Prelims

Half Title Page

Attaining the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal of Gender Equality

Series Title Page

Family Businesses on a Mission

Series Editors:

Naomi Birdthistle

Rob Hales

The Family Businesses on Mission series examines how the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) can be applied in family businesses around the world, providing insights into cultural and societal differences and displaying innovative approaches to complex environmental and societal issues

Title Page

Attaining the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal of Gender Equality

Edited by

Naomi Birdthistle

Griffith University, Australia

And

Rob Hales

Griffith University, Australia

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Emerald Publishing, Floor 5, Northspring, 21-23 Wellington Street, Leeds LS1 4DL

First edition 2024

Editorial matter and selection © 2024 Naomi Birdthistle and Rob Hales.

Individual chapters © 2024 The Authors.

Published by Emerald Publishing Limited.

These works are published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence.

Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of these works (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode.

The ebook edition of this title is Open Access and is freely available to read online.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-80455-835-5 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-80455-832-4 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-80455-834-8 (Epub)

List of Figures

List of Tables

About the Editors

Professor Naomi Birdthistle has entrepreneurship and family business running through her veins. She tried to work in her family business when she was four but was told she was too small. She came back year after year asking to work and eventually her grandmother capitulated and left her work in the family business when she was seven. After years of working in the family business part-time and having completed her studies at Stirling University, Babson College, Harvard University, and the University of Limerick, Naomi established her own consulting business, consulting family businesses in her hometown. She is now a Professor of Entrepreneurship and Business Innovation at Griffith University, teaching future family business leaders and researching family business issues as well. Naomi is an award-winning academic having received numerous awards for her teaching and her research.

Associate Professor Rob Hales is the discipline leader for Sustainable Business and Management in the Department of Business Strategy and Innovation. His research interests focus on the governance issues around the grand challenges of our time. Furthermore, his research focuses on SDGs in business and government, a business case for climate change, climate change policy, carbon management, sustainable tourism and working with First Peoples on consent processes and climate change. He was the first programme director of Griffith University's Master of Global Development. He teaches in the Department of Business Strategy and Innovation and has convened master’s level courses such as Leadership for Sustainable Business, Research Methods for Policy Makers and Sustainability and Systems Thinking. He supervises PhD students in the areas of collaborative governance, sustainability transitions and climate change.

About the Contributors

Bettina Lynda Bastian is a researcher in entrepreneurship and focuses on the intersections of gender, culture, governance, policy and organisation associated with new ventures and innovation. Her research is internationally recognised for translating social science into work policies and practices that promote entrepreneurship and sustainable business, especially women's development and capacity building. She has been working in senior university roles promoting entrepreneurship, innovation, gender equality and sustainability/ESG. She served as the Dean of the College of Business and Law at the Royal University for Women in Bahrain; she was the Head of Academic Programmes in Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the Holy Spirit University of Kaslik, Lebanon (USEK), and the Head of Business Ethics programmes at the American University of Beirut (AUB). Currently, she is building her own educational consultancy and she works as an adjunct Associate Professor at the American University in Bulgaria.

Allan Discua Cruz is a member of the Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business and director of the Centre for Family Business at Lancaster University Management School (United Kingdom). His current research interests relate to entrepreneurship by families in business and the role of women in the continuity of family firms. He has co-authored other entries in this series such as UK: Pentland Brands; UK: George Cox and Sons; UK: Atkinsons Coffee Roasters.

Karen Dubon is the CEO and legal representative of Luna Inversiones (real estate) and Bay Island Harvest S de RL where the products of the Hacienda Las Flores and Paraiso brands are marketed and distributed. She has a PhD from Aden Business School and a degree in marketing from Central American Technological University. Twenty-one years of experience in corporate Banking, cash management, payroll, leasing and export projects among others.

Divinia Eather is the passionate representative and second generation of the family business Eather Group, advocating for sustainability across major infrastructure projects in New South Wales. As Marketing Manager, Divinia recognises the role of storytelling in motivating change and seeks opportunities to share Eather Group's experiences and achievements in their industry. With an emphasis on inspiring sustainability and diverse employment in their field, her insights have appeared in national newspapers, construction reviews and industry publications. At just 21 years of age, Divinia has featured as a keynote speaker at conferences, forums and summits across Australia, as well as a guest Lecturer for universities, demonstrating the merits of a Circular Economy model and the importance of sustainable development in the industry. Divinia was the 2022 Hawkesbury Business Awards Young Business Person of the Year, and through her efforts she aims to make environmental and social sustainability accessible to businesses and individuals at different stages of their journeys, fostering a more sustainable future.

Lena Leifeld, Paris Lodron University, Salzburg graduated with a bachelor’s degree in ‘Sociology’ from the University of Innsbruck and in ‘Business Administration’ from the Management Center Innsbruck. After completing an internship at the Center for Family Businesses at the Management Center Innsbruck, she joined the organization as a Project Assistant from March 2019 to August 2022. During this period, she actively participated in various projects while finishing her master’s degree in ‘Organization Studies’ at the University of Innsbruck. Since October 2022, she has been pursuing her PhD at Paris Lodron University, Salzburg. Her interdisciplinary research interests primarily lie in the fields of sustainable business, family business and change management.

Poh Yen Ng is an Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Aberdeen Business School, Robert Gordon University. She holds a PhD in Management from the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, and is currently a Senior Fellow of Advance HE in the United Kingdom. Poh Yen grew up in a family business and ran an education franchise with her husband in Malaysia back in the 2000s. She then ventured into academia to pass on her business experiences to university students. This later motivated her into developing a research passion for entrepreneurship, particularly the family business. Her research outputs cover many areas within the entrepreneurship and family business discipline including the following: influence of socioemotional wealth in the family business, empowerment process and social network dynamics of women entrepreneurs and environmental practices of small and medium-sized enterprises.

Valerie Nickel, MCI The Entrepreneurial School, is part of the Family Business Center at the Entrepreneurial School (MCI) since 2018. She is researching and teaching in the field of family businesses with a special focus on gender dynamics, identity work and narratives in family firms. She graduated from the University of Innsbruck with bachelor’s degrees in ‘Management and Economics’, ‘Health and Competitive Sports’ as well as ‘Psychology’ and a master’s degree in ‘Applied Economics’. Currently, she is doing a master’s degree in ‘Psychology’. In 2019, she started her PhD exploring the interplay of contemporary roles, social structures and identity work which is supported by the EQUA Stiftung Munich with a fellowship. She was part of the doctoral colloquium Gender and Gender Relations in Transitions in 2020.

Silvia Paz is the CEO of Inversiones S y B S de RL (Hacienda Las Flores) since 2011. She is an Industrial and systems Engineer who graduated from the Central American Technological University with 13 years of experience in the area of quality and planning in the automotive industry and 11 years of experience in the food industry, specifically in the production of healthy snacks.

Rachel Perkins, Department of Business Strategy and Innovation, Griffith Business School, Griffith University, has a PhD in regional tourism business development in the context of destination management. She is a Lecturer at the Griffith Business School at Griffith University and currently teaches courses that focus on start-up development, sustainable and innovative business management and small business development. Rachel grew up in the small country town of Stanthorpe, in QLD Australia, where she was able to observe the originality that came from small business and became interested in pursuing this focus in her research career. Rachel has received awards at domestic and international conferences and from other institutions for her research.

Alan Reddrop has an honours degree in history from the University of Cambridge – and passed in the second class of the City & Guilds of London ordinary certificate in foundry practice. After a half-century gap, he returned to academia where he is an adjunct fellow at the University of South Australia – Business. In 2012, he wrote his doctoral thesis ‘Family Business Engagement’ (Reddrop, 2012 ¹ ) which explores the propensity – and frequent reluctance – of family businesses to seek available external advice on the challenges they face. Subsequent publications include ‘Family businesses-seekers of advice’ (Reddrop & Mapunda, 2015 ² ) and ‘Listening skills: accountancy educators in retreat?’ (Reddrop & Mapunda, 2019 ³ ), willingness to listen was found to be diminishing, both co-authored with Dr Gido Mapunda.

Dr Bronwyn P Wood (Aisha) has a PhD in Marketing from Otago, in her native Aotearoa, New Zealand. She currently teaches in the UAE, has a consultancy, www.MuslimMarketingMatters.com, and is a Field Editor for the International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship. With publications across the business spectrum, particularly in Islamic Marketing and Women’s Entrepreneurship, Dr Wood applies her varied experience to perceptual and epistemological discussions of meaning and well-being. Her interest areas include non-hegemonic methodologies, decolonization, social justice and social and economic sustainability.

Anita Zehrer, MCI The Entrepreneurial School, is a Professor, Head of the Family Business Center as well as Head of Research (Management and Society) at the Management Center Innsbruck (MCI). She graduated from Innsbruck University with a PhD in Social Sciences and became a full Professor in 2015 (Catholic University of Eichstaett-Ingolstadt). From 2007 to 2015 she was the Deputy Head of the MCI Tourism Department and from 2012 to 2017 she was the Deputy Head of the MCI Academic Council. She was an Adjunct Professor at the University of Notre Dame in Sydney, Australia (2012–2016), and at the University of Canberra, Australia (2013–2016). From 2009 to 2018 she served as the Vice President of the German Association for Tourism Research DGT, from 2014 to 2017 she was a Member of the Tourism Advisory Board of the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Energy, Germany, and from 2016 to 2017 she was a tourism expert at the Committee of Regions at the European Union. Her research interests are diverse and include entrepreneurship and family business management. She has broad competence in interdisciplinary research and teaching in tourism and family business.

Foreword

Prof. Walter Leal Filho (PhD, DSc, DPhil, DTech, DEd)

Chair, Inter-University Sustainable Development Research Programme

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2015 provide a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that by 2030 all people enjoy peace and prosperity.

They also entail elements of importance towards a strategic business engagement with sustainability issues. These offer a framework which provides businesses with a systematic approach to identify new business opportunities whilst contributing to the solution of the grand sustainability challenges facing the world today, including climate change. Each SDG, if achieved, will have a direct and significant positive impact on millions of people's lives around the world and the environment in which they live. Businesses have an opportunity to widen the purpose of business through adopting the SDGs as targets for their operations. Thus, they can make a meaningful contribution to the greater good through achieving their operational objectives.

Family businesses are uniquely placed to contribute to SDGs for many reasons. Firstly, because family business models have longer time perspectives, and this allows the family business to link with the longer term SDG time frame – 2030. Second, family businesses often focus on aspects of business operation which do not have an immediate return on investment such as relationship building with stakeholder groups. Thirdly, family businesses tend to rate the importance of ethics higher than standard businesses and thus align well with the social dimensions of the SDGs. Lastly, family businesses have intergenerational perspectives which is a core principle of sustainability.

This book provides insights into how family business operationalises SDG#5: Gender Equality. This book uses a rigorous case study approach for family businesses to detail aspects of their business which help to advance gender equality. The cases provided here are living proof that the family business that operate for the greater good actually work! Non-family businesses can take a leaf out of the family businesses portrayed in this book as they can provide different perspectives on how businesses can successfully align SDGs and business strategy.

Despite many businesses having adopted environmental social governance strategies and environmental management systems, the effect of this activity has not been reflected in a healthier planet. Many ‘state of the environment’ reports indicate that planetary health is decreasing, and planetary boundaries are being crossed or are about to be crossed. Whilst the cause of this decline is not entirely the fault of business, there still needs to be a greater effort to address the decline. The challenge for family businesses is to use their unique characteristics and set ambitious programmes of work that make a meaningful contribution to achieving global goals. This book provides insights into how family businesses can achieve such a mission and how non-family businesses can be inspired to do the same.

Acknowledgements

The Editors would like to thank the contributors of the book for providing insights and sharing learnings from their business practice. We acknowledge that writing up cases in the format required considerable time and effort. The quality of the cases presented is testament to their efforts.

The Editors would also like to thank Emerald Publishing for supporting the publication of this book and the mission for deeper sustainability through utilising the SDGs.