined and redeveloped? Second, the book considers how we can balance poverty alleviation and stimulate economic growth without stressing the ecosystem. Tragically, the poor are hardest hit by the adverse effects of environmental deterioration such as water shortages, climate change or the destruction of habitats. While the economic welfare of the poor is critical, the BoP approach must balance its inherent paradox of encouraging greater consumption while avoiding further pressures on environmental sustainability. The link between the BoP approach and sustainable development is a key feature of this book. Third, it looks at innovation and asks what kinds of"bottom-up" innovation (open source, technological, social and business) support BoP initiatives (and sustainable development)?Fourth, the book deals with the relationship between development assistance and BoP. Is a BoP strategy the antithesis to development aid or can these two co-exist or even complement each other?Finally, the book raises questions about the relationship between corporate responsibility and BoP. Is BoP a new form of corporate neo-colonialism or a new form of corporate responsibility? Although the BoP concept has unleashed an extensive and generally enthusiastic response from academics, businesses, NGOs and governments, the knowledge domain around this concept is still in the early stages of development. This book addresses that need with a focus on the needs of the end-users – the poor – as a starting point for BoP products and innovations. With contributions from both supporters and critics, it provides a treasure trove of global knowledge on how the concept has developed, what its successes and failures have been and what promise it holds as a long-term strategy for alleviating poverty and tackling global sustainability.
Climate change, the resource constrained economy, and sustainability in general are amongst the hottest and most problematic topics for contemporary businesses. This book provides a comprehensive overview of how the world's sustainability challenges are affecting and being affected by business.
