Sustainability and organizational transformation: putting the cart before the horse? (part one)

Abstract

Purpose

Global corporate strategies are revealing the boundaries of organizational capabilities and the limits of the natural resource capacity that is needed to sustain business operations. Sustainability has emerged as a strategic response adopted by many corporations to reduce resource dependency and consumption costs in an effort to secure existence as a going concern while also demonstrating corporate citizenship. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Design/methodology/approach

This two-part paper will present a review of recent findings relevant to sustainability and change management was performed in order to develop a better understanding of factors that may hinder corporate adoption of sustainability, the role of sustainability in transformational change, and the change management challenges involved in integrating sustainability within corporate culture.

Findings

For a growing number of organizations, sustainability has recently been elevated from “doing” to the level of “being”, which involves integration into their mission, vision and shared values. Corporate leaders and governing bodies play a critical role as champions in the implementation of sustainability for organizational transformation.

Research limitations/implications

The limited number of examples of organizations fully embracing sustainability at a vision level stems from the fact that most executives do not fully understand the issues and do not know how to devise the governance or strategies needed to adopt a more sustainable path. However, the research points to the fact that there is a recognized shortage of empirical research work specifically focused on sustainability change and effective business cases.

Practical implications

Organization development practitioners have a significant role in helping firms implement sustainability-focused transformations.

Social implications

Given the economic, ecological and social imperatives, there is urgency for firms around the world, both big and small, to adopt effective sustainability strategies that add value for stakeholders while reducing resource demand.

Originality/value

The research points to the fact that there is a recognized shortage of empirical research work specifically focused on sustainability change including limited examples of effective business cases.

Citation

Muja, N., H. Appelbaum, S., Walker, T., Ramadan, S. and Sodeyi, T. (2014), "Sustainability and organizational transformation: putting the cart before the horse? (part one)", Industrial and Commercial Training, Vol. 46 No. 5, pp. 249-256. https://doi.org/10.1108/ICT-02-2013-0007