toward integrating sustainability into business strategy

2
Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment * Correspondence to: Yvonne Scherrer, University oAS Northwestern Switzerland, School of Business, Zürcherstrasse 1202, CH – 5210 Windisch. Telephone: +41 61 301 92 08. Fax: +41 61 301 92 08. E-mail: [email protected] Business Strategy and the Environment Bus. Strat. Env. 16, 459–460 (2007) Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/bse.594 Editorial: Toward Integrating Sustainability into Business Strategy Yvonne Scherrer, 1 Claus-Heinrich Daub 1 and Paul Burger 2 1 University of Applied Sciences Northwestern, Switzerland 2 University of Basel, Switzerland Received 30 June 2007; revised 10 July 2007; accepted 13 July 2007 Keywords: sustainability; business strategy; integrative management instruments; sustainability reporting; decision-making processes F ORTUNATELY, THERE ARE MANY INITIATIVES WITH THE AIM OF INTEGRATING SUSTAINABILITY INTO the world of business. From the well known Global Compact and the Global Reporting Initiative to thousands of enterprise initiatives, business is starting to respond to a changing social and ecological environment. Notwithstanding these efforts, there is still a long way to go both in theory and in practice. One of the most substantial challenges in this context is the question of how to translate and integrate the normative sustainability concept into day-to-day business and management practices. Here it is necessary to discuss how to identify the impact of products and services on society and the environment; how to find the connection between the overall business strategy and sustain- able development strategies or – on a more practical level – how to define a sustainable management system and integrate it into the overall business process and finally how to communicate the success of the process. The articles presented in this special issue tackle some of these questions. They evolved out of the First International Sustainability Conference, ISC 2005, hosted by the University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland and by the University of Basel, Switzerland, in October 2005 in Basel. The theme of the conference, Strategies for a Sustainable Society, enabled and strengthened interdisciplinary approaches and focused on socio-cultural and economic aspects of sustainability and on best-practice examples with respect to implementation in politics, business and society. Accordingly, the articles pre- sented in this special issue explore three domains: management practice and integrative management instruments (first paper), the role of corporate reporting in the context of integrating sustainability into accounting practices (second and third papers) and finally the linkages between business strategies and infrastructure development (fourth and fifth papers). The first paper, ‘DartBoards and Clovers as new tools in sustainability planning and control’ by Massimiliano Bonacchi and Leonardo Rinaldi, argues that, while it is increasingly acknowledged that businesses must move beyond their approach of solely maximizing profit, management practices supporting the integration of social and environmental standards are not yet equally anchored in the private sector. The authors assert that traditional performance measurement systems based only on shareholder value are inadequate for sustainability management and suggest a new multi-dimensional

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Page 1: Toward integrating sustainability into business strategy

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment

* Correspondence to: Yvonne Scherrer, University oAS Northwestern Switzerland, School of Business, Zürcherstrasse 1202, CH – 5210 Windisch. Telephone: +41 61 301 92 08. Fax: +41 61 301 92 08. E-mail: [email protected]

Business Strategy and the EnvironmentBus. Strat. Env. 16, 459–460 (2007)Published online in Wiley InterScience(www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/bse.594

Editorial: Toward Integrating Sustainability into Business Strategy

Yvonne Scherrer,1 Claus-Heinrich Daub1 and Paul Burger2

1 University of Applied Sciences Northwestern, Switzerland2 University of Basel, Switzerland

Received 30 June 2007; revised 10 July 2007; accepted 13 July 2007

Keywords: sustainability; business strategy; integrative management instruments; sustainability reporting; decision-making

processes

FORTUNATELY, THERE ARE MANY INITIATIVES WITH THE AIM OF INTEGRATING SUSTAINABILITY INTO

the world of business. From the well known Global Compact and the Global Reporting Initiative

to thousands of enterprise initiatives, business is starting to respond to a changing social and

ecological environment. Notwithstanding these efforts, there is still a long way to go both in

theory and in practice. One of the most substantial challenges in this context is the question of how to

translate and integrate the normative sustainability concept into day-to-day business and management

practices. Here it is necessary to discuss how to identify the impact of products and services on society

and the environment; how to fi nd the connection between the overall business strategy and sustain-

able development strategies or – on a more practical level – how to defi ne a sustainable management

system and integrate it into the overall business process and fi nally how to communicate the success

of the process.

The articles presented in this special issue tackle some of these questions. They evolved out of the

First International Sustainability Conference, ISC 2005, hosted by the University of Applied Sciences

Northwestern Switzerland and by the University of Basel, Switzerland, in October 2005 in Basel. The

theme of the conference, Strategies for a Sustainable Society, enabled and strengthened interdisciplinary

approaches and focused on socio-cultural and economic aspects of sustainability and on best-practice

examples with respect to implementation in politics, business and society. Accordingly, the articles pre-

sented in this special issue explore three domains: management practice and integrative management

instruments (fi rst paper), the role of corporate reporting in the context of integrating sustainability into

accounting practices (second and third papers) and fi nally the linkages between business strategies and

infrastructure development (fourth and fi fth papers).

The fi rst paper, ‘DartBoards and Clovers as new tools in sustainability planning and control’ by

Massimiliano Bonacchi and Leonardo Rinaldi, argues that, while it is increasingly acknowledged that

businesses must move beyond their approach of solely maximizing profi t, management practices

supporting the integration of social and environmental standards are not yet equally anchored in the

private sector. The authors assert that traditional performance measurement systems based only on

shareholder value are inadequate for sustainability management and suggest a new multi-dimensional

Page 2: Toward integrating sustainability into business strategy

460 Y. Scherrer et al.

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment Bus. Strat. Env. 16, 459–460 (2007) DOI: 10.1002/bse

and multi-level performance measurement system designed for the planning and control of sustain-

ability. Using two managerial instruments, the system is able not only to combine fi nancial indicators

with social and environmental metrics but also to detect and articulate win–win as well as trade-off

situations, while also giving proper weight to stakeholder satisfaction.

The second paper, ‘Paving the way for sustainability communication: evidence from a Swiss study’

by Ylva Stiller and Claus-Heinrich Daub, describes the outcomes of a three-year research project that

assessed corporate reporting practice in Switzerland’s 250 largest companies, by using a benchmark

approach and by focusing on the integration of sustainability issues into corporate disclosure. Although

agreeing that assessing the corporate reports should be kept distinct from auditing the sustainability

performance itself, the authors claim that this type of study delivers important insights into the behav-

iour of companies in the context of sustainability. The paper claims that the corporate report, as a purely

fi nancial report, will be replaced by complex and integrated reporting practices that are better suited

to meeting the expectations of the stakeholders regarding the disclosure of the social and ecological

performance of companies.

The third paper, ‘Online reporting for sustainability issues’ by Ralf Isenmann, Christoph Bey and

Markus Welter, focuses on emerging digital reporting approaches facilitated by current information

and communication technologies (ICT). It describes how – compared with traditional methods – online

reporting offers a range of media-specifi c capabilities and technical benefi ts for improved sustainability

communication. The authors argue that online reporting benefi ts both the companies and the report

users (i.e. various stakeholders) as it overcomes commonly acknowledged shortcomings of paper-based

disclosure such as ‘one size fi ts all’ reports, print medium fi xation and one-way-communication. It

allows for more target-group-tailored sustainability reports and for intensifi ed stakeholder dialogue as

an interactive process.

The fourth paper, ‘Finding the best location for pumping stations in the Galovica drainage area of

Serbia: the AHP approach for sustainable development’ by Zorica Srdjevic, Vasiljka Kolarov and Bojan

Srdjevic, analyses the impact of a group decision-making framework for sustainability appraisal in proj-

ects concerned with infrastructure development in public space. Describing the actual process of select-

ing the most acceptable locations for pumping stations, the authors outline the potential of the analytic

hierarchy process (AHP) as a group decision-making framework and show that AHP takes into account

both how to incorporate, account for and quantify human opinions and how to rate such preferences

according to the stakeholders’ attributed importance.

The fi nal paper, ‘How do stakeholders and legislation infl uence the allocation of green space on

brownfi eld redevelopment projects? Five case studies from Switzerland, Germany and the UK’ by

Wendy Altherr, Daniel Blumer, Heike Oldörp and Peter Nagel, investigates fi ve urban redevelopment

projects on disused railway sites in terms of their allocated green space. They argue that whereas the

location determines the amount of green space (i.e. the closer the area is to the city centre, the lower the

percentage of green space; more green space is allocated in projects located in outer districts, as green

space enhances the attractiveness of these residential areas), stakeholder interests and legal constraints

strongly determine its quality. Developers and local residents strive primarily for conventional green

parks with low biodiversity impact. Only nature conservation experts and the relevant legal frameworks

recognise the value of green spaces in terms of biodiversity conservation.

The papers in this special issue may be read individually. Combined, however, they have the potential to

provide the reader with new ideas and perspectives on how to implement sustainable practices in everyday

business life and use the capacities of companies to move towards a more sustainable global society.