Symposium

SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS MODELS: 

TOWARDS MEANINGFUL ORGANIZATIONS AND ORGANISING

Academy of Management Conference 5-9 August 2016, Anaheim (CA) USA.

 Symposium: Tuesday 9 August 3PM, Orange County Ballroom 1 room of the Anaheim Marriott, Anaheim, CA, USA.

Organizations are currently facing significant pressure to broaden their identity and mission from mere economic value creation to include also social and environmental aspects. Research on corporate responsibility, business sustainability and stakeholder theory have provided us a lot of understanding of the topic. Recently, research on business models – i.e. how firms operationally organize to implement their strategy and mission – has started to integrate with these discussions. The literature focuses on how firms create, deliver and capture value though business models for sustainability or sustainable business models. Current research explores new empirical approaches to more deeply understand the strategic, organizational and practical implications of sustainable business models. This symposium will contribute to this important topic by providing seven empirical papers using different methods and data in examination how sustainable business models are organized in various fields globally. It is organized in the form of a thematic panel with an introduction and seven complementary presentations. Discussion among the discussant and with the audience follows.

Speakers include:

Nancy Bocken  chair and panel facilitator who will first provide a state-of-the-art overview of scholarly knowledge on sustainable business models archetypes (presenting part of the forthcoming Network for Business Sustainability report on “Business Models for Shared Value”).

Paavo Ritala will provide insights on the adoption of sustainable business models among S&P500 firms over time (2005-2014).

Laura Albareda will discuss the new and transformed sustainability-oriented capabilities that organizations adopt to build new sustainable business models, including three different types of incremental, renewing and regenerative dynamic capabilities.

Krzysztof Dembek will discuss Sustainable business models at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BoP).

Frank Boons will discuss sustainable business models as a social process.

Thijs Geradts will discuss how corporations can create balanced social, environmental and economic value through social entrepreneurship.

Steve Kennedy will discuss findings of cases focused on implementing new business models for the circular economy.

Stefan Schaltegger will present on co-evolutionary development of sustainability-oriented business model innovations of different companies in a market