In this article, we theorize a novel approach to addressing the world’s grand challenges based on the philosophical tradition of American pragmatism and the sociological concept of robust action. Grounded in prior empirical organizational research, we identify three robust strategies that organizations can employ in tackling issues such as climate change and poverty alleviation: participatory architecture, multivocal inscriptions and distributed experimentation. We demonstrate how these strategies operate, the manner in which they are linked, the outcomes they generate, and why they are applicable for resolving grand challenges. We conclude by discussing our contributions to research on robust action and grand challenges, as well as some implications for research on stakeholder theory, institutional theory and theories of valuation

The literature on organizations and the natural environment, published since 1992, is reviewed, with the purpose of assessing its contributions to strategy and organizational theory. I perform the review at three levels -firm, industry and organizational environment. Subsequently, I discuss empirical and conceptual constraints on the production of quality research, and highlight research that successfully overcomes these barriers. * Joan Enric Ricart greatly helped streamline the structure and clarify the exposition of this article. Lisa Hehenberger provided useful comments on an earlier version. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher, bepress, which has been given certain exclusive rights by the author. An Article Submitted to Journal of Management AbstractThe literature on organizations and the natural environment, published since 1995, is reviewed, with the purpose of determining if and what the contributions have been to strategy and organizational theory. I perform the review at three levels -firm, industry and organizational environment. Subsequently, I discuss empirical and conceptual constraints on the production of quality research, and highlight research that successfully overcomes these barriers. * Joan Enric Ricart greatly helped streamline the structure and clarify the exposition of this article. Lisa Hehenberger provided useful comments on an earlier version.

We study institutional entrepreneurship in an emergent field by analyzing the case of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and its efforts to purposefully institutionalize the practice of sustainability reporting. We suggest that analogies affect institutionalization processes through two mechanisms. In early stages of institutionalization, analogy operates primarily as a normative mechanism and adoption is driven mainly by an instrumental logic. This emphasis on similarity to existing institutions stresses conformity and promotes legitimacy. Yet, analogies can also have a cognitive effect on institutional design, especially once initial acceptance from the environment has been secured, by directing attention towards incongruences between the emergent institution and its analogical source. Institutional entrepreneurship can spur innovation and departure from existing institutions by highlighting limitations of the analogical source and providing a compelling value-rational argument underscoring the worth of the new institution. This theoretical contribution helps explain how analogies to existing institutional practices can both provide legitimacy to novel institutions and constitute the basis for a creative process of institutional design.3 Institutional entrepreneurship is a delicate balancing act between two conflicting tasks. On the one hand institutional entrepreneurs must disguise the radical nature of their enterprise in order to engage supporters and evade the wrath of incumbents, while on the other they cannot adhere too closely to existing practices, for by doing so, they will not be able to further any meaningful change (Aldrich and Fiol 1994). Institutional entrepreneurs need to become skilled cultural operatives, fashioning stories in order to attract resources. In this work it is essential to "balance the need for legitimacy by abiding by societal norms about what is appropriate with efforts to create unique identities that may differentiate and is relatively well-studied. However, the role of analogy in shaping institutional design has not been explored in depth. Tropes like simile, analogy and metaphor can help gather political support and legitimacy, but they also lead to analytical closure (Oswick, Keenoy and Grant 2002). Remaining within the confines of a clearly defined analogy cannot lead to evolution to profoundly different institutions (Hoffman and Ventresca 1999). Furthermore, the analogy cannot be discarded at later stages (Ocasio and Joseph 2005) when deeper institutional change is being advocated, as cognitive lock-in has already limited external constituents' receptivity to alternative scenarios. How, then, do analogies shape the construction and evolution of proto-institutions? 4In this article we address the role of analogies in institutional change by presenting a longitudinal case-study of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and its strategies to promote and institutionalize sustainability reporting practices. GRI, a non-profit organization headquartered in Amsterdam, ...

The emergence of socially responsible investing has led to the development of a large number of methodologies for rating corporate social responsibility and to a growing body of research exploring the link between environmental and financial performance. Increased availability of information potentially generates an abundance of riches upon which to base investment decisions, but it also raises issues of commensurability, information overload, and confusion. Using a unique data set combining environmental ratings from three leading purveyors, we identify the principal components of corporate environmental performance. We find that two distinct factors-the environmental processes and practices implemented by firms, and the environmental outcomes they generate-explain 80% of the variance of the data. We also find corporate financial performance to be associated to process but not to outcome measures.

a b s t r a c tShifting to dramatically more sustainable systems is an unconventional or wicked problem, encompassing multiple actors, disciplines, and values. Yet to date, sustainability initiatives have been tackled primarily by means of conventional managerial approaches. We contend that these approaches are illsuited for achieving sustainability transformations. We propose an alternative approach founded upon the sociological concept of robust action. In robust action, leaders embrace ambiguity (rather than striving for clarity), focus on short-term accomplishments (rather than long-term goals), and are satisfied with oblique movement (rather than linear progress). We elaborate on three robust strategiesdparticipatory architecture, multivocal inscription and distributed experimentationdand investigate their effectiveness in three sustainability related contexts: wind power, sustainability reporting and microcredit. We conclude by discussing the applicability of robust action to other contexts, and the complementarities between robust action and other forms of leadership towards sustainability.

We contend that big data and management for sustainability are very good bedfellows, in that many of the affordances big data provides are naturally aligned with sustainability concerns (e.g., multidimensional nature, collective actions, smart allocation of resources, efficiency priority). Notwithstanding this promising stepping off point, and the enticing analytical opportunities that an abundance of data will generate, we provide some reflections on big data and the most promising avenues of research it might inspire in the field of management and sustainability. In the first part of our essay, we explore what managers can do with big data to reinforce organizational sustainability and how different operational, strategic, and corporate activities are affected in this process. In the second part, we focus on what big data allows researchers to explore and examine, ranging from sustainability job descriptions through environmental metrics to industry transformation. We conclude by advocating for strong theoretical orientation in research on and with big data. Keywords big data, organizations and natural environment, sustainability, management, strategy It's alluring, and perhaps even joyous to engage with the linguistic creativity and metaphorical hyperbole spawned by the ubiquity of bits and bytes in our lives. Big Data, The Internet of Things, and the Deep Web have captured the imagination not only of Silicon Valley but also of other industries, governments, and non-profits all developing novel offerings that employ vast troves of data. Many successful and well-known firms focus a substantial part of their business around big data or use big data to enhance competitive advantage, including Netflix, Uber, Facebook, Google, and a host of insurance providers, among others. In general, media outlets, bloggers, activists, and scientists regularly provide deep dives and fascinating visuals that help us to see trends distilled from massively sized and unimaginably complex information. Even the most interesting fodder for investigative reporting increasingly originates with the release of large, unfiltered data dumps that must be undergo intense analysis in the pursuit of meaning.

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An overlooked aspect of the diffusion of a practice in a population is the emergence of a de facto classificatory schema, distinguishing between actors that adopt a practice and those that do not. To investigate diffusion as classification, I develop a simulation model that highlights the conditions under which limited diffusion of practices leads to the emergence and entrenchment of classificatory schemas. The model depicts classification as a systemic phenomenon resulting from the interplay of actor-level micromotives and field-level macrobehaviors that jointly drive diffusion. Whereas extant theory on the origin of classificatory schemas emphasizes the role of agency, results from the model suggest that classificatory schemas can emerge somewhat unintentionally as practices diffuse. Moreover, by conceptualizing diffusion as classification, I suggest a means for disentangling the closely related and often conflated concepts of diffusion and institutionalization