The purpose of this research study is to focus on the idolization and pitfalls of sustainable entrepreneurship, the study aims to highlight the challenges, gaps, and key barriers that hinder sustainable entrepreneurship in start-ups and small enterprises (SSEs). Examine the idolization of sustainable entrepreneurship and its potential implications on entrepreneurial decision-making and risk perception. METHODOLOGY: The thesis is based on a mixed research method centred around Drivhuset Borås collected data over the span of 7,5 years, whereas the last two years includes evaluations on sustainable entrepreneurship. The collected data is collected from the company’s operating reports between the year 2016 and 2022, as well as from their in-house material, such as lecture material. Since the operating report for 2023 still is in progress the researcher was able to get access to the collected statistics for January to April 2023. FINDINGS: This study provides examples of the impact key barriers and challenges faced by the start-ups and small enterprises have for effect. It has become obvious that, even though organisations such as Drivhuset Borås aim to educate and counsel individuals, the barriers and challenges are a persisting problem. There is a significant amount of research on business sustainability, which covers topics connected to the social, economic and environmental aspects of sustainability.

Our world faces environmental and socio-cultural problems that will impact young children in the long term. Therefore it is important to advance research in the field of Early Childhood Education for Sustainability (ECEfS) to support educators in working alongside young children, families, and communities toward a more sustainable future. The purpose of my study was to create professional development to support educators in engaging in ECEfS with the children in their care. The participants were 14 early childhood educators who worked with young children between the ages of 1.5 and 5 years old. My study was grounded in social constructivist theory and systems theory, and was informed by the work of influential scholars in ECEfS. I adopted a complex mixed methods design that consisted of four research phases. In Phase 1, I collected qualitative and quantitative data about the educators' ECEfS previous knowledge and practices by means of the adapted Environmental Rating Scale for Sustainable Development in Early Childhood and interviews. In Phase 2, I merged the qualitative and quantitative data, created and implemented ECEfS professional development, and let 2 months pass for the educators to apply the strategies learned in the professional development. In Phase 3, I conducted a second implementation of the scale and a second round of interviews. In Phase 4, I performed a final merged interpretation of the data. Results of the study indicated that some of the educators' ECEfS reported practices improved slightly after the professional development while other ECEfS practices decreased due to strict COVID-19 restrictions. Although the modest improvements in the educators' ECEfS practices after the professional development point to the need for a deeper and broader engagement with ECEfS, the educators' reported engagement with ECEfS also provided evidence about the importance of professional dialogues, reflective practices, and loose parts as mediums to engage in ECEfS. A key implication is that some ECEs are engaging in ECEfS despite not labeling their practices as such.

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The purpose of this study was to adapt a strategic management model for use in not-for-profit organisations in Namibia. Such organisations are facing increasingly turbulent environments and strategic management has been useful for allowing them to adapt better and to remain sustainable. Not-for-profit organisations, also known as the third sector, make a significant economic contribution; a contribution which, in Namibia, amounted to 2.1% of GDP in 2015/16. However, not-for-profit organisations are largely reliant on donor funding. In Namibia, such funding has declined by 33% since 2010, accounting for just 6% of total health expenditure in 2014/15. A triangular approach to strategic management, with a strategic focus on financial sustainability, programme sustainability and people sustainability, is deemed to be the most effective way to address sustainability in not-for-profit organisations. Accordingly, a qualitative study was undertaken to investigate the way in which not-for-profit organisations that receive PEPFAR funding and operate in the field of HIV/AIDS in Namibia conduct their strategic management. A pragmatic research philosophy was followed with an abductive approach to theory development. The research strategy comprised a case study conducted within a cross-sectional time frame. Purposive sampling was used to identify the 12 research participants, with whom semi-structured interviews were conducted. Data were subsequently analysed using content and thematic analysis. The study concluded that not-for-profit organisations in Namibia carry out limited strategic management. The thematic analysis, however, showed relationships between strategic management and sustainability, strategic management and financial sustainability, strategic management and programme sustainability, and strategic management and people sustainability. A strategic management model was subsequently adapted for use in not-for-profit organisations in Namibia. This model covers the stages of strategic management, namely, the business mission, external and internal analyses, strategy formulation, programme formulation, implementation, as well as feedback and control. Additionally, the model addresses strategic management and the triangular sustainability of organisations in terms of financial, programme and people aspects, and presents the tools necessary for both external and internal analysis during strategy making. This study concludes that the use of this adapted model for strategic management will contribute to the sustainability of not-for-profit organisations in Namibia. / Business Management / D. Phil. (Management Sciences)

<p>  </p> <p>Although airports of all sizes have incorporated sustainability practices into planning, there is a gap in literature concerning the impacts of sustainability initiatives on airport operations and stakeholders. This multiple case study sought to explore the impact assessment methods used by six small hub airports (cases) that received the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) airport sustainability Airport Improvement Program (AIP) grants to prepare airport sustainability planning documents.</p> <p>The objective of the study was twofold. The first objective was to gain in-depth understanding of sustainability metrics and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), and sustainability impact assessment methods and tools used by small hub airports. The second objective was to develop a preliminary framework for assessing the impacts of sustainability initiatives in airports. Three types of data were collected airport sustainability planning documents, archival records, and interviews with 14 airport executives and two airport planning consultants. Sustainability planning processes, sustainability assessment methods and tools, and sustainability metrics and KPIs were identified from data for each case and compared to one of the most comprehensive industry-specific airport sustainability rating systems, the Airport Cooperative Research Program (ACRP) <em>Report 119: Protype Airport Sustainability Rating System: Characteristics, Viability, and Implementation Options</em>. Interview responses from airport executives and consultants were used to corroborate information in the sustainability planning documents.</p> <p>The findings of this study showed more commonalities than differences in the approaches to sustainability impact assessment by the six small hub airports in this study. Commonalities were evident in the criteria for selecting sustainability initiatives, indicating that cost and return on investment were the major factors. In addition, small hub airports in this study reported similar challenges on tracking sustainability metrics and KPIs, indicating that more work is needed in this area. The differences noted were driven by airport operating conditions such as geographical location and local community goals. </p>

Today smartphones and mobile applications are a part of our everyday life and information has become more accessible then ever before. The notion of sustainability was established in 1987 and is just as relevant now as then. Sustainable Interaction Design is still today a rather unexplored area, nonetheless important to examine. The purpose of this thesis is to study how mobile applications can help and encourage users toa more sustainable lifestyle. Further more we wanted to look into the awareness of people and their willingness to change their everyday life. By choosing two different mobile applications with a focus on environmental questions we have analyzed how users are allowed to be affected. The result is also based on one survey and one focus group. The resultis interpreted based on previous research by Jeffrey Bardzell and Shaowen Bardzell, Elina Eriksson and Daniel Pargman, Maria Normark and Jacob Tholander with theories around Critical Design, Vanilla Sustainability and Perfomative Design. Our conclusion is that mobile applications can help users to a more sustainable living. For users to be encouraged and affected we have defined som key factors. Pleasing aesthetics and structure are required, the information published should not be ambiguous, but clear and accurate, and the behaviour that is encouraged should benefit the user. In addition we have discovered a connection between awareness and the willingness to change. / Smarta telefoner och mobilapplikationer är idag en del av vår vardag och information harblivit mer lättillängligt än någonsin. Begreppet hållbarhet definierades år 1987 och är likaaktuellt då som nu. Hållbar interaktionsdesign är idag ett relativt outtforskat område och somär, möjligtvis just därför, viktigt att undersöka.Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka hur mobilapplikationer kan hjälpa och uppmuntraanvändare till en mer hållbar livsstil. Samtidigt ville vi undersöka medvetenheten och viljantill förändring hos människor i vardagen när det kommer till hållbara val.Vi har valt ut två applikationer med miljöfokus och med hjälp av dem har vi analyserat huranvändare blir påverkade av miljörelaterade frågor. Resultatet är även baserat på enenkätundersökning och en fokusgruppstudie. Vi har tolkat resultatet utifrån tidigare forskningav Jeffrey Bardzell och Shaowen Bardzell, Elina Eriksson och Daniel Pargman samt MariaNormark och Jacob Tholander med teorier kring kritisk design, vanillasustainability och perfomative design. Vi har kommit fram till att mobilapplikationer kanhjälpa användare till en mer hållbar livsstil. Vi har definierad några viktiga faktorer för attanvändare ska bli påverkade och uppmuntrade. En tilltalande estetik och struktur krävs,informationen som ges ut bör inte vara tvetydig utan klar och korrekt samt att denbeteendeförändring som uppmuntras gärna ska gynna användaren själv. Vi har även funnit enkoppling mellan medvetenhet och förändringsvilja.

<p>As the world population continues to grow past seven billion people and global challenges continue to persist including resource availability, biodiversity loss, climate change and human well-being, a new science is required that can address the integrated nature of these challenges and the multiple scales on which they are manifest. Sustainability science has emerged to fill this role. In the fifteen years since it was first called for in the pages of Science, it has rapidly matured, however its place in the history of science and the way it is practiced today must be continually evaluated. In Part I, two chapters address this theoretical and practical grounding. Part II transitions to the applied practice of sustainability science in addressing the urban heat island (UHI) challenge wherein the climate of urban areas are warmer than their surrounding rural environs. The UHI has become increasingly important within the study of earth sciences given the increased focus on climate change and as the balance of humans now live in urban areas. </p><p>In Chapter 2 a novel contribution to the historical context of sustainability is argued. Sustainability as a concept characterizing the relationship between humans and nature emerged in the mid to late 20th century as a response to findings used to also characterize the Anthropocene. Emerging from the human-nature relationships that came before it, evidence is provided that suggests Sustainability was enabled by technology and a reorientation of world-view and is unique in its global boundary, systematic approach and ambition for both well being and the continued availability of resources and Earth system function. Sustainability is further an ambition that has wide appeal, making it one of the first normative concepts of the Anthropocene. </p><p>Despite its widespread emergence and adoption, sustainability science continues to suffer from definitional ambiguity within the academe. In Chapter 3, a review of efforts to provide direction and structure to the science reveals a continuum of approaches anchored at either end by differing visions of how the science interfaces with practice (solutions). At one end, basic science of societally defined problems informs decisions about possible solutions and their application. At the other end, applied research directly affects the options available to decision makers. While clear from the literature, survey data further suggests that the dichotomy does not appear to be as apparent in the minds of practitioners. </p><p>In Chapter 4, the UHI is first addressed at the synoptic, mesoscale. Urban climate is the most immediate manifestation of the warming global climate for the majority of people on earth. Nearly half of those people live in small to medium sized cities, an understudied scale in urban climate research. Widespread characterization would be useful to decision makers in planning and design. Using a multi-method approach, the mesoscale UHI in the study region is characterized and the secular trend over the last sixty years evaluated. Under isolated ideal conditions the findings indicate a UHI of 5.3 ± 0.97 °C to be present in the study area, the magnitude of which is growing over time. </p><p>Although urban heat islands (UHI) are well studied, there remain no panaceas for local scale mitigation and adaptation methods, therefore continued attention to characterization of the phenomenon in urban centers of different scales around the globe is required. In Chapter 5, a local scale analysis of the canopy layer and surface UHI in a medium sized city in North Carolina, USA is conducted using multiple methods including stationary urban sensors, mobile transects and remote sensing. Focusing on the ideal conditions for UHI development during an anticyclonic summer heat event, the study observes a range of UHI intensity depending on the method of observation: 8.7 °C from the stationary urban sensors; 6.9 °C from mobile transects; and, 2.2 °C from remote sensing. Additional attention is paid to the diurnal dynamics of the UHI and its correlation with vegetation indices, dewpoint and albedo. Evapotranspiration is shown to drive dynamics in the study region.</p><p>Finally, recognizing that a bridge must be established between the physical science community studying the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect, and the planning community and decision makers implementing urban form and development policies, Chapter 6 evaluates multiple urban form characterization methods. Methods evaluated include local climate zones (LCZ), national land cover database (NCLD) classes and urban cluster analysis (UCA) to determine their utility in describing the distribution of the UHI based on three standard observation types 1) fixed urban temperature sensors, 2) mobile transects and, 3) remote sensing. Bivariate, regression and ANOVA tests are used to conduct the analyses. Findings indicate that the NLCD classes are best correlated to the UHI intensity and distribution in the study area. Further, while the UCA method is not useful directly, the variables included in the method are predictive based on regression analysis so the potential for better model design exists. Land cover variables including albedo, impervious surface fraction and pervious surface fraction are found to dominate the distribution of the UHI in the study area regardless of observation method. </p><p>Chapter 7 provides a summary of findings, and offers a brief analysis of their implications for both the scientific discourse generally, and the study area specifically. In general, the work undertaken does not achieve the full ambition of sustainability science, additional work is required to translate findings to practice and more fully evaluate adoption. The implications for planning and development in the local region are addressed in the context of a major light-rail infrastructure project including several systems level considerations like human health and development. Finally, several avenues for future work are outlined. Within the theoretical development of sustainability science, these pathways include more robust evaluations of the theoretical and actual practice. Within the UHI context, these include development of an integrated urban form characterization model, application of study methodology in other geographic areas and at different scales, and use of novel experimental methods including distributed sensor networks and citizen science.</p> / Dissertation