Towards sustainable development: evolution of corporate sustainability in multinational firms

Scholars have often found a lack of strategy in Corporate Sustainability management and literature lacks longitudinal studies that could shed light on the transformations needed to push it forward. In this longitudinal study (2013–2019), we show how Corporate Sustainability has evolved to be now truly embedded in Corporate Strategy. A paradigm shift is taking hold: sustainability is not an altruistic option for managers anymore, it is now considered a source of revenue. A key contribution of this paper is that it lists the most relevant transformations through which the case study organisations went during the period of study, including bottom-up leadership, purpose-driven brand management, enhanced long term partnerships, increased transparency and renewed goals and priorities. Results offer implications for theory and practice. Managers willing to improve the sustainability performance of their companies can use the proposed framework to take advantage of the multiple opportunities that arise from the sustainability megatrend.