• Differentiate between sustainable development, corporate sustainability, and sustainable intra- and entrepreneurship, and discuss their interrelations using concepts from the syllabus.
• Design and explain a triangulated, mixed-methods research plan, and compare qualitative field research methods in terms of their strengths and limitations for problem definition.
• Analyse and contrast different hybrid strategies for identifying sustainable business opportunities, and evaluate potential complementarities between such strategies.
• Discuss key forms of impact investing, and assess their suitability for different types of sustainable enterprises.
• Evaluate sustainable impact assessment tools, and explain how their use can influence decision-making and performance in sustainable enterprises.
• Evaluate how project management can be applied to the startup process, and discuss how to adapt it to that context.

This course treats sustainable entrepreneurship as an applied context in which core project management principles are mobilised, tested, and extended through group-based field work. It is explicitly designed around a call back reading principle: students revisit and apply foundational project management texts encountered earlier in the programme, using them as analytical lenses to structure their fieldwork, organise collaboration, and guide group decision making. Thus, in addition to introducing an new body of theory, the course deepens prior learning by embedding it in the complex, real world challenge of developing sustainable business models; hence, concepts such as temporary organising, coordination, and goal alignment are not only recalled but enacted in the process of identifying and addressing sustainable entrepreneurship opportunities.

Sustainable entrepreneurship describes the discovery and exploitation of opportunities to create business models which address humanity’s social and environmental challenges. Sustainable entrepreneurship generates disequilibria in market and non-market environments, by finding ways of turning environmental and societal problems into complementary assets. The course will develop capabilities in sustainable opportunity identification as well as sustainable enterprise modeling. At this point in history, particularly due to anthropogenic climate change, there is broad consensus that humans in aggregate need to use fewer resources, consume less, and set humanity on a sustainable relationship with the earth. Generally, when we ponder these sorts of changes to human existence, we think in terms of sustainability. 

Sustainable entrepreneurship will give you the opportunity to both define sustainability and design a business model for an organization or a startup to implement your idea of sustainability. 

The course Sustainable Entrepreneurship will be divided into three sections. In the first section, students will learn basic research design and design thinking as it relates to sustainability and then craft independent research projects which result in a robust and rigorous problem definition. In the middle section of the course, students will undertake group-based independent field research on the topic of their choosing in order to develop a business model addressing the issue selected. In the final section of the course, students will analyze their research data and then design and present their sustainability solution. 

Sustainable entrepreneurship will be highly interactive and assignment based. Students will have the opportunity to try out and workshop everything they learn in the class. Most of the course's time will be spent in this sort of applied learning. Given that, attendance, diligent coursework, and participation are all essential parts of learning in Sustainable Entrepreneurship. 

The course is taught and examined in English. 

• Classic and basic theory
• New theory
• Teacher’s own research

• Data collection
• Analysis
• Discussion, critical reflection, modelling
• Students conduct independent research-like activities under supervision

Richardson, Katherine, et al. "Earth beyond six of nine planetary boundaries." Science advances 9, no. 37 (2023): eadh2458 . (Note: Not available via CBS Library, but free access possible via this link.)

Dyllick, Thomas, and Kai Hockerts. "Beyond the business case for corporate sustainability." Business strategy and the environment 11.2 (2002): 130-141 .

Hockerts, Kai, and Rolf Wüstenhagen. "Greening Goliaths versus emerging Davids—Theorizing about the role of incumbents and new entrants in sustainable entrepreneurship." Journal of business venturing 25.5 (2010): 481-492.

Hockerts K. 2015. ”How Hybrid Organizations Turn Antagonistic Assets into Complementarities,” California Management Review, 57(3): 83-106, 2015 . 

Brown, T., & Wyatt, J. (2010). Design thinking for social innovation. Stanford Social Innovation Review , 8(1), 31–35 .

Guan, S., Tian, S., & Deng, G. (2021). Revenue diversification or revenue concentration? Impact on financial health of social enterprises. Public Management Review, 23(5), 754-774.

Kuratko, D. F., & Audretsch, D. B. (2013). Clarifying the domains of corporate entrepreneurship. International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, 9 (3), 323–335 .

Baden-Fuller, Charles; Morgan, Mary S., 2010: “Business Models as Models,” Long Range Planning , 43(2-3), Pages 156-171.

Peredo, A. M., Haugh, H. M., & McLean, M. (2018). Common property: Uncommon forms of prosocial organizing. Journal of Business Venturing , 33(5), 591-602 .

Fichter, K., Lüedecke-Freund, F., Schaltegger, S., Schillebeeckx, S. (2023).  Sustainability impact assessment of new ventures: An emerging field of research.  Journal of Cleaner Production .

Hockerts, Kai, Lisa Hehenberger, Stefan Schaltegger, and Vanina Farber. "Defining and Conceptualizing Impact Investing: Attractive Nuisance or Catalyst?." Journal of Business Ethics, (2022): 1-14.

Lam, David PM, Berta Martín-López, Arnim Wiek, Elena M. Bennett, Niki Frantzeskaki, Andra I. Horcea-Milcu, and Daniel J. Lang. "Scaling the impact of sustainability initiatives: a typology of amplification processes." Urban Transformations 2 (2020): 1-24.