Search results

The influence of sustainability practices, especially those related to the environment and society in driving business growth is evident from the annual sustainability reports of big corporations. Also, there has been a plethora of research relating sustainability performance to the financial performance of these companies. However, in the case of small and medium-sized enterprises, a very limited research study has been done so far considering the societal and environmental aspects of their business operations. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs), especially those in the emerging economy have grossly neglected their responsibilities and obligations towards the environment and society. SMEs are considered as growth engines for any nation. However, literature has shown that a large percentage of SMEs across the world fail within a few years of their incorporation. This paper aims to verify the relationship between sustainability performance and business growth for SMEs in the developing economy.

In the paper, the authors have tried to develop a model taking a sample of 200 SMEs from Indian leather and chemical sectors and find out how the factors like collaborative synergy and government policy initiatives impact the sustainability performance of small and medium firms and how in turn, their improved sustainability performance helps them to drive sustainable business growth. Data were mainly collected through primary survey and also from the company websites.

Empirical results of the study reveal that both policy initiatives and collaborative synergy positively influence the firm’s sustainability performance and, in turn, the company’s business growth is positively impacted by their enhanced sustainability performance. Company size was found to have a moderating effect on this relationship.

There are theoretical and conceptual papers elaborating on the importance of adoption of sustainability practices in SME business operations but no empirical study has been conducted to mathematically relate the factors of sustainability and business growth. The authors have tried to build a model relating the factors of sustainability improvement with those of the business growth of the firm and also verified the influence of control variables like company size on the proposed relationship.

By drawing attention to the finite rather than unlimited nature of physical resources, the purpose of this paper is to: examine the implications of the (near absolute) emphasis placed on firm growth on sustainable consumption; and discuss complementary perspectives spanning individual, firm and societal levels that allow for both firm growth and sustainable consumption.

The authors integrate multidisciplinary insights from marketing, sociology, environmental sciences, management and economics, to understand the inherent tensions between unchecked firm growth, consumption and sustainability. Five propositions link production, consumption and marketing from a resource standpoint.

A ceaseless economic growth paradigm and overconsumption causes an unwarranted depletion of resources and is at odds with sustainability. Firms can play an important role by guiding future marketing and production toward sustainable ends. Several alternate perspectives support the case that growth may coexist and align with sustainable consumption. Consequently the authors consolidate and reflect on seven approaches (voluntary simplicity, humane consumption, CSR 2.0, social marketing, marketing 3.0, anti-positional economy and degrowth) that hold promise for achieving sustainability via responsible growth and consumption.

The authors consider the complex triad of growth, consumption and sustainability that spans multiple levels. A focus on the pattern and nature of growth and consumption helps to identify its effects on sustainability. Specifically, two value chain activities – production and marketing may be leveraged as firm level initiatives to achieve sustainable goals. In addition, the authors present seven heterogeneous perspectives that complement firm attempts to achieve growth with sustainable consumption. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

The sustainability of global production chains is at the centre of discussion in the past few years. One of the most polluting sectors is the fashion industry. Fashion brands often decline responsibility, and continue misleading or exaggerated communication. This study aims to provide a comprehensive evaluation of regulation in the fashion industry and show practices of fashion firms.

Based on documentary analysis and literature review, the article describes current civil, supranational and governmental policies aiming to enhance the three dimensions of sustainability. Connecting these to the high-growth firm theory, the authors present a case study of a rising Hungarian fashion star based on press, sustainability and balance-sheet report analysis and personal interviews.

The article highlights some problematic areas of sustainability and greenwashing and describes the different levels and targeted areas of regulation. From the entrepreneurial perspective, the difficult balancing among growth and sustainability is analyzed and illustrated by the detailed case study. The authors provide regulatory suggestions (including the creation of a supranational monitoring agency).

Even if the authors doubt that global fashion chains can be sustainable, they offer both managerial and policy suggestions to reach the highest level of sustainability.

The suggested measures can contribute to the more sustainable practices and fraud reduction in the fashion industry.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the economic-regulatory approach used in this study to sustainable fashion industry is new, such as the presentation of the practices of a high-growth firm with a sustainable image.

This article shows operational excellence achieved during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic using the Lean, Six Sigma and Sustainability practices in small medium enterprise (SME) manufacturing firms and its impact on the performance dimensions of efficiency, growth and profit for firms located in the industrial zones of Pakistan.

A quantitative methodology was used and data were collected from a sample of top-level managers from 28 SME manufacturing firms located in the five industrial zones in Pakistan. A total of 62 questionnaires were included in the study.

The findings show that awareness levels of Lean, Six Sigma and Sustainability are emerging, and firms are trying to implement these concepts. However, the results show that while Lean and Six Sigma enhance firms’ performance in terms of efficiency, profit and growth, sustainability has no impact on these three performance dimensions.

The quantitative data of a sample of 28 manufacturing firms inevitably present limitations on the generalizability of this work. Future research could employ greater quantitative data to explore the topic further. Only one particular country is studied so that future research could be carried out in other countries or regions.

This study may have value for policymakers and other stakeholders who need to know more about how Lean, Six Sigma and Sustainability affect a firm’s performance in industrial zones in the context of a developing country.

This paper contributes to knowledge in the field by integrating Lean, Six Sigma and Sustainability with firms’ performance during the COVID-19 pandemic by assessing efficiency, growth and profit dimensions where otherwise no empirical research has been undertaken in the Pakistani context.

The purpose of this paper is to examine social enterprise sustainability by comparing recent international research with prior findings seeking to identify the important factors that facilitate social enterprise development.

The research used a concurrent, convergent mixed methods approach on a sample of 93 social enterprise leaders using surveys and face-to-face interviews. The participants were sourced from a cross-section of social enterprise organisational types from urban and regional locations in Australia and Scotland.

The findings support prior research, identifying resourcing, organisational capabilities, collaborative networks and legitimacy as influential in the success of social enterprises. However, the research contributes new knowledge by revealing an overarching growth orientation as the dominant factor in the strategic management for sustainability of these ventures. This growth orientation is generally associated with the intent to achieve profitability. Thus, social enterprise managers view a commercially focused growth orientation as an overarching strategic factor that underpins organisational sustainability.

The paper delivers new insights into the strategic orientation of social ventures of benefit to policy makers and practitioners alike. The findings are significant for policy makers providing perspectives into how governmental assistance can be targeted to develop sustainable social enterprises, particularly the need to support the growth of these ventures. Similarly, practitioners are alerted to the strategic imperatives of incorporating a commercially focused growth orientation and the latent potential that exists in the networks of social enterprise.

The purpose of this commissioned paper is to offer some personal reflections on sustainability within the hospitality industry.

The paper opens by identifying sustainability as a teasing paradox for the hospitality industry and a short discussion of the characteristics of sustainability. It then explores the growing interest in corporate sustainability and offers a review of the range of academic research into sustainability within the hospitality industry literature. More generally, the authors suggest three fundamental sets of issues that currently face the industry, namely, defining sustainability within the industry, materiality and independent external assurance and sustainable consumption and the industry’s commitment to continuing economic growth.

In addressing these three sets of issues, the authors make a number of suggestions. First that definitions of sustainability within the hospitality industry can be interpreted as being constructed around business imperatives rather than an ongoing commitment to sustainability. Second that materiality and external assurance are not treated comprehensively within the industry, which undermines the credibility of the sustainability reporting process. Third that the concept of sustainable consumption and any critique of the industry’s commitment to economic growth are conspicuous by their absence in the both the research literature on sustainability and in sustainability reporting within the industry.

The paper suggests that the hospitality industry may need to examine how it defines sustainability, to extend its sustainability reporting to embrace materiality and external assurance and to address the issues of sustainable consumption and continuing economic growth if it is to demonstrate a worthwhile and enduring commitment to sustainability.

The paper provides some accessible personal reflections on sustainability within the hospitality industry and, as such, it will be of interest to academics, students and practitioners interested in the hospitality industry and more widely within the business and management community.

This study has two aims. It aims to analyse three essential pre-conditions of an authentic sustainability curriculum (ASC). The theoretical analysis involves the definition of authenticity through the learning outcomes (LOs) framework called authentic minimum (AM). This paper also aims to gauge students’ views on economic growth, sustainability and mindfulness.

The theoretical aim was accomplished by extensive study of and critical reflections on the relevant literature. The empirical research was qualitative using an online questionnaire as survey instrument consisting of predominantly open-ended questions involving students of two economic faculties. Directed content analysis and nonparametric quantitative methods were used to assess the answers.

Viable sustainability goals are in stark contrast with the promotion of sustainable economic growth in sustainable development goals 8 and the reigning neoliberal agenda. The empirical findings provide valuable insights into how undergraduate students view mindfulness, economic growth and aspects of sustainability.

The empirical research has some obvious limitations that warrant caution in generalizing the results. The authors used a sample of convenience and the base population of the survey consisted only in students of economics in two economic faculties of two Hungarian universities.

Practical implications of the present paper are many all sharing; however, the need for existential courage on the part of teachers, students and leaders of higher education institutions. Existential courage is required for profound personal transformation, for going against mainstream ideology and the possible confrontations with colleagues, leaders of institutions, students, friends or family members.

On the theoretical side, the concept of ASC was introduced with AM as its LOs framework. For the first time, an attempt was made to interpret authenticity in sustainability education as an integration of mindfulness, human and environmental ethics and a firm opposition to economic growth and neoliberal ideals. The analysis of qualitative data supported earlier research and also provided unique findings in the examined areas.

This paper aims to explore and analyse stakeholders’ perceptions of the development priorities and suggests more effective strategies to assist sustainable economic growth in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

The authors use the World Bank data set, which collects various stakeholders’ opinions on the UAE development. First, the exploratory factor analysis has been applied to detect the main groups of development priorities. Second, the fuzzy cluster analysis has been conducted to detect the groups of stakeholders with different attitudes towards the importance of extracted groups of priorities. Third, clusters have been compared according to demographics, media usage and shared prosperity goals.

The two main groups of development priorities have been extracted by the exploratory factor analysis: economic priorities and sustainability priorities. Four clusters have been detected according to the level of motivation when it comes to the economic and sustainability priorities: Cluster 1 (High economic – High sustainability), Cluster 2 (High economic – Medium sustainability), Cluster 3 (High economic – Low sustainability) and Cluster 4 (Low economic – Low sustainability). Members of the cluster that prefer a high level of economic and sustainability priorities (Cluster 1) also prefer more diversified economic growth providing better employment opportunities and better education and training for young people in the UAE.

Limitations stem from the survey being conducted on a relatively small sample using the data collected by the World Bank; however, this data set allowed a comparison of various stakeholders. Future research should consider a broader sample approach, e.g. exploring and comparing all of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries; investigating the opinions of the expatriate managers living in the UAE that are not from GCC countries; and/or including other various groups that are lagging, such as female entrepreneurs.

Several practical implications were identified regarding education and media coverage. Since respondents prioritize the economic development factors over sustainability factors, a media campaign could be developed and executed to increase sustainability awareness. A campaign could target especially male citizens since the analysis indicates that males are more likely to affirm high economic and low sustainability priorities than females. There is no need for further diversification of media campaigns according to age since the analysis did not reveal relevant differences in age groups, implying there is no inter-generational gap between respondents.

This paper contributes to the literature by comparing the perceived importance of various development goals in the UAE, such as development priorities and shared prosperity indicators. The fuzzy cluster analysis has been used as a novel approach to detect the relevant groups of stakeholders in the UAE and their developmental priorities. The issue of media usage and demographic characteristics in this context has also been discussed.

This study explores the scope, materiality and extent of environmental and social sustainability disclosure – as benchmarked against the Global Reporting Initiatives (GRI-G4) – of the top 10 logistics firms operating in Australia. It also investigates the relationships between the extent of environmental and social sustainability disclosure of these firms and their actual financial performance.

The authors adopted an inductive case study approach for an in-depth investigation of the relationships among concepts. A content analysis of the firms' sustainability reports was performed to determine their pattern and extent of sustainability disclosure against the GRI framework. A disclosure–performance analysis (DPA) matrix was employed to relate the extent of environmental and social sustainability disclosure of these 10 firms with their actual financial performance (i.e. return on assets [ROA] and total revenue growth).

This study found that the extent of sustainability reporting was relatively high on the labour practices and decent work subgroup, followed by the environmental dimension of the GRI-G4 framework. However, it was relatively low on the society, human rights and product responsibility subgroups of the GRI framework. The DPA revealed that “Leaders” (firms with higher sustainability disclosure levels) achieved significantly higher ROA. However, “Opportunists” (firms with lower sustainability disclosure levels) achieved higher levels of financial returns (i.e. ROA and total revenue growth) with less attention to sustainability issues, which contradicts the win-win view of the sustainability disclosure–financial performance relationship.

First, this study contributes an in-depth review of sustainability disclosure practices of top logistics firms operating in Australia. Second, using DPA, it identifies the novel effects of environmental and social sustainability disclosure levels on these firms' financial performance. It also sheds further light on the potential effect of investments beyond substantial profitability for sustainability growth and corporate governance on the sustainability disclosure–financial performance relationship.

The purpose of this paper is to trace the impact that the ecological approach has in international development programs in both the USA and Europe. It discusses the applications of sustainability by international donor agencies among bilateral and multi‐lateral organizations in developing economies. It outlines the influence of sustainability in the US Federal Government agencies to protect and maintain environmentally‐based development programs.

The paper compares industrial ecology and ecological anthropology approaches to sustainability development. It discusses their policy implications for international development assistance programs. It describes how anthropological and sociological approaches to sustainability have impacted the development policies and programs of bilateral and multilateral organizations, as well as those of multi‐national corporations.

There are common sustainability trends among the four competing donor organizations in approaching sustainability development by bilateral and multilateral international development organizations. These organizations – the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the World Bank, the United Nations and its affiliated Organizations, and the US Federal government agencies, for example, the Environmental Protection Agency – have shaped and influenced the policies and programs of sustainability development in business organizations and in developing economies.

Sustainability has been a subject of interest in international development assistance programs in both bilateral and multilateral organizations since the 1970s. Over time, the subject of sustainability received prominence in the developed world. It can be argued that sustainability has its roots in the developing economy and has been adapted/modified to meet the environmental and natural resources conservation and management policies of the developed economies.