Sustainability Leaders’ Influencing Strategies for Institutionalising Organisational Change towards Corporate Sustainability: A Strategy-as-Practice Perspective

Abstract

Through deductively applying the influencing strategies component of the institutionalizing change model, the article sets out to discover what sustainability leaders do to create a readiness for and reinforcing the institutionalization of relatively large-scale organizational change towards corporate sustainability. This study used the influencing strategies component of the institutionalizing change model as a framework in order to uncover the pragmatic change practices of a group of sustainability leaders in a multi-level organization with several subsidiaries. This article argues that to realize meaningful organizational change, it is important to know the ‘pragmatic practices’ underpinning the ‘theoretical what’. The research drew on the qualitative case study method to realize this endeavour. The study found that all seven influencing strategies identified in the literature were in use and so confirmed their value for change management theory and practice. Findings also showed the unique socially situated practices underlying each influencing strategy. The study concluded that the seven influencing strategies are potentially applicable and of value to other organizations although change agents may deploy these strategies differently as is appropriate for the change agenda in their organization.