Sustainable Business Practices and Their Influence on Manager Decisions: Transversal Study

Introduction

Society and stakeholders cannot guarantee the sustainable use of natural resources without the involvement of qualified institutions and large enterprises or SMEs. In this respect, enterprises become responsible for having the necessary technological and financial basis for the application of sustainable development (Elkington, 1997), while also having an institutional role (Labuschagne et al., 2005). Although there have been divergences in the implementation of the principles of sustainable development, including its conceptual-applicative delimitation (Bolis et al., 2014), most specialists advocate the competitive advantages of corporate social responsibility (Porter & Kramer, 2006), the use of sustainable corporate technology in the long run, the promotion of human values with a direct effect on the progress of society (Porter & Kramer, 2011). Thus, businesses, especially SMEs, face the challenge of incorporating sustainability into their businesses, trying to contribute to global sustainability. Traditional business models are transformed based on innovation and thus give rise to sustainable business models (Boons & Lüdeke-Freund, 2013; Bocken et al., 2014). Starting from the general framework of sustainable development, the main business models and sustainable business models present in the literature are presented and analyzed. It also presents and analyzes a transversal study on the use of sustainable business models in SMEs in Bucharest, Romania, but also the results and conclusions of the authors. The main objectives of this chapter are: (1) identifying and presenting the main business models and sustainable business models, and (2) presenting and analyzing a transversal study on the use of sustainable business models in SMEs in Bucharest, Romania.