Show simple item record

dc.contributor.authorCaldera, HTS
dc.contributor.authorDesha, C
dc.contributor.authorDawes, L
dc.date.accessioned2019-07-04T12:33:14Z
dc.date.available2019-07-04T12:33:14Z
dc.date.issued2019
dc.identifier.issn0959-6526
dc.identifier.doi10.1016/j.jclepro.2019.01.239
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10072/382495
dc.description.abstract‘Sustainable business practice’ is an aspiration for an increasing proportion of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) around the world, promising profitability, resilience and positive social and environmental impacts. ‘Lean thinking’ has evolved as a popular business strategy for SMEs to achieve sustainable business practice, addressing the need for efficiency in production and waste reduction. In this study we explore the co-evolution of ‘lean and green thinking’ and the potential for lean and green practices to enable successful transitions to sustainable business practice. Focusing on investigations into manufacturing SMEs in Queensland, Australia, we first establish four key enablers and six key barriers to sustainable business practice, derived from a series of in-depth interviews with Chief Executive Officers and senior managers involved in sustainability and lean manufacturing. We offer an institutional theory perspective on these findings, concluding the potential for normative, coercive and mimetic drivers to influence SMEs to shape environmental, social and economic decision making and legitimize the transition to sustainable business practice. We then present a novel ‘Model of strategic enablers of sustainable business practice’ to guide SMEs to intentionally use their lean and green strategies to successfully adopt sustainable business outcomes. We propose that through adopting lean and green thinking to transition to sustainable business practice, SMEs can more rapidly contribute to the circular economy at the level of firm. Agencies and professional bodies can support SMEs in this transition through targeted interventions that address the enablers and barriers presented.
dc.description.peerreviewedYes
dc.languageEnglish
dc.language.isoeng
dc.publisherElsevier
dc.publisher.placeNetherlands
dc.relation.ispartofpagefrom575
dc.relation.ispartofpageto590
dc.relation.ispartofjournalJournal of Cleaner Production
dc.relation.ispartofvolume218
dc.subject.fieldofresearchEnvironmental engineering
dc.subject.fieldofresearchEnvironmental engineering not elsewhere classified
dc.subject.fieldofresearchManufacturing engineering
dc.subject.fieldofresearchOther engineering
dc.subject.fieldofresearchcode4011
dc.subject.fieldofresearchcode401199
dc.subject.fieldofresearchcode4014
dc.subject.fieldofresearchcode4099
dc.subject.keywordsLean and green
dc.subject.keywordsEnablers
dc.subject.keywordsBarriers
dc.subject.keywordsSmall and medium-sized enterprises
dc.subject.keywordsInstitutional theory
dc.titleEvaluating the enablers and barriers for successful implementation of sustainable business practice in 'lean' SMEs
dc.typeJournal article
dc.type.descriptionC1 - Articles
dc.type.codeC - Journal Articles
dcterms.licensehttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
gro.facultyGriffith Sciences, School of Engineering and Built Environment
gro.rights.copyright© 2019 Elsevier. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, providing that the work is properly cited.
gro.hasfulltextFull Text
gro.griffith.authorDesha, Cheryl J.


Files in this item

This item appears in the following Collection(s)

  • Journal articles
    Contains articles published by Griffith authors in scholarly journals.

Show simple item record