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Chapter 1: 2: a Introduction portfolio of practices for embedding Sustainability 12 ChAPTER 2 A Portfolio of Practices for Embedding Sustainability The members of the NBS Leadership Council that commissioned this study wanted to know how to embed sustainability in organizational culture. In constructing this review, we are not addressing all of the ways to be a sustainable organization. Instead, this review is targeted at those organizations that have made some strategic choices about their pursuit of sustainability and in the process, have identified a need to strengthen their organization’s sustainability culture. Consequently, in conducting our analysis of the available practitioner and academic literature in this area, our focus was on organizational practices that build and support a culture of sustainability. As we read each source, we asked ourselves the following questions: what are they doing; who is doing it; what are they trying to accomplish; and how are they going about it? Our analysis of the 179 sources that make up this review revealed a multitude of different ways that organizations can work to embed sustainability into organizational culture. In the end, we identified 59 distinct practices. We examined these different practices and grouped them in a way we anticipate will be meaningful for businesses. The practices varied on two main dimensions relating to intent and their approach. These two dimensions are described below.
Chapter 1: 2: a Introduction portfolio of practices for embedding Sustainability 13 intent: What are you trying to accomplish? As we compared the practices, we found that they appeared to target two different sustainability goals: fulfillment and innovation. On the path to sustainability, organizations often face tensions between ensuring they meet existing sustainability commitments (fulfillment) and making way for changes that will help them improve their sustainability performance in the long run (innovation). These two goals form the vertical axis of our framework. fulfillment fulfillment innovation Practices aimed at fulfillment were those targeted at delivering on current sustainability commitments or implementing current sustainability initiatives. These practices involved discussions about what the organization ‘should do’ and emphasized compliance, operational excellence and targeted reinforcing or refining what the organization was already doing in the area of sustainability. innovation In contrast, practices aimed at innovation were those that attempted to find ways to do things differently or better. These practices involved discussions of what the organization ‘could do’ and involved experimenting, learning, and trying new things. approach: hoW are you going about it? The practices were also grouped into two different approaches to meeting goals: informal and formal. There is an ongoing interplay between these two approaches and both impact culture. Managers should be aware of the existence and impact of both ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ approaches to building culture. informal informal formal Informal approaches to shaping an organization’s culture target people’s values as well as social norms. A social norm is an expectation that people will behave in a certain way. Norms (as opposed to rules) are enforced by other members of the organization through the use of social sanctions. Norms and values are generally passed on and shaped through observation or experience. Thus, informal approaches aim to establish and reinforce shared values and shared ways of doing things that align the organization with its journey to sustainability. This is often accomplished through discussion, through experiences and by modelling desired behaviours. formal Formal approaches to shaping an organization’s culture involve trying to guide behaviour through the rules, systems, and procedures. The idea is to codify and organize values and behaviours that have developed informally. This is often accomplished by generating documents and texts such as codes of conduct, procedures, systems, and training materials and by implementing programs.
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