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Business sustainability and collective intelligence

Paulo Garrido (School of Engineering, Algoritmi Centre and Industrial Electronics Department, University of Minho, Guimarães, Portugal)

The Learning Organization

ISSN: 0969-6474

Article publication date: 17 April 2009

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to analyze to which point collective intelligence (CI) concepts and ideas, as applied to organizations, can contribute to enlarge the conceptual basis for business sustainability (BS).

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is written from an engineer‐minded, systemic and cybernetic perspective. It begins by establishing a definition for business as a special type of organization and frames its sustainability on autopoietic theory. Next, it presents basic ideas on CI and of its application to businesses. Then, it singles out which concepts of CI are of interest to BS.

Findings

Inside the autopoietic analysis of organizations, it is found that evolvability, understood as learning, is a concept with a potentially deeper and larger value than sustainability. Since evolvability (as learning) matches well the concept of intelligence, it is found that the application of CI ideas to businesses is relevant to BS. In particular, CI provides systemic arguments in favor of changing the condition of “employeeship” to “ownership” for BS, as a corollary.

Practical implications

All the findings indicated above are deemed relevant to managerial practice and general thinking and action on BS.

Originality/value

To the best knowledge of the author, this paper presents for the first time useful conceptual connections between BS and CI. The proposal of “evolvability”, understood as learning, as a concept to ground deeply BS is deemed original, as well as the systemic arguments in favor of turning “employeeship” into “ownership”, inside businesses. For the value, let the reader judge.

Keywords

Citation

Garrido, P. (2009), "Business sustainability and collective intelligence", The Learning Organization, Vol. 16 No. 3, pp. 208-222. https://doi.org/10.1108/09696470910949935

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2009, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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