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This paper seeks to present a longitudinal case study of Ontario Hydro – an industrial organization that used sustainable development as the basis for a strategy of social and organizational transformation.

The paper describes the complex factors that influenced the formulation and implementation of this strategy.

The findings indicate the advanced ambition and authenticity of Ontario Hydro's strategy, even though it was formulated some ten years ago. The study suggests that the strategy was abandoned for reasons that include the gap between the processes identified in the strategy and the processes followed in practice, the absence of platforms to discuss and agree the meaning and practice of sustainable development within the company and its wider system, and the scarcity of skills to facilitate sustainable development as a process of multi‐actor innovation. Consequently, the concept of sustainable development was not translated into practices that had shared meaning for the many actors involved in the energy system of Ontario. While based on a case study of one organization, the findings appear to speak to more general issues of sustainable development as the management of organizational and contextual change.

The paper indicates much about the process of organizational change to effect more sustainable practices within a company and its social context.

No other organization has pursued a strategy for sustainable development with the same claim to authenticity as that of Ontario Hydro, where the strategy was cross‐referenced to Agenda 21 and developed with input from some of the main architects of Agenda 21. Moreover, few studies of sustainable development in the literature span a period as long as this case.

This study aims to assess the determinants of corporate direction in sustainable development through time in a B2B setting.

This study has been conducted in one industry, and overcoming contextual bias as a judgmental sampling was used to select the organizations studied in a Business to Business (B2B) setting.

The determinants of sustainable development in this study indicate the existence of different corporate directions in a B2B setting taken through time in the healthcare organizations studied. The determinants found are change in organizational leadership, financial assets of the organization, religious orientation of the organization, organizational connection to the healthcare system, internal values of the organization and top-staff orientation in the organization.

The empirical findings reported in a B2B setting have disclosed key determinants of corporate direction in sustainable development.

The determinants provide managerial guidance to assess the corporate direction in a B2B setting taken in the continuing development of sustainable practices in these organizations.

This study contributes to a multidimensional framework of determinants in a B2B setting to assess the corporate direction taken in sustainable development through time in a B2B setting. The organizational gap between past and present sustainable development provides guidance to assess the corporate direction in B2B taken by an organization into the future.

This chapter presents an organizational learning approach to understanding the objectives and challenges of an National Health Service (NHS) Sustainable Development agenda, which involves the integration of social, ecological and economic concerns into organizational functioning, for example the construction and management of buildings, design and delivery of services, and employment of staff.

The approach is used to frame an empirical analysis of 11 Projects conducted by NHS organizations aiming to advance this agenda during a particularly active phase in the mid to late 2000s. The approach helps identify the assumptions of organizational purpose, strategy and practice inherent in proposals for Sustainable Development and expose the challenges these are likely to pose. This framing helps articulate a vision and identify the actor groups, and their guiding assumptions, which need to be engaged if progress is to be made.

The vision of Sustainable Development being promoted was predominantly one of an NHS contributing to the economic and social determinants of health through its procurement, service development and employment activities. Contributions to environmental determinants only took place where financial gains to the NHS organizations themselves made activities, such as investment in renewable energy, viable in the short-term. Within most Projects strategic tools able to predict and measure benefits had to be developed on-the-job and most received help from external agencies to do this work.

Rather than expecting individual NHS organizations to progress this agenda alone, others involved in the shaping of collective assumptions of the NHS' purpose and strategies for growth must be engaged in what can be viewed as a social process of learning.

The purpose of this paper is to characterize sustainable development and sustainability as study objects for comparative management theory.

The primary objective of this paper is to characterize sustainable development and sustainability as study objects for comparative management theory.

Analytical dimensions were related to establishing three proposals, which represent possible theoretical routes for characterizing sustainable development and sustainability as study objects for comparative management theory. A framework which illustrates the theoretical route taken to develop these proposals is presented at the end of the theoretical-analytical discussions.

This paper considers that discussion about sustainable development, sustainability and comparative management theory, as interesting themes for organizational studies, lack epistemological clarity and theoretical depth. Such shortcomings are identified based upon the difficulty in identifying ontological postures, epistemological perspectives, dominant paradigms and conceptual approaches that enable greater coherence to analysis of these themes, and also support the undertaking of research that can contribute to enriching proposals related to comparative management theory.

This is an innovative paper as it relates comparative management theory approaches with structural concepts from sustainable development and sustainability developed using contributions from organizational theories, sociological reflections, and political science. The proposed characterization is intended to blaze new and alternative epistemological paths for adding greater rigor to empirical research focussed on the relationship investigated here in a theoretical context.

The literature on corporate responsibility (CR) increasingly recognizes the importance of leadership in support of organizational change. This is particularly the case when CR provides the basis for the business contribution to sustainable development, which is understood to involve organizational and social innovation leading to change. The paper draws on theoretical and empirical studies to examine leadership for CR as a particular example of management innovation.

The paper develops a model of leadership for CR as the business contribution to sustainable development by confronting and integrating the literatures on management innovation and leadership for CR. The proposed model is consistent with the direction, alignment, commitment (DAC) framework that fosters a culture of organizational leadership relevant to the specific case of business and sustainable development.

The process model described in the paper connects leadership in organizational change with literature on management innovation. The paper draws on theoretical and empirically grounded literature on management, corporate responsibility and organizational psychology. It puts forward a sequence of mechanisms that contribute to successful change and discusses how they are linked. This sequence provides a process model of leadership practices for CR as the business contribution to sustainable development viewed as a particular form of management innovation, which involves the advancement of leadership practices for CR as organizational and social change.

The model is useful as a reference to practice and as a basis for leadership development. In terms of theory the model needs to be more thoroughly tested in empirical settings to understand better the interdependencies between leadership practices for CR and management innovation.

This process model is the first attempt to develop a comprehensive understanding of CR in a management innovation framework. In doing this it moves beyond the recent focus on leadership skills and competences of individuals.

Organizations and businesses have evolved tremendously during the last years. Previously, the focus of organizations was on goods and production, however, later on this perspective has changed to a more knowledge and intellectual capital focus nowadays. As such, concepts of organizational knowledge and know‐how, as well as stakeholders and society rights are increasingly being raised and discussed in recent studies. This paper aims to present the fundamental questions on the importance of undertaking sustainable development roles by organizations and the effects that it can have on the organizations. The paper will also discuss how organizations can benefit from acting to their sustainable development roles and consider it as a means of competitive advantage, rather than an organizational threat.

In‐depth literature review as well as years of experience of authors in the field has been used to develop this research.

It is concluded that despite some initial limitations for the organizations in undertaking their sustainable development roles, they will benefit from the positive image that is created for their organization as well as other benefits and competitive advantages in the long run.

It is necessary for organizations to be aware of their sustainable development roles and undertake their responsibilities toward the society.

After the recent global economic meltdown, the question whether sustainability and organizational commitments toward sustainable development can help organizations gain a competitive advantage to better survive in the challenging world of today, is yet to be further discussed. This paper is an attempt to investigate this in more detail.

This paper investigates the interactional relationships between sustainable human resource management (SHRM) and organizational performance (OP). Sustainable HRM is an approach that links HRM and sustainability. These studies focused on integrating HR with sustainable developments, such as economic and social aspects, in favour of focusing on the environmental aspect. Organizational change is an ongoing process that has to be managed effectively to keep the change in place for a long time.

A framework was offered to estimate the cause-and-effect relation of the SHRM and OP factors. Data is gathered from professionals from various pharmaceutical industries. This study applied two methods, Fuzzy AHP and DEMATEL Type II. These techniques are used to understand the cause-and-effect factors and their interactions.

It was observed from the findings that the factor of SHRM, such as Social Justice (F2), Green Job Design (F5), Green Training (F6) and Implementation of Green Policy (F8), was the most critical for the pharmaceutical sector that effects Financial performance (F13), Customer Satisfaction (F15) and Market performance (F14). Pharmaceutical firms ought to coordinate public health advocacy efforts, engage in healthcare initiatives and provide financial support for environmentally friendly efforts that improve social and economic conditions.

For this sustainability, managers concentrate on creating an environment that is healthy and acceptable, and they work hard to mitigate the impact of natural factors and repair damage done to the environment; it is essential to move towards sustainable development to resolve environmental problems. Improving HR efficiency is among essential HRM responsibilities, as they expand the knowledge base of the workforce, enhance human capital, and eventually create valuable intangible assets and promote and encourage sustainable pharmaceutical products for some years.

This research paper has presented exclusive worth to the SHRM and organizational performance literature as it employs fuzzy FAHP and DEMATEL type 2. There is less research on SHRM in the pharmaceutical sector with these factors. In addition, FAHP and TYPE 2 DEMATEL are used in very few researches on SHRM approaches.

Higher education institutions have a significant role in preparing future generations for the world of work and sustainable development. This paper aims to present a curriculum model of an enquiry-based learning pedagogy and a sustainable development conceptual context as a mechanism for teaching skills in a geography module. Potential influences of this model on organisational change towards integrating sustainable development are explored.

Following the design and implementation of the curriculum model, semi-structured interviews of the module teaching team were conducted. Thematic analysis was undertaken against a priori objectives determined from existing theoretical frameworks.

Thematic analysis suggests powerful synergies exist between enquiry-based learning, education for sustainable development and skills teaching. Potential impacts are as follows: conceptual perspectives enhance cognitive potential around systems thinking, learning methods promote behavioural potential around professional capability and agency and cultural encounters raise affective potential around inclusive curricula.

Findings indicate potential for bottom-up curriculum intervention to enhance individual learner capability and outcomes, to promote the role of Geography in responsible futures, to build teaching team capacity for active learning pedagogies, to influence individual and institutional behaviour change towards sustainability practices, diversity and inclusion, and to catalyse organisational change around sector priorities including integrating education for sustainable development, active learning, inclusive education and enhanced graduate outcomes.

This paper identifies multiple benefits from a curriculum model combining skills teaching in a synergistic pedagogical and conceptual framework and its bottom-up potential to catalyse organisational change in higher education.

The development puts the problem under consideration in a strategic light and gains attention with its wide comprehensiveness on the plane of unification of the activity of several modern scientific fields, which have always had intersections, but in their essence perform rather different roles – human resources management (HRM), public relations (PR), and sustainable development (SD). Examining the possibilities of applying innovative approaches in the research of these areas, in the context of the influence of digital and smart technologies and an entirely new scientific field. In this sense, the theoretical substantiation of the thesis on the synergy between HR, PR, and sustainable development is targeted in the aspect of highlighting contemporary challenges and the relevant response to achieve organizational effectiveness, based on knowledge of the impact of digitization processes and their connection with the development of human capital in the organization.

Emphasis in the present work is placed on the relationship between the management of human capital in the organization and the influence of digital and smart technologies on these processes. Focus in the research is placed in three directions – first of all – the role of digital/smart/technologies on sustainable development. Second, the impact of digital and smart technologies on green human resource management is explored, and third, emphasis is placed on the changed role of strategic communications in the context of the digital revolution.

The development brings out some good practices and ideas in the described areas.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an explanation for the global influences and dynamics that have led major mining companies to adopt corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies, and frame them in terms of sustainable development. Bad reputations stemming from environmental disasters and social disharmony led mining multinationals to adopt CSR policies and improve their practices. Rationalist expectations about what is driving firm responses to external pressures are a necessary, but insufficient, explanation of how and why mining companies have sought to improve their reputations. Three elements are necessary to explain firm responses, including strategic adaptation to external pressures, learning processes associated with CSR, and internalization of sustainable development norms, understood as standards of appropriate behavior.

The paper presents a multidisciplinary theoretical framework for explaining the adoption of CSR policies and practices on the part of mining companies, and applies that framework to case studies of two major mining companies with global operations.

An account of learning processes and norms socialization as they relate to CSR provide a more comprehensive explanation of how and why mining companies adopt CSR policies. Incorporation of these elements provides a better explanation of why mining companies began to frame their CSR policies in terms of the global norm of sustainable development.

The paper contributes to the theoretical understanding of how and why firms adapt to changing societal expectations about appropriate corporate behavior by integrating two sets of literatures; constructivism from international relations theory, and learning from organization theory.