Sustainability Champions: Pragmatic Agency and Social Skill in Sustainability Practice Implementation

This paper explores the strategies of executives leading sustainability initiatives across multinational companies in multiple geographies and sectors. It draws on qualitative multiwave interviews with senior leaders and applies a network lens to the diffusion of sustainability initiatives within multinational enterprises. The findings show that change agents often draw on external networks to build resilient work identities and require social skills in managing stakeholders of sustainability initiatives. The paper thereby draws attention to the organizational paradoxes of sustainability leadership, where leaders need to have personal conviction but require pragmatic approaches in dealing with outside stakeholders.