Organizational development for social sustainability in work systems

A work system may be said to exhibit social sustainability if it utilizes its human, social, economic, and ecological resources with responsibility. This entails using these resources in a non-exploitive way, regenerating them, and paying due attention to the needs and ambitions of its stakeholders in the short- and long-term. For most presently existing organizations attaining and maintaining sustainability requires a midcourse correction, a transformation process. This chapter reviews the main concepts regarding sustainability and previous research of organizational development in this context. It presents a four-phase model for this transformation process and illustrates the model's application in four different contexts. The results are discussed and directions for further research are presented.