SHAPING SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS MODELS:Stakeholder collaboration for sustainable value creation

Recent economic crises, environmental problems and social challenges have urged us to drastically change our consumption and production patterns and transform organisations to contribute to socio-technical transitions that positively impact these challenges. Therefore, sustainable development and the transition towards a circular economy are gaining increased attention from academics and are being widely adopted by national and local governments, companies and other organisations and institutions. Since the implementation of more sustainable solutions lags behind expectations and technological possibilities, scholars and practitioners are increasingly seeing sustainable business model innovation as the key pathway to show the value potential of new sustainable technology and stress the importance of integrating the interests of multiple stakeholders and their economic, environmental and social value goals in the business model’s development. However, there is limited research that elucidates which stakeholders are actively involved, how they interact and what the effect is on the collaborative business modelling process for sustainability. This thesis addresses this research gap by building on the notion of business models as boundary-spanning activity-systems and studies stakeholder interaction from the level of a focal firm, as well as from the level of cross-sector actors collaborating in innovation ecosystems. Through four independent studies, three empirical studies and a design science study, this thesis aims to provide a better understanding of how stakeholder interaction affects collaborative business modelling for sustainability. The first study (Chapter 2) took a process perspective on interaction with network ties from the perspective of a focal firm. Based on two case studies of SMEs successfully introducing sustainable technology in the market, value shaping was identified as the operative mechanism describing the relation between networking and business modelling, from ideation to growth of the business. A stage model with five successive forms of value shaping describes how, in each stage, interaction with network ties help firms to clarify the types of economic, environmental and social value that a sustainable technology can deliver and who possible beneficiaries are. In return, changes in the business model clarify what other network ties are needed, demonstrating how the boundary-spanning function of business models spurs firms to expand and strengthen the value network. The second study (Chapter 3) focused on the commercialisation stage, in which a cognitive change in the manager’s mind was found during the development of a sustainable business model. Based on three empirical cases of business model innovations for sustainability, the study explored how stakeholder interaction may trigger and support managerial cognitive change and hence business model innovation. The findings suggest that the influence of stakeholders on the manager’s understanding of the business runs via three interrelated shaping processes: market approach shaping, product and/or service offering shaping and credibility shaping. In these shaping processes, new or latent stakeholders are found to have a bigger impact than existing ones. A research agenda is presented to further unravel the role of stakeholders affecting managerial cognition around business model innovation for sustainability. The third study (Chapter 4) examined innovation ecosystems’ processes of developing a collaborative business model for sustainability. Based on a study of four sustainably innovative cross-sector collaborations, this chapter studied how innovation ecosystems resolve the tensions that emerge from the collaborating actors’ divergent goals and interests. This study finds that innovation ecosystems engage in a process of valuing value that helps the actors to manage the tensions and find a balance of environmental, social and economic value creation and capture that satisfies all involved actors. The findings reveal that valuing value occurs in two different patterns – collective orchestration and continuous search – that open up a research agenda that can shed further light on the conditions that need to be in place in order for an innovation ecosystem to develop effective sustainable business models. The final study (Chapter 5) used a design science approach, developing a tool for innovation ecosystems’ actors to manage the degree to which stakeholders are involved throughout the process of collaborative business modelling for sustainability. The resulting ‘degree of engagement diagram’ and accompanying stepwise approach makes it possible to identify stakeholders from six cross-sector stakeholder groups that represent economic, social and environmental aspects of sustainable value and visualise their roles. By discriminating between four concentric and permeable circles of engagement, the tool integrates different degrees of involvement of stakeholders and enables users of the DoE diagram to accommodate changes that may occur in the evolving business model and its context. The tool enables innovation ecosystems’ actors to keep the collaboration manageable during the development of a joint and viable sustainable business model. Overall, this thesis extends the understanding of the dynamics of collaborative business modelling for sustainability and the role of stakeholder interaction therein. The research makes three key contributions to the sustainable business model innovation literature. First, it extends the literature by exploring the interplay between stakeholder interaction and business modelling over time. It establishes that stakeholder interaction and business modelling have a reciprocal relationship and contributes with two frameworks – value shaping and valuing value – that explain this reciprocal relationship for firms and innovation ecosystems. Second, the thesis unravels the micro-processes and mechanisms that elucidate how stakeholder interaction actually influences the direction into which the sustainable business model develops. Third, this thesis enriches the scholarly understanding of stakeholder interaction by identifying the main contributors to business model innovation for sustainability, by differentiating between stakeholders and their roles and by providing a tool that accommodates this. The research contributes to practice by offering practitioners useful insights on how they can increase, improve and effectuate stakeholder interaction in order to develop viable business models for sustainability and hence contribute to the desired socio-technical transitions

Rethink Kaartenset voor Duurzaam Verpakken

De kaartenset is een hulpmiddel om out-of-the box ideeën te genereren voor het integraal verduurzamen van bestaande product-verpakkingscombinaties. Het maakt gebruik van de strategie Rethink, een circulaire strategie die hoog op de R-ladder staat. Het is een creativiteitstool om de strategie Rethink te faciliteren tussen (keten) partners

Prototype van bank gemaakt van oude archiefkasten

Dutch: Repurpose: Afgedankte producten en reststromen hergebruiken in een andere functie en/of context om daarmee de waarde van deze materialen te behouden. Binnen dat kader is voor Ahrend de CiJal Bench ontworpen, waarbij gebruik is gemaakt van kunststof (PP) lameldeuren en Ciranol werkbladen. De lameldeuren zijn afkomstig van jaloeziedeurkasten die overtollig zijn door o.a. de toenemende digitalisatie en de groeiende trend van thuiswerken. De Ciranol bladen zijn afkomstig van teruggenomen bureaus, die na revitalisatie opnieuw in de markt worden gezet. Daarbij worden de bureaus voorzien van nieuwe werkbladen, waarbij de oorspronkelijke Ciranol bladen als reststroom overblijven. Door deze twee reststromen gecombineerd her te gebruiken en dus te kiezen voor Repurpose als strategie binnen de R-Ladder wordt hiermee een aanzienlijk hogere waarde gecreëerd, dan wanneer zou worden gekozen voor de huidige strategieën voor de twee afzonderlijke reststromen: Recycling en Recovery voor respectievelijk de lameldeuren en de Ciranol bladen. English: Repurpose: Reusing discarded products and residual flows within another function and/or context to maintain the value of these materials. Within that framework the CiJal Bench is designed for Ahrend, with the use of plastic (PP) tambour doors and Ciranol desktops. The tambour doors come from tambour door cabinets, which are left over due to the growing digitalisation and the trend of working from home. The Ciranol desktops are coming from returned office desks, which are revitalised before being brought back to the market. Those desks are fitted with new desktops, leaving the Ciranol desktops as a residual flow. By combining these two residual flows for reuse and thus choosing for Repurpose as a strategy within the R-Ladder, the created value is considerably higher than when choosing for the two initial strategies for these two materials: Recycling and Recovery for the tambour doors and the Ciranol desktops respectively

Prototype van stoel gemaakt van staal snijafval

NL:  Tijdens het ontwerptraject van deze Tolhuijs stoel stond het woord simpel centraal voor zowel destoel zelf als de productietechniek. De intentie is om de stoel te laten produceren in socialewerkplaatsen. De benodigde materialen voor de stoel zijn afkomstig van afvalstromen van anderebedrijven, waarbij het staal uit de fabriek van Bruynzeel storage systems komt en de poten gemaaktzijn van oude deuren. Door het gatenpatroon in het staal kunnen de medewerkers van de sociale werkplaats gemakkelijkde plat aangeleverde onderdelen vormgeven, waardoor een tussenstop bij de metaalwerkplaatswordt voorkomen. Dit ontwerp is onderdeel van het Repurpose Driven Design & Manufacturing onderzoek van UrbanTechnology van de Hogeschool van Amsterdam. Repurpose: Afgedankte producten en reststromenhergebruiken in een andere functie en/of context om daarmee de waarde van deze materialen tebehouden. EN: During the design process of this Tolhuijs chair, the word simple was key for both the chair itself and the production method. The intention is to have the chair produced in sheltered workshops. The materials required for the chair come from waste streams of other companies, where the steel that’s used comes from the factory of Bruynzeel Storage Systems, and the legs are made from old wooden doors. Thanks to the hole pattern in the steel, the employees of the sheltered workshop can easily design the parts supplied flat, thus preventing an extra stop at the metal workshop. This design is part of the Repurpose Driven Design & Manufacturing research from Urban Technology of the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences. Repurpose: Reusing discarded products and residual flows within another function and/or context to maintain the value of these materials

The interaction between business modelling and networking across the life cycle of eco-sustainable innovations

Gepresenteerd op conferentie R&D Management 2016 door Inge Oska

Prototype van loopfiets gemaakt van bureaubladen

NL: Repurpose: Afgedankte producten en reststromen hergebruiken in een andere functie en/of context om daarmee de waarde van deze materialen te behouden. Het materiaal dat bij Koninklijke Ahrend voor Repurpose in aanmerking komt, is restmateriaal uit het productieproces of bij gebruikers ingeruild vanwege beschadiging en/of vernieuwing, voortkomend uit de cradle-to-cradle bedrijfsfilosofie van Ahrend. Veel terugkomend materiaal bestaat uit de onverslijtbare, maar verkleurde of toch (licht)beschadigde bureaubladen van Ciranol (Trespa). Deze Ciranol bureaubladen bleken uitermate geschikt om toe te passen in een loopfiets. De vormgeving is gebaseerd op de vormen van diverse bureaustoelen van Ahrend, zodat zowel in vorm als in materiaal de verwantschap met Ahrend zichtbaar is in de loopfiets. EN: Repurpose: Reusing discarded products and residual flows within another function and/or context to maintain the value of these materials. The material to be considered at the Royal Ahrend for Repurpose is left over material from the production process or material returned by users because of damage and/or renewal, stemming from the Cradle-to-cradle business philosophy of Ahrend. Material that often returns exists of the long-lasting but discolored or slightly damaged desktops of Ciranol (Trespa). These Ciranol desktops were found to be ideal to be used in a push bike. The design is based on the shapes of a multitude of Ahrend’s desk chairs, so that the relationship with Ahrend is visible in both shape as well as the material of the push bike