Critically Exploring Different ‘Sustainability-Change’ Approaches
Thursday 13 March 2025, 12:30pm to 4:30pm
Venue
SAT - Science & Technology C009 - View MapOpen to
Postgraduates, Public, Staff, UndergraduatesRegistration
Free to attend - registration requiredRegistration Info
Registration link: https://lancaster-uk.libcal.com/calendar/pentland-centre/Sus-change
Registration deadline: Thursday 27 February 2025. Please contact pentlandcentre@lancaster.ac.uk for queries re booking after that date.
Event Details
The Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business is organising a half-day workshop on “Critically Exploring Different ‘Sustainability-Change’ Approaches”.
Is business change around ecological change fundamentally different to ‘organisational change’? Organisational change, or organisational change management has been a mainstay of practitioner and academic interest for at least fifty years, but does the threat (or reality) of impending ecological crises upend our understanding of the change of organisations, or how it may be facilitated? This event is predicated on the exploration of whether ‘sustainability-change’ (that is, change in response to, in anticipation of, or as an attempt to mitigate, adapt to, or prevent significant ecological-disruptions) is a necessary new paradigm and avenue for organisational research and action. While there continues to be a focus on behavioural approaches to organisational change, there are significant trends towards practice-focused, systems-focused and action-research forms of change and development, across different scales of groups, organizations, industries and societies.
The workshop will feature two sessions, beginning with a presentation by Patrick Elf from Middlesex University, followed by a panel discussion on the event topic, involving Jan Bebbington, Patrick Elf, and Alison Stowell, and chaired by Dermot O’Reilly.
The schedule of the workshop is:
12.30 Lunch
13:00–14:15 “Going beyond or just accepting businesses' responsibilities? Driving customer behaviour and lifestyle change at home”, Patrick Elf, Middlesex University
Outline: The role of businesses is nearly ubiquitous in today’s world. Through pervasive billboards and subtle yet savvy marketing campaigns, our consumption behaviour is constantly influenced—both knowingly and often unknowingly. In the first session, we will explore the responsibilities of businesses in society and the roles they can take on. We will present findings from a longitudinal behaviour change study with IKEA UK, demonstrating what can happen when businesses go beyond conventional business-customer interactions and use their influence to drive the adoption of sustainable behaviours and lifestyle changes.
14:15-14:30 Break
14:30-16:30 Panel discussion on Critically Exploring Different ‘Sustainability-Change’ Approaches, chaired by Dermot O’Reilly
All welcome - registration required.
NB: The seminar runs from 13:00-16:30. There will be a light lunch available for participants (present in-person) from 12:30-13:00.
Photo at top of page by ready made from Pexels.
Speakers
Organisation Work and Technology, Lancaster University
Alison is a Senior Lecturer in the Dept of Organisation, Work and Technology in Lancaster University Management School. Alison's research interests focus on societal, organisational and management responses to complex wastes (e.g. e-waste, plastics etc). She is interested in how a range of actors (companies, government, civic society, local communities and individuals) respond to waste and how these actors can develop inclusive solutions to waste generation or circular solutions. Specific areas
Organisation Work and Technology, Lancaster University
Dermot is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Organisation, Work and Technology at Lancaster University Management School. His research interests revolve around interpretative and critical perspectives on social and organisational development, co-ordination, and conflict. He has a particular focus on the forms and dynamics of leadership, organizing, and learning. At the core of this intellectual endeavour is an interest in the dynamic and multiply-tendential processes, moments and relations t
LUMS - PG & Post Experience Office, Lancaster University
Jan is the Rubin Chair in Sustainability in Business, and the Director of the Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business at Lancaster University Management School. She focuses on research that emerges at the intersection of sustainable development concerns and organisational operations. As an accounting scholar she focuses on the use of accounting technologies to create organisational control as well as reporting activities that might discharge accountability relationships. Her work includes
Middlesex University
Patrick is an Associate Professor in Sustainable Business at Middlesex University. Patrick’s research focuses on investigating avenues for behaviour change approaches towards the adoption of more sustainable lifestyles, and mechanisms towards the adaptation of sustainable business models. He has a particular interest in sustainable and transformative consumption and questions of post-growth and degrowth. Recently funded research projects include interdisciplinary longitudinal work examining the
Contact Details
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