Sustainability Reporting and Organizational Change Management in Companies - A survey-based Analysis of the Relationship between Sustainability Reporting and Organizational Change
Summary
Over the last decades, there has been an increase in sustainability reporting (SR) in the corporate world. A review of the literature on SR in companies showed that although there has been research on how to assess sustainability, the link to organizational change management (including its challenges and barriers, management practices) and its potential to foster organizational learning has been underexplored. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the process and evolution of SR in companies, whether (and how) SR fosters organizational learning and to analyze whether (and how) SR fosters organizational change or vice versa. In a worldwide survey a non-probability sample of companies, listed in the Global Reporting Initiative’s (GRI) Sustainability Disclosure Database as having published at least one sustainability report in the last ten years, were addressed to close this research gap. A quantitative dominant mixed methods approach was applied to analyze the obtained data. Results were obtained via descriptive, bi- and multivariate analyses and complemented by qualitative analyses based on the Grounded Theory method. The overall findings showed that the decision to publish a sustainability report is primarily driven by company internal motivations including an increase in corporate transparency and the assessment of sustainability efforts. Challenges concerning the technical organization of the reporting process and a lack of commitment to SR can be overcome by improved internal communication and adjustments in the reporting strategy. Furthermore, the process of SR induces learning processes resulting in stronger sustainability awareness throughout the company, which in turn positively influences organizational change processes. However, SR can be both, the outcome of change processes by communicating corporate sustainability efforts that were implemented in a company, and a catalyst for change by inducing organizational learning based on the process of assessing a company’s sustainability performance. Perceiving a sustainability report as an opportunity to evaluate the sustainability performance and to improve identified shortcomings rather than a possibility to gain competitive benefits and reputation from the mere disclosure of the obtained data could strengthen SR’s role in organizational change management.