Prelims

Half Title Page

Attaining the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal of Decent Work and Economic Growth

Series Title Page

Family Businesses on a Mission

Series Editors:

Naomi Birdthistle Rob Hales

The Family Businesses on Mission series examines how the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) can be applied in family businesses around the world, providing insights into cultural and societal differences and displaying innovative approaches to complex environmental and societal issues.

Title Page

Attaining the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal of Decent Work and Economic Growth

Edited By

Naomi Birdthistle

Griffith University, Australia

And

Rob Hales

Griffith University, Australia

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK

First edition 2022

Editorial matter and selection © 2022 Naomi Birdthistle and Rob Hales.

Individual chapters © 2022 The authors.

Published under exclusive licence by Emerald Publishing Limited.

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No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without either the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying issued in the UK by The Copyright Licensing Agency and in the USA by The Copyright Clearance Center. Any opinions expressed in the chapters are those of the authors. Whilst Emerald makes every effort to ensure the quality and accuracy of its content, Emerald makes no representation implied or otherwise, as to the chapters' suitability and application and disclaims any warranties, express or implied, to their use.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-80382-490-1 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-80382-487-1 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-80382-489-5 (Epub)

List of Figures

List of Tables

About the Editors

Dr Naomi Birdthistle is an Associate Professor who has entrepreneurship in her blood. She worked in her family business for over 20 years, which is the largest indoor funfair in Europe. On leaving the family business she ran her own consulting business, where she consulted family businesses on management issues. Naomi's passion for family business management and entrepreneurship is evident by her research outputs. She wrote the first ever PhD on family businesses in Ireland which won the Family Firm Institute's ‘Best Doctoral Dissertation Award’. She has published 32 peer-reviewed papers, four books, 18 book chapters, 63 conference papers and an abundance of national and European reports. Naomi's research covers many areas within the entrepreneurship and family business discipline including the following: entrepreneurship education, minority groups and entrepreneurship; women owned and led businesses; succession planning in family businesses; divorce and family business and the role women play in family businesses. Naomi supervises PhDs around women entrepreneurship, family business management issues and high growth firms.

Dr Rob Hales is the Director of the Griffith Centre for Sustainable Enterprise in the Griffith Business School at Griffith University. The Centre oversees the sustainability strategy and initiatives of the Griffith Business School. He is the Co-chair of the Griffith University's Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Working Group which oversees the SDG Strategy and Times Higher Education Impact ranking processes of the university. His research focusses on SDGs in business and government, a business case for climate change, climate change policy, carbon management, sustainable tourism and working with First Peoples on consent processes and climate change. He created and was the first programme director of Griffith University's Master of Global Development. He teaches in the Department of Business Strategy and Innovation and has convened master’s level courses such as Leadership for Sustainable Business, Research Methods for Policy Makers and Sustainability and Systems Thinking. He supervises PhD students in the areas of collaborative governance, sustainability transitions and climate change.

About the Contributors

Dr Sofiane Baba is Assistant Professor of Strategic Management at the University of Sherbrooke in Québec, Canada. His research focuses on the organization–society nexus from a variety of theoretical perspectives and research interests, mainly related to institutional change, sustainability and strategic management. His work has received best paper awards and is published in leading peer-reviewed journals. He holds a Master of Science in Strategy and a PhD in Organizational Theory and Strategy from HEC Montreal.

Elisa Balabram, MBA, is an entrepreneurship lecturer, co-owner of her family's business, a business coach, writer and the author of Ask Others, Trust Yourself: The Entrepreneurial Woman's Key to Success and Mending a Broken Heart: Lili's Magic Journey. She blogs about business, self-love and trust on her website AskOthersTrustYourself.com. Originally from Brazil, Elisa moved to the United States to pursue an MBA in Entrepreneurship Management. Upon graduation, she launched her own business, pursued a career in non-profit economic development organisations and in higher education, with a focus on entrepreneurship and business development.

Dr Mary Barrett recently retired as Professor of Management in the School of Management and Marketing at the University of Wollongong. She now holds an honorary research professorship there. She has published extensively on business communication, family business, gender in management and entrepreneurship.

Sara Brennan, Pentland Brands Limited, is Positive Business Director where she is tasked in looking at how Pentland and its portfolio of sports, outdoor and lifestyle brands can accelerate its positive business strategy to deliver on its commitment to take action for people and our planet. Sara started her career in regulatory affairs and later moved into sustainability and CSR, whilst working in the petrochemical industry and studying for her master’s. Her work caused her to grow more conscious of existing sustainability issues and opportunities and the role of businesses in addressing those issues. As a PhD candidate Sara is also interested in organisational change, especially in relation to developing beyond conventional leadership and discovering new ways of contributing to the wider environment in which organisations operate.

Dr Allan Discua Cruz is a member of the Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business and Director of the Centre for Family Business at Lancaster University Management School. His current research interests relate to entrepreneurship by families in business. He has published in journals such as Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Business Ethics, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research and International Small Business Journal among others. He has recently co-edited books around the topics of the family firm group phenomenon and family firms in Latin America. He teaches courses in the area of entrepreneurial teams, small and medium-sized enterprises, social contexts and family business.

Dr Taïeb Hafsi is the Strategy and Society Professor of Management at HEC Montréal. He has written numerous articles and books dealing with strategic management and change in organisations. His work has been published in most major journals including Administrative Science Quarterly, the Academy of Management Review, the British Journal of Management and Journal of Management Studies. He holds a Master's of Science in Management from the Sloan School of Management, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston, and a Doctorate in Business Administration from the Harvard Business School.

Dr Omar Hemissi is a Professor at the École Supérieure de Commerce of Algiers. He graduated from the National School of Administration (Algeria) and holds a Master's in Finance and a Doctorate in Management Sciences. His research focuses mainly on issues related to change management, governance and growth strategies. His publications focus both on the public sector and family businesses, largely in developing countries. He also acts as an expert and consultant to various organisations.

Dr Ken Moores is Emeritus Professor and was Founding Director of the Australian Centre for Family Business at Bond University where he previously held positions of Vice-Chancellor and President, Dean of Business, and Professor of Accounting. His research in accounting, education, management and family business has been published internationally across these disciplines.

Foreword

Professor Walter Leal Filho

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2015 provide a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that by 2030 all people enjoy peace and prosperity.

They also entail elements of importance towards a strategic business engagement with sustainability issues. These offer a framework which provides businesses with a systematic approach to identify new business opportunities while contributing to the solution of the grand sustainability challenges facing the world today, including climate change. Each SDG, if achieved, will have a direct and significant positive impact on millions of people's lives around the world and the environment in which they live. Businesses have an opportunity to widen the purpose of business through adopting the SDGs as targets for their operations. Thus, they can make a meaningful contribution to the greater good through achieving their operational objectives.

Family businesses are uniquely placed to contribute to SDGs for many reasons. Firstly, because family business models have longer time perspectives, and this allows the family business to link with the longer-term SDG time frame – 2030. Secondly, family businesses often focus on aspects of business operation which do not have an immediate return on investment such as relationship building with stakeholder groups. Thirdly, family businesses tend to rate the importance of ethics higher than standard businesses and thus align well with the social dimensions of the SDGs. Lastly, family businesses have intergenerational perspectives which is a core principle of sustainability.

This book provides insights into how family business operationalises SDG#8: Decent Work and Economic Growth. The book uses a rigorous case study approach for family businesses to detail aspects of their business which help to advance decent work and economic growth. The cases provided here are living proof that family businesses that operate for the greater good actually work! Non-family businesses can take a leaf out of the family businesses portrayed in this book as they can provide different perspectives on how businesses can successfully align SDGs and business strategy.

Despite many businesses having adopted environmental social governance strategies and environmental management systems, the effect of this activity has not been reflected in a healthier planet. Many ‘state of the environment’ reports indicate that planetary health is decreasing, and planetary boundaries are being crossed or are about to be crossed. Whilst the cause of this decline is not entirely the fault of business, there still needs to be a greater effort to address the decline. The challenge for family businesses is to use their unique characteristics and set ambitious programmes of work that make a meaningful contribution to achieving global goals. This book provides insights into how family businesses can achieve such a mission and how non-family businesses can be inspired to do the same.

Acknowledgements

The Editors would like to thank the contributors of the book for providing insights and sharing the learnings from their business practice. We acknowledge that writing up cases in the format required considerable time and effort. The quality of the cases presented is a testament to their efforts.

The Editors would also like to thank Emerald Publishing for supporting the publication of this book and the mission for deeper sustainability through utilising the SDGs.