Sustainability as practice Erlend Aas Gulbrandsen Research Scholar Høgskolen i Innlandet (HINN)

Source: Aguinis & Glavas (2012). Sammendrag av 690 forskningsstudier publisert fra 1970 og frem til i dag. Brorparten i løpet av de siste 20 årene. Det er gjort mye, og det er mange interessante enkeltfunn. Jeg skal gi et kort overblikk over noe av det som har med strategi å gjøre her i dag. Source: Aguinis & Glavas (2012).

The old, familiar story: BUT HOW? Eccles et al. 2014. 180 amerikanske selskaper, fulgt gjennom nesten to tiår 1992-2010. Matcher sammenlignbare firmaer og bruker statistiske teknikker for å eliminere andre faktorer som kan forårsake endringer. Sammenligner de som har implementert frivillige tiltak med de som ikke har gjort det. Tilsvarende mønster i regnskapstallene – ROE, return on equity. Flere andre studier finner tilsvarende mønstre. Vi skal innom en av dem etterpå – Khan og kollegaer. Source: Eccles et al. (2014).

Traditional business model Sustainable business model Change process The goal: Increased sustainability + Increased profits Traditional business model Sustainable business model Change process I’ll come back to defining the business model in a little while, and also I’ll define ‘sustainability’, but first, let me stop with the goal of increased sustainability AND profits. Is it possible? You’ve heard som great evidence earlier this module, and let me give you some more evidence on this before we move on. Sustainable business model innovation Source: Gulbrandsen (2015).

Traditional business model Sustainable business model Realized change Emergent change Traditional business model Sustainable business model Realized change Intended change Deliberate Ideas. People. Practices. Etc. Circumstances (and people) Unrealized Inspired by: Mintzberg (1978), Burgelman et al. (2018).

SUSTAINABILITY AS PRACTICE: A framework for sustainability seen as tinkering and improvising. Practices: Established routines and recipes Practitioners: The people doing the tinkering Praxis: The daily improvisation of the practitioners These elements all mutually affect one another. Praxis becomes practices. Physical tools: Hardware and software for sustainability Inspired by: Jarzabkowksi et al. (2007), Schatzki (2002).

… experiment in our praxis! We need to collect praxis examples, improve them and make them into practices! And we also need to … … experiment in our praxis! … talk about our praxis! We need to stop taking inspiration only from the image of the natural scientist, trying to uncover laws (as I and my colleaguages have done, and still do) or follow laws, and start taking inspiration from other sources.

Performance level Time Expectations from stakeholders Organizational performance Time Phase 1: Incremental changes Phase 3: Radical change or death Phase 2: Flux Adapted from: Johnson (1992).

Green canary practice Established research: Best practices for persuasion Tricks to use Knowledge to employ Based on a rationalistic, conscious approach My findings: Praxis patterns Canaries: Lack of knowledge tricks Seem to draw on unconscious knee jerk-behavior Three praxis patterns: The Moralizer The Missionary The Guardian Open question: How these patterns influence success.

Thank you!  Questions? Comments? Business proposals? Praxis stories? Please feel free to contact me! erlend.aas.gulbrandsen@inn.no