A sticky chocolate problem: Impression management and counter accounts in the shaping of corporate image

Demand for chocolate is at an all-time high. However, producing chocolate comes with some sticky social, environmental and economic problems. This paper focuses on the issues of child labour, forced child labour and unsustainable farming practice within the chocolate industry, and specifically on the discourse about Nestlé’s Ivory Coast cocoa supply chain. We analyse corporate disclosures, related counter accounts and subsequent responses in new and old media as a dynamic communication process. A mobilising of Goffman's (1959) dramaturgical metaphor of impression management contextualises each communication as a performance towards an audience. Behind the communications is Nestlé’s need to repair its legitimacy – because child labour and unsustainable farming exist in its cocoa supply chain – and the audience’s vested interests in their counter-performances. The Nestlé case offers substantive and nuanced insights into corporate disclosure and communication practices, how the Internet is changing the more unidirectional performances of the past, and how appreciation of counter accounts and subsequent responses to counter accounts contributes to theoretical understanding as well as provides insights into the plight of cocoa’s child labourers

Teaching sustainability: complexity and compromises

Purpose: Sustainability is one of the leading challenges of our age, and higher education plays a vital role in supporting the implementation of sustainability initiatives. There has been substantial progress in business schools introducing sustainability into courses with extant literature detailing case studies of sustainability education and student perceptions of their learning. The purpose of this paper is to address the gap in literature from educators' perspectives on their experiences of introducing sustainability teaching using specific teaching tools for sustainability. Design/methodology/approach: This paper presents a case study on a sustainability teaching tool, WikiRate, that was embedded into business and management courses at seven higher education institutions from across the globe. Interviews were conducted after course delivery to gain insights into the practical challenges of designing and implementing a sustainability education activity. Findings: The findings show that educators perceive sustainability as a complex issue, presenting a challenge to teaching in university systems whose normative curricula are rooted in instrumental problem-solving. Furthermore, educators described challenges to their own learning in order to implement sustainability into curricula including the need for compromises and adaptions. Originality/value: This empirical study reports on educators' experiences embedding sustainability into their courses through an innovative teaching tool, WikiRate. This paper has implications for reframing how we can approach sustainability education and presents discussion ways to teach complexity without reduction or simplification. © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited

Learning experientially for corporate contribution to global sustainable development: International applications of the WikiRate project

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