Systematic Review - Network for Business Sustainability

In the Organizational Transformation context, firms
explore ways of shifting the organizational mindset
from “doing less harm” to “creating shared value” and
“delivering wider benefits for society.” Firms operating in
this context also increasingly focus, either incrementally
or systemically, on the social dimension of sustainability,
which emphasizes the need to address unmet human
and societal needs. This is a shaping logic that goes
beyond an internal, operational focus on greening
to a more external, strategic focus on sustainable
development (Hart, 1997).
Innovation in the context of Organizational
Transformation involves small-scale explorations and
experimentation not only in products and services but
also in social and organizational aspects, which may
lead to new business models. Such innovation is more
challenging but offers significantly higher potential to
achieve more ambitious sustainability-oriented goals
than the gradual incrementalism characteristic of
Operational Optimization.
In this context, an awkward juxtaposition can occur
between “good business economics of cost savings
through environmental investments” and “strategic reorientation
of the firm around sustainability concerns,”
in which the firm takes on new responsibilities regarding
environmental and social development. Many firms in
this category experiment within an existing institutional
framework at, for example, the level of the product or
the strategic business unit (SBU).
SYSTEMIC RELATIONSHIPS
Sustainability develops greater significance in the firm,
making new types and degrees of collaboration evident.
1. New opportunities can be explored at the interfaces
of previously unrelated industries
2. Collaborations become increasingly interdependent
3. New innovation platforms can be tested: e.g.
reverse innovation, jugaad innovation and resourceconstrained
innovation
1. New opportunities can be explored at the
interfaces of previously unrelated industries
The Kalundborg industrial symbiosis project is a
powerful illustration of this type of interdependence.
Eight firms co-operated to convert their environmental
problems into business opportunities, whereby
one company’s waste material or energy became
another’s resources. By pooling material resources,
the Kalundborg companies derived synergistic
environmental and economic benefits (Birkin, Polesie &
Lewis, 2009).
In a Swedish multi-sectoral initiative, the Landskrona
industrial symbiosis program brought more than 20
firms and three public organizations together to search
for novel solutions to sustainability challenges. The
initiative focused on the following:
• Defining the problem
• Searching for benefits at inter-sectoral interfaces
• Enhancing learning through inter-organizational
collaboration
This facilitated exploration paved the way for
innovations typified by the discovery of opportunities
at the interfaces of previously unrelated industries. In
one case, wastewater from car glass manufacturing
replaced the drinking-quality water that had previously
been used in the wet scrubber used for removing
Innovating for Sustainability 37