1st Edition
Transforming Business Education for a Sustainable Future Stories from Pioneers
As the impact of climate change becomes more evident and dire, business leaders, educators, students, and academic leaders are deciding what they need to change and do to survive and thrive in a new and dramatically different environment. This book sets out how to transform business education and integrate sustainability practices into curriculum and a wider academic culture.
While some universities around the globe are still teaching business practices that have contributed to human and environmental crises, pioneering educators and higher education institutions are researching, developing, and implementing programs to transform business education and practices. With stories from 26 administrators, researchers, and faculty across the globe, this book inspires business educators with innovative tools and creative solutions to address challenges in the business world and society. These pioneers are helping students and business ventures change the way they conduct business to survive and thrive in a fast-changing global environment. Their unique and personal journeys offer tools, models, lessons-learned, and inspiration for change.
The book will both inspire and guide faculty members, administrators, students, and alumni to transform business education for a sustainable future.
Notes on contributors
Forethoughts
Introduction
1 Seeing Shadows: Unveiling Assumptions Underlying Management Education
Nurete Brenner
2 A Transformational Attempt to Embed PRME College-Wide
Orla Kelleher
3 Pluralism and "ConscientizaçaÞo" in the Business Classroom and Beyond
Lovasoa Ramboarisata (she/her) Celine Berrier-Lucas (she/her), and Dimbi Ramonjy (he/him)
4 Regenerative Finance and Economics from Start to Finished (For Now)
Ken Sagendorf
5 Teaching Sustainability Management and the Creation of the MSc Sustainable Supply Chain Management at Excelia
Jesus Gonzalez-Feliu, Valérie Fernandes, and Morgane Fritz
6 Transforming Finance Education in Business Schools: A Finance Course Aligned with Sustainability
Luis Raúl Rodríguez-Reyes and Gabriel Penagos
7 Students Initiate Change: Design Thinking Challenges at the University of Graz
Magdalena Rusch
8 Educating Students as Future Transition Intermediaries for Circular Ecosystems
Jean-Claude Boldrini and Donatienne Delorme
9 Teaching Sustainability from Beneath the Surface: The Permeable Membrane between
Business and Nature
Miguel Cordova and Marina A. Schmitz
10 Teaching Sustainability across Borders: Looking Back to Look Ahead
Subhasis Ray
11 How an Innovative Entrepreneurial Education Device Fosters Sustainable Entrepreneurship among Students
Christel Tessier Dargent
12 Back to School for the Planet Alumni Initiative: Lifelong Learning in Sustainability
Carina Hopper and Johanna Wagner
13 Creativity for Managing Life in Common
Fabio B. Josgrilberg, Luciana Hashiba, and Luís Henrique Pereira
14 Knowing and Acting toward Sustainable Consumption
Ruth Areli García-León
15 Marketing Principles for Sustainable Business Survival
Linda Irwin
16 21st Century Leadership Practice: Building Reflection into Sustainable Purpose
Jed Lindholm
Biography
Linda Irwin taught Strategy and Marketing and is passionate about transforming business education for sustainability. She is the CEO of SeeComm Group and a member of Global Movement Initiative.
Isabel Rimanoczy is the convener of PRME Working Group on Sustainability Mindset and co-developer of the Sustainability Mindset Indicator. She authored/edited 28 books about sustainability, learning, poetry, and children’s books.
Morgane Fritz is Associate Professor in Sustainable Supply Chain Management. She researches/teaches about sustainable and ethical supply chain management and acts as an author/editor/reviewer for various peer-reviewed journals and books.
James Weichert is a serial entrepreneur in all aspects of real estate development, the founder of www.livingconservancy.org, and a doctoral candidate in sustainable economics.
“We must end teaching, researching, and legitimizing business-as-usual practices that are rapidly destroying the planet’s capacity to support all species. These authors tell exciting stories that inspire business schools around the world to break away from those practices to focus on activism, researching, and teaching to create a sustainable/flourishing/regenerating world. These powerful stories will inspire many to follow in their footsteps, and to share our own transformation stories.”
James A. F. Stoner, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, Fordham University
“If we are ever to overthrow the yoke of shareholder primacy, we must creatively destroy business education as we know it. This important new book provides a roadmap and narrative for making that happen.”
Stuart Hart, Ph.D., Professor, University of Vermont and author of Beyond Shareholder Primacy
"We all agree that business education needs to be transformed if we are to transition towards a sustainable political economy but how exactly is this to be done? Transforming Business Education for a Sustainable Future: Stories from Pioneers will be an invaluable resource for anyone who is currently wrestling with this question."
Lee Matthews, Ph.D., Lecturer in Business and Society, University of Nottingham
"This book provides a deep and sincere insight into meaningful and useful practices regarding sustainability in education. The simple writing of each chapter encourages the reader to realize and encourage aspects of sustainability in work and daily life."
Respati Wulandari, Ph.D., Associate Professor, BINUS Business School, Bina Nusantara University, Indonesia
"What we are teaching in business schools today is irrelevant. Many organizations are working against an urgent timeline to change business and business education for human survival. This book takes us beyond conversations about what might be done or should be done. It offers stories from pioneers who are in action. No one has all the answers but these pioneers are on the front lines of figuring out business for a finer future."
Hunter Lovins, JD., President and Founder of Natural Capitalism Solutions (NCS), founding professor of the MBA in Sustainability at Bard College
"I was deeply inspired as I read the 16 chapters of this urgently needed book which is filled with well documented, positive, 'sustainability promoting,' examples of changes that have been and are being made in business schools’ courses and curricula. As an educator since 1965, I strongly endorse this book for educators, students, and business school policy makers, globally."
Donald Huisingh, Professor and Editor-in-Chief, Emeritus, Journal of Cleaner Production
“Education is arguably the most immediate way to drive socio-ecological change and have an impact in business/management. This book is a fantastic collection of hands-on stories from those committed to transforming business education and making a difference. It provides much-needed resources and practical insights and I am sure it will become a reference in the field."
Anne Touboulic, Ph.D., Chair of the Social and Environmental Responsibility Group, Nottingham University Business School
"The world is facing unprecedented challenges, and it is essential that our future business leaders are equipped with the knowledge, skills, and mindset necessary to navigate and address these complex issues. This book serves as a guiding light, providing a collection of success stories from pioneers who have developed innovative programs, courses, and systems that are already transforming the way business education is conducted to cope with our global sustainability challenges.”
Rupert Baumgartner, PhD, Professor of Sustainability Management, University of Graz, Austria
