Integrating Selected Concepts And Methods To Enhance Corporate Sustainability

The striving for sustainable development is one of the great challenges of the 21st century. As a result on a corporate level, companies are increasingly forced to broaden their scope by considering environmental and social aspects in their decision-making processes to ultimately remain competitive and prospering. However, the incorporation of sustainability into both qualitative and quantitative corporate decision-making is challenging and complex. Against this background the present doctoral dissertation reveals ways to implement and enhance corporate sustainability. This is done by means of integrating selected methods and concepts, namely the concepts of transdisciplinarity, reverse logistics, and green information systems as well as methods and tools from the discipline of operations research. Within seven research contributions qualitative and quantitative approaches are developed that improve corporate decision-making to achieve sustainability goals.

Redefining Success: Integrating Sustainability into Management Education advocates incorporating sustainability concepts that go beyond the financial ‘bottom line’ into management education and business practice. Highlighting the UN Global Compact (UNGC), the Principles for Responsible Management Education (PRME) and the Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs), it explores conceptual and practical issues, presents case studies and other empirical evidence, and offers solutions that will both encourage and assist management educators in the incorporation of sustainability into their courses and research. incorporating sustainability into their courses and research. Written by 34 individuals from 17 countries, the book addresses these topics from a variety of theoretical, disciplinary, geographic and organizational perspectives. The authors demonstrate how management educators, collaborating with business and civic organizations, can be change agents for a better world. Written for educators, scholars and business practitioners, the volume concludes with lessons learned, challenges encountered, and implications for responsible management education.

Corporations are slowly realizing the impact of their businesses on the environment and society. They are also facing increasing pressure from stakeholders to follow responsible business practices. Many companies are looking to incorporate sustainable practices and manage a sustainable business. However, they are unaware of where and how to start this transition. This book explains the basics of how to incorporate sustainability into any business. It provides a simple understanding of the concept of sustainability and the basic approaches to identifying, implementing, and measuring sustainability in any business. Through the various examples given in this book with the reference to textiles and chemical Industries, readers can identify which aspect of sustainability to adopt in their business, and the various steps that can be taken for its implementation and management. This book aims to simplify and explain corporate sustainability to professionals, students, and business owners from all industries.

The difficulties in moving towards corporate sustainability raise the question of how environmental and social management can be integrated better with economic business goals. Over the last decade, the relationship between environmental and economic performance, and more recently the interaction between sustainability performance and business competitiveness, have received considerable attention in both theory and practice. However, to date, only partial aspects of the relationship between sustainability performance, competitiveness and economic performance have been studied from a theoretical as well as an empirical perspective. And, to date, no unique relationship has prevailed in empirical studies. A number of explanations have been put forward to explain this, including methodological reasons, such as the lack of statistical data, the low quality of that data, or the fact that such data is often available for short time periods only. Other theoretical explanations have been developed, such as the influence of different corporate strategies or the relatively small influence of environmental or sustainability issues as one factor among many on the economic or financial success of firms. So, how should the business case for sustainability be managed? This is the starting point for this book, which compiles insights on a large number of aspects of the link between sustainability performance, business competitiveness and economic success in an attempt to provide a comprehensive and structured view of this relationship. The book provides an unrivalled body of knowledge on the state of theory and practice in this field and identifies prospective future fields of work. The book includes: conceptual frameworks for the interaction of social, environmental and economic issues in business environments; case studies of companies that have successfully integrated social, environmental and economic issues; analyses of the causal and empirical relationship between environmental and/or social performance, business performance and firm-level competitiveness; concepts and tools useful for improving business value with proactive operational strategies; assessment of the factors influencing operational sustainability strategies and their economic impact; and comparisons of interactions between sustainability performance and firm competitiveness across industry sectors and countries. Managing the Business Case for Sustainability is the definitive work in its field: the most comprehensive book yet published on the theory and practice of managing sustainability performance, competitiveness, environmental, social and economic performance in an integrated way. It will be essential reading for managers, academics, consultants, fund managers, governments and government agencies, NGOs and international bodies who need a broad and comprehensive overview of the business case for sustainability.

A new collection of realistic, proven best practices for implementing sustainability and making it stick… 4 authoritative books, in a convenient e-format, at a great price! 4 authoritative Books show how to transform business sustainability from idea to profitable reality: Understanding the value of sustainability is one thing: successfully implementing it in your business is another. Good intentions aren't enough: you need excellence in implementation. In this unique 4 eBook package, world-class experts focus on the nitty-gritty and the nuts-and-bolts of successful business sustainability: what it takes to make it work, build on success, and keep moving forward. In Creating a Sustainable Organization: Approaches for Enhancing Corporate Value through Sustainability, Peter A. Soyka helps you choose the right strategies, and then manage and measure them well. Bridging the worlds of the sustainability professional and the investor/analyst, Soyka reveals what the evidence says about linkages between sustainability and value… how to effectively manage sustainability throughout the business… how to manage key investor and stakeholder relationships, and much more. Next, in Return on Sustainability: How Business Can Increase Profitability and Address Climate Change in an Uncertain Economy , Kevin Wilhelm reviews today's best practices for capitalizing on the business opportunities presented by climate change. Wilhelm helps you make the business case by identifying key climate-related business risks that will require your company to act whether it wants to or not. He presents real-world case studies of firms ranging from Yakima to Lockheed Martin, demonstrating how enterprises have significantly improved business performance by improving climate performance -- and offering practical strategies, techniques, and lessons from their experiences. Then, in Making Sustainability Stick: The Blueprint for Successful Implementation, Wilhelm offers a complete, up-to-date blueprint for successfully and profitably integrating sustainability across your enterprise. Wilhelm organizes his plan into easy-to-digest chapters, with action steps backed up from his extensive real-life consulting experience and candid interviews with 40+ directors of Sustainability or Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). He provides a step-by-step roadmap for realizing the benefits of sustainability by fully engaging employees… a checklist for implementation… powerful tips on regaining lost momentum… and specific resources and exercises for overcoming common obstacles. Finally, in Financial Times Briefings: Sustainable Business, Brian Clegg delivers concise, practical, and actionable advice for integrating sustainability throughout your business in ways that improve both the environment and your bottom line. Organized to deliver fast and realistic solutions, this FT Briefing presents targeted strategies, detailed tactics, real cases, crucial consensus-building techniques, effective metrics, proven executive interventions, and more. Whatever your role in executing on business sustainability, this collection will help you achieve outstanding results -- environmental and financial. From world-renowned business sustainability experts Peter A. Soyka, Kevin Wilhelm, and Brian Clegg

Invaluable guidance for complete integration of sustainability into reporting and performance management systems Global businesses are under close scrutiny from lawmakers, regulators, and their diverse stakeholders to focus on sustainability and accept responsibility for their multiple bottom line performance. Business Sustainability and Accountability examines business sustainability and accountability reporting and their integration into strategy, governance, risk assessment, performance management and the reporting process. This book also highlights how people, business and resources collaborate in a business sustainability and accountability model. Looks at business sustainability and accountability reporting and assurance and their incorporation into the reporting process Focuses on how the business sustainability and accountability model are impacted by the collaboration of people, business, and resources Presents laws, rules, regulations, standards and best practices relevant to business sustainability performance, reporting and assurance Organizations worldwide recognize the importance of all five EGSEE dimensions of sustainability performance and accountability reporting. However, how to actually assess sustainability risk, implement sustainability reporting, and obtain sustainability assurance remain a major challenge and best practices are evolving. Straightforward and comprehensive Business Sustainability and Accountability hits on all of the hottest topics around sustainability including multiple bottom line (EGSEE) performance and reporting, related financial and non-financial key performance indicators (KPIs), business social responsibility and environmental reporting.

Responding to the pressing need of business schools to incorporate sustainability thinking into their curricula, this new book offers fresh thinking on how to achieve this in practical terms. Structured on a typical MBA programme, each chapter explores how sustainability thinking can be integrated into existing subject areas. Rather than being prescriptive, the chapters provide opportunities to reflect on successes as well as challenges associated with embedding sustainability into MBA courses. Contributors explore the employability implications of sustainability and how these are reflected in course designs, pedagogy and assessments. Filling an important gap in current literature, Incorporating Sustainability in Management Education provides important support to Higher Education Institutes who must quickly adapt to this desired change in business school curricula.

The developments in our environment and society has made it clear that the way we run our businesses and govern our nations is not sustainable in the long run. This is also why more and more companies and organizations are pursuing sustainable business through various Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities. However, many companies experience that although they facilitate a CSR strategy on corporate level, CSR is often not embedded in their business and/or integrated across their functions. If companies are to achieve the full business potential and performance impact of CSR, sustainability has to be operationalized, targeted and measured across the value chain through empowered employees and in alignment with the business strategy of the company. Though state-of-the-art CSR research, theories and models, the theoretical platform for sustainable business and CSR is presented in this book. However, CSR is carried out in practice, and not just in theory. This is why each chapter is supplemented with practical case examples explaining the way in which different companies and their managers have integrated sustainable business in their strategy and across the organizations’ different functions. As is evident both in theory and practice, the success of CSR integration is highly affected by industrial context, as the unique characteristics of the industry have an impact on the key sustainability challenges and business opportunities of the specific company and industry. In support of this evidence, the book also reveals how CSR can be implemented across private and public organizations as well as small & medium sized entities (SMEs).