Leveraging on levers of control to learn how to integrate sustainability in management

PurposeThis paper aimed to contribute to the current debate of scholars and practitioners about the fundamental challenge of embedding corporate sustainability within business operations.Design/methodology/approachOur study provides empirical evidence of how three Environmental Social Governance champions across different industries, progressively learn to integrate sustainability into management. To track the integration process, this paper took the perspective of management control systems (MCSs) operationalized by means of Simons' (1995) levers of control (LoC) model. This paper assumed that firms significantly leverage all LoC and learn progressively from intuiting to institutionalizing sustainability.FindingsThe findings confirm that sustainability integration is a dynamic, long-term process that unfolds through multiple learning loops. Belief and boundary systems often initiate the sustainability integration process. The design and use of diagnostic systems underlying the disclosure of the sustainability report are critical and crucial in the integration process. Interactive systems often operated as feedback and refinement mechanisms for both diagnostic and boundary systems.Research limitations/implicationsOur study may suffer from researchers' bias; the case study method implies that our findings are not generalizable (Jans and Dittrich, 2008). With our work this paper contributed to highlight the transformative potential of MCSs.Practical implicationsWith our work, this paper contributed to highlighting the transformative potential of MCSs.Social implicationsThe framework guides managers to design and adapt their MCSs to foster a culture of continuous learning and genuine sustainability integration, demonstrating an aligned set of controls to the sustainable development goals, whose attainment requires unprecedented collaboration, practice and intellectual innovation.Originality/valueThe study suggests how to unlock value for companies and their stakeholders and create a sustainable future where people and the planet prosper together.