Integrating Environmental Policies into Business Strategy: The Problem Structuring Stage in a Framework for Decision Support

Abstract

Companies are increasingly including their corporate social responsibility into their business strategy. The environmental issues assume here a priority role. In order to get a balance in economic, social and environmental trade-offs, companies need to consider multiple objectives, namely related to the allocation of resources and investments, which can cause contradictory opinions among diverse stakeholders. Companies should incorporate into the decision-making process tangible and intangible elements, identifying and structuring objectives in a consistent way, in order to choose sustainable options for the company and create compromises between stakeholders. The main motivation of this paper is to present a methodology or framework to support decision-making and appraisal of corporate environmental strategies and subsequent management approaches. In order to gain a closer view over the proposed approach, we will present the preliminary results illustrated with examples from an ongoing case study within a public passenger transport company. © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014.