Sustainable Strategic Management

Today’s strategist recognises the need to tackle the grand sustainability challenges. Yet, many still use the old, trusted causal models of the past that seek to optimise performance. This chapter asserts that for organisations to make the transition from strategy to SSM practice, it needs to be dynamic for the new normal. To make the transition will require a reconfiguration of expert action and processes within a context of inter-, cross-, and multidisciplinary thinking. Changes in the external environment have motivated the need for sustainability in business education. This book contributes to this void. To tackle societal concerns, a multidimensional perspective is adopted. A strategic management spectrum illustrates the differences between the old and new ways, which differ from a top-down to a more distributed and consultative decision-making culture. A starting point is to gauge the organisational positioning in terms of old and new practices. This chapter provides two sustainable strategy toolkits: the seven dimensions of strategic management and the five transition levels of the SSM Journey. The Nigerian Geregu Power Plc Mini Case Study illustrates the momentum towards net-zero in the natural gas-fired combined cycle gas turbine facility. The BT Strategy Nugget features the principal shareholder, billionaire telecoms tycoon Sunil Bharti Mittal, who orchestrated a two-day strategy meeting with the BT board.