Persistent differences in corporate commitments to sustainability have led to an increasing debate. However, reasons behind such differences still lack a generic theorization. To address this research gap, the purpose of this study is to: 1) explicate key organizational functions and process underpinning dynamic capabilities for corporate sustainability; 2) explore the relationship between supply chain knowledge transfer and the development of dynamic capabilities for corporate sustainability. For such a purpose a theoretical framework is established with proposed hypotheses deriving from existing literature. Then a two-stage, mixed method is designed to test the model. In Stage One, a case study and a large-scale archival analysis are performed to elaborate the microfoundations, i.e. key organizational functions and process underpinning dynamic capabilities for corporate sustainability. In Stage Two, a largescale survey is conducted among about 2,500 CILT members. The validity and reliability of the collected data are then verified through a series of tests. Finally the empirical data are fitted into a Structural Equation Model (SEM) to test proposed hypotheses. The findings of the research are twofold. The result of Stage One study suggests that three types of dynamic capabilities for corporate sustainability, namely scanning, sensing, and reconfiguration capabilities, underpin a firm’s competence to successfully respond to the environmental and social concerns of various stakeholders and mobilize internal resources to make strategic change towards sustainability. Moreover, key organizational functions and process underpinning dynamic capabilities for corporate sustainability show commonalities among firms across various industrial sectors and geographic regions. In Stage Two study, the empirical finding is that supply chain knowledge transfer positively impacts the development of firm's scanning capability and sensing capability. However, the impact patterns vary significantly between focal firms' upstream and downstream supply chain partnerships. The research contributes to knowledge from three perspectives. To theory, as an early attempt to extend Dynamic Capabilities View (DCV) to the area of corporate sustainability, the research not only introduces the concept of dynamic capabilities for corporate sustainability to the literature, but also examines how these capabilities can be developed through supply chain knowledge transfer. It thus contributes to the theories of both DCV and corporate sustainability. To research, the empirical findings of the research indicate that the effect of inter-firm knowledge transfer on capabilities development of supply chain customers tends to be underestimated by previous studies, thus providing a new potential research direction. To practice, professionals could possibly use the theoretical framework developed in the study to better understand what types of dynamic capabilities should be developed to more effectively overcome emerging sustainability challenges, and how to further develop these capabilities through supply chain knowledge transfer.

This thesis addresses two research objectives: i).empirically develop a taxonomy based on firms strategic Corporate Sustainable Development (CSD) orientation to better understand and describe their characteristics and business differentials; and ii).develop and empirically test an integrated framework of antecedents and consequences of the strategic CSD, including pathways and contingencies. The full study involves two consecutive steps: a qualitative study using in-depth interviews with senior marketing executives/experts from eight selected organisations; and a quantitative inquiry using an online survey, with a final sample of 183 medium to large Australian companies across manufacturing, mining and utilities/energy industries. Collectively, this two-stage study yields interesting research findings that are of substantial academic and managerial value as follows: The taxonomy analysis identifies three distinct groups: Strategic Achievers, Risk Avoiders and Suspicious Observers, that represent the three levels/stages of CSD adoption from high to low. These three clusters are described by what they do, why they do it, the major barriers and performance differentials. These findings contribute to the classification scheme and may assist managers to determine current levels of CSD, identify possible business opportunities and/or decide on the strategies of CSD adoption. Through developing CSD measures and testing the relationships within the proposed framework, Innovation Capability (IC) is found to be a pathway (mediator) for firms to gain competitive advantage from Corporate Sustainable Development, whereas CSD does not impact on Business Performance directly when IC is absent. This inconsistent mediating effect of IC provides interesting new insight. In addition, CSD exhibits a positive impact on firms Member Organisation Identification, a surrogate measure of corporate reputation from the perspective of employees. As part of the second research objective, this study also conducts the first empirical testing of the Menon and Menon (1997) model, and found that Industry Reputation moderated the Enviropreneurial Marketing and Business Performance relationship. These findings provide new knowledge concerning strategic Corporate Sustainable Development (CSD) orientation as well as the underlying mechanisms, which may inform managers with viable directions for integrating corporate economic benefits with social and environmental considerations.

This study explores the factors that affect the corporate sustainability behaviour of UK manufacturing small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). To date, SMEs have been reported as being generally reluctant to engage in corporate sustainability activities. However, due to their significant negative environmental impacts, volume, and the contributions they make to economic growth and stability, no meaningful progress can be made towards corporate sustainability without SMEs’ involvement. As extant literature has focused more on the corporate sustainability activities of large or multinational companies with limited focus on SMEs, this study contributes to addressing this gap by adopting an SME perspective to exploring the factors affecting their corporate sustainability behaviour. The study was conducted as a qualitative study and data was collected through semi-structured interviews with a total of forty SME owner-managers from manufacturing companies in the South-East region of the UK and a focus group conducted with an additional twelve SME owner-managers from the same sector and region. Based on the study’s findings and an elaboration of the Responsible Environmental Behaviour (REB) framework, a framework for exploring the factors affecting SMEs’ corporate sustainability behaviour was developed. This framework suggests that SME Capacity Building in the form of information on corporate sustainability issues as they relate to SMEs, action strategies they can employ for corporate sustainability and transparency of the corporate sustainability business case, as well as Organisational Attitude, Stakeholder Influence and Resource Constraints are the main factors affecting UK manufacturing SMEs’ corporate sustainability behaviour.

In light of never before seen environmental degradation and social injustice, the urgency to move forward on the path of sustainable development has skyrocketed. As Millennials, we see it in our duty to raise awareness about the dangers of our lifestyles and contribute with a solution to measuring sustainability. Corporations alone or along with other market players have been quoted many times as the ones ‘who will save the world’. Thus, the theoretical framework places an emphasis on corporate sustainability, in addition to sustainable development and TBL. As supporters of the view that corporations will play a defining role, the thesis is an investigation into the sustainability of one of the most pollutant corporations, Royal Dutch Shell. As such, the formulated four-dimensional model (Green Model) stands as an addition to the plethora of frameworks in reporting and describing corporate sustainability. In consequence, the research question is aimed at describing the corporate sustainability of Shell, meaning actions, processes and policies as the focus. As such, the emphasis is on the in-depth description of its sustainable or unsustainable characteristics. The path of sustainability is revealed through an analysis that includes 39 indicators. For this, secondary data was collected from Shell itself and other unrelated sources in an attempt to provide an unbiased perspective. The Green Model also contains a rating scale going from favorable and neutral to unfavorable for a visual representation of findings in all indicators. The conclusion is based on the Green Model findings in the case study, plus the Dunphy phase model of sustainability, as an additional tool to answer the research question. Thus, the conclusion reveals the good and the bad deeds, which confirm Shell’s dual nature of actions in terms of sustainability along with an indication of the corporation’s future road. Regarding the case study, Shell was found to hold an unfavorable position on the path of sustainability based on the Green Model. Although this is not surprising, the focus is on considering the positive aspects along with the negative ones. This framework indicated the four footings are not balanced. First, the economic dimension is favored. Second, the environmental dimension versus the social one looks at a disadvantage for the ecosystem, and the fourth dimension, sustainable thinking is deemed unfavorable because the future energy plan is unsustainable. In addition, Shell is seen positioned in between the phase of efficiency and that of strategic proactivity, based on the Dunphy phase model. Thus, these findings point to what Shell can do next in order to move forward on the path of sustainability. But, also they bring to surface the process of alignment of such a corporation. The project is concluded with a discussion of the duality of Shell, recommendations, as well as a description of the Ecotopia, as the ultimate goal of sustainable development.

Background: Sustainability is the need of the time, everyone in the society should play a role in making a more sustainable environment. Organizations as demanded by the whole society need to be more sustainable in order to achieve survival and success. The sustainable development of a company is inseparable from a sustainable supply management. Supplier development is one of the critical parts in supply management which can contribute to the buying firm and its suppliers’ sustainable development. With different strategies in supplier development life-cycle stages and the sustainability considerations in supplier development practices are significant in corporate sustainable development. Purpose: The intention of this thesis is to empirically study what strategies in supplier development practices are implemented in Ericsson and how sustainability is taken into consideration. By studying supplier development practices in Ericsson empirically, this thesis intended to deepen knowledge of supplier development practices in the telecommunications industry. Method: This thesis is a qualitative research study which utilizes the single-case study methodwith multiple interviews. The empirical findings were supported by both primary and secondary data. The interviews were conducted with semi-structured ways under the framework of the interview’s ethical considerations and interview guide. Conclusion: There are different strategies which include both direct and indirect strategies in different supplier development life-cycle stages in Ericsson. Sustainability is taken into consideration in designing, recruiting, implementing, evaluating and rewarding stages of supplier development life cycle. The findings have contributed to deepen the knowledge of supplier development practices empirically in the telecommunications industry.

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Changes in global context, especially in environmental aspects, are increasing sustainability issues, which also encompasses the social and economic perspectives. In this context, the role of organizations as participants in society, generating profit and impacting on the environment, becomes clear in the triple helix of sustainability. Organizations have incorporated sustainability into their practices because they are agents with financial and technological resources, and therefore society expects these corporations to adopt sustainable practices (HINZ, VALENTINA AND FRANCO, 2006). There are many instruments that measure the sustainable development of organizations, however, there is a latent need for tools that measure sustainability in a complex way, which consider the three areas of sustainability: social, economic and environmental jointly. In this context the model developed by Chow and Chen (2011) becomes the ideal for measuring corporate sustainable development, since it includes 22 questions about sustainable practices in daily industries. Thus, this work, which has the general objective "check sustainable practices that are adopted in the agricultural machinery and implements sector of the State of Rio Grande do Sul that lead to Corporate Sustainable Development" used the model (CHOW AND CHEN, 2011) as support for the questionnaire survey instrument sent by electronic mail to the companies belonging to SIMERS. To this end, it was implemented a quantitative and descriptive research. Among the findings it was found that the economic, social and environmental variables, formed by practices arising from Chow and Chen (2011) model positively influence the Corporate Sustainable Development, confirming the three hypotheses of the research. The results also showed that social variable is the one that most influences the Corporate Sustainable Development in the studied organizations, which depends 28.8% of the social variable, 11.3% of the economic variable and 17.6% of the environmental variable. In addition, open questions were added about the practices that are performed and that are intended to be adopted by organizations, as it was noticed a dominance of quotes regarding environmental practices. / As mudanças em contexto global, principalmente de ordem ambiental, têm tornado ascendente o tema da sustentabilidade, que engloba também as perspectivas sociais e econômicas. Neste contexto, o papel das organizações como participantes da sociedade, geradores de lucro e que impactam no meio ambiente, se torna claro na tríplice hélice da sustentabilidade. Cada vez mais organizações têm incorporado à sustentabilidade nas suas práticas, pois elas são agentes com recursos financeiros e tecnológicos, e, portanto, a sociedade espera destas corporações práticas sustentáveis (HINZ, VALENTINA E FRANCO, 2006). Existem muitos instrumentos que medem o desenvolvimento sustentável das organizações, porém, há uma necessidade latente de ferramentas que mensurem a sustentabilidade de uma forma complexa, ou seja, que considerem os três âmbitos da sustentabilidade: social, econômico e ambiental de forma integrada. Neste contexto o modelo desenvolvido por Chow e Chen (2011) torna-se o ideal para medir o desenvolvimento sustentável corporativo, uma vez que o mesmo contempla 22 questões sobre práticas sustentáveis no dia a dia das indústrias. Desta maneira, o presente trabalho, que tem como objetivo geral verificar as práticas sustentáveis que são adotadas no setor de indústrias de máquinas e implementos agrícolas do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul que levam ao Desenvolvimento Sustentável Corporativo utiliza-se do referido modelo como suporte para o questionário, instrumento de pesquisa enviado por correio eletrônico para as empresas do setor pertencentes ao SIMERS. Para tanto, implementou-se uma pesquisa com caráter quantitativo e descritivo. Dentre os resultados encontrados obteve-se que, as variáveis econômica, social e ambiental, formadas pelas práticas, oriundas do modelo de Chow e Chen (2011) influenciam positivamente o Desenvolvimento Sustentável Corporativo, confirmando as três hipóteses da pesquisa. Os resultados também demonstraram que a variável social é a que mais influencia no Desenvolvimento Sustentável Corporativo nas organizações estudadas, sendo que ele depende 28,8% da variável social, 11,3% da variável econômica e 17,6% da variável ambiental. Além disso, foram acrescentadas questões abertas sobre as práticas que são e que pretendem ser adotadas pelas organizações, no que percebeu-se uma dominância de citações de práticas ambientais.