
To unlock the full potential of sustainable innovation, look at patterns in business models
ARTICLE· 08/08/2023
The term sustainability and the acronym ESG (environmental, social, and governance concerns) are on everyone’s lips. More than a fad, they represent a profound paradigm shift in the expectations that society voices towards business.
Customers, employees, regulators and other stakeholders – particularly so younger generations - are increasingly demanding that companies assume leading roles in creating and preserving a world worth living in.
Beyond compliance sustainability and ESG represent critical opportunities for companies to review their normative foundations and strategies, and to innovate their business models.
Several cases will be discussed to illustrate essential insights and approaches. Participants get first-hand experience in creating and validating their own sustainable business models.
Prof. Dr. Lorenzo Massa consults, speaks, researches, and teaches in the fields of strategy, innovation, and sustainability. He is the Managing Director of the Business Design Lab and Professor for Strategy, Innovation and Sustainability at Aalborg University Business School. Lorenzo is member of the World Economic Forum’s Expert Network for Innovation and adjunct professor for executive education at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), the International Academy of Sport Science and Technology (AISTS), Frankfurt School of Finance and Management as well as Bologna Business School (BBS). Lorenzo sits on the advisory board of different for-profit and nonprofit organisations and is a trusted strategy, innovation, and sustainability advisor to executives in companies across many industries. Lorenzo holds graduate degrees in mechanical engineering from the Dublin Institute of Technology (B. Eng.) and the University of Genoa (M.Sc. Eng.) and a Master’s and a PhD in Management from IESE Business School in Barcelona.
Prof. Dr. Henning Breuer consults, researches, and teaches in the fields of innovation management and business psychology. He is founder of UXBerlin – Innovation Consulting, and a Professor for Business and Media Psychology at HMKW Berlin. Since 2001, Henning has worked with multinational corporations, SMEs, public organisations, and start-ups, providing consulting on sustainable innovation culture and business models, future scenarios, and ethnographic stakeholder research. Henning co-authored numerous journal and conference publications and books on Values-Based Innovation Management, Sustainable Business Model Design, and Gamification for Innovators & Entrepreneurs. As a visiting researcher and professor, he has worked at the University of Chile (Santiago) and Waseda University (Tokyo). Before, he studied psychology, philosophy, and law in Berlin and Tübingen, and received his PhD in Psychology.
Prof. Dr. Florian Lüdeke-Freund is Professor for Corporate Sustainability at ESCP Business School, Berlin, Germany, where he holds the Chair for Corporate Sustainability. He is a Research Fellow at ESCP’s SustBusy Research Center and Leuphana University’s Centre for Sustainability Management (CSM). He also was a Research Fellow at the Governing Responsible Business Research Environment at Copenhagen Business School (CBS), Denmark. Prior to joining ESCP Business School, he was a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Hamburg and earned a PhD in social sciences and economics from Leuphana University.
Florian’s research and teaching deal with corporate sustainability management, sustainable entrepreneurship, sustainable business models, and values-based innovation. As well as publishing numerous journal articles, books, and book chapters on these topics, he is Editorial Board Member at Organisation & Environment and Co-Editor of several journal special issues (e.g., Business & Society, Organisation & Environment, Journal of Cleaner Production, Int. Journal of Innovation Management, Journal of Business Models). Florian founded SustainableBusinessModel.org as an international research hub with 25 members from more than 10 countries, and he is an active supporter of the Strongly Sustainable Business Model Group at OCAD University, Toronto, Canada.