Sustainability Transition Management

The course will provide an overview of critical global standards and frameworks regarding corporate sustainability
developed by the UN and EU – with particular focus on the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, the upcoming EU
Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive, and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (the SDGs). Additionally, students
will increase their awareness of key pressure points of corporate accountability: civil society, and investors — and how understanding
how by working with these key stakeholders, companies can become truly sustainable in the long term.

Human-caused climate change is one of the most serious issue of our time and it portends
unprecedented environmental changes for our societies and future generations. Terms like “global
warming”, “climate change” or “greenhouse effect” are nowadays commonly used by non-specialists,
although this is often done without a clear understanding of the science behind them. Understanding
the science of human-caused climate change is essential to understand the economic, political and
moral dimension of it, and ultimately to tackle it. The objective of this course is to explain the basics of
the climate change science in a concise yet rigorous way, providing the scientific knowledge which
underlies all aspect of the human-induced climate change problem.

The goal is to develop participants’ awareness of their own leadership style and boost some of their key skills to manage processes of change in risk situations with authority. The program is based on experiential learning: Participants alternate meetings which are aimed at doing tasks at different moments to observe their behavior, participants will benefit from the assistance of professionals and managers who have significant experience in leading groups and organizations to excellent results

The course will offer students a multidimensional perspective on the dynamic links between human societies and the environment, using insights from environmental, resource, and ecological economics. The course will particularly focus on climate change and the associated societal responses, spanning multiple methodologies and approaches. At the end of the course, students will have a comprehensive understanding of sustainability issues, the methods to study them, and the policies to address them.

Background on Artificial Intelligence Techniques, overview on main challenges and risks of AI for sustainable development based on the SDGs. Main focus on practical cases study based on equitable, unbiased and trustworthy AI systems, sustainable energy management through AI, and hate speech monitoring through AI.

On the one hand, the module aims to provide Operations’ basics within modern production and service delivery systems. Following this initial framework, it will be possible to deepen the role of automation and digitalization within the modern Supply Chain and in particular the effect of enabling technologies foreseen by Industry 4.0.

This course is premised on the notion that sustainability represents a fundamental paradox: at the current moment, sustainability presents itself as a goal that can only be achieved through a radical transformation of the ways that we relate to each other and the environment—sustainability is premised upon the unavoidability of transformation. The goal of this course is therefore not to import one or several ethical theories into the world of business and commerce in order to form moral judgments about business practices, or to train business leaders to be more efficient decision makers.  Our task is to identify and navigate ethical dilemmas that arise when we entertain sustainability as a guiding principle for our individual, organizational, and global actions.

The purpose of this module is to increase awareness of the role and functioning of modern corporations as sustainability challenges, opportunities, and solutions emerge. My objective is to enhance our collective awareness of the multiplicity of issues associated with sustainability and explore what all of this means for firms. Towards this end, I have outlined three facets of sustainability – adapting to new demands, dealing with multiple stakeholders and creating a temporal horizon– that can serve as the basis for deepening your understanding of issues connected with sustainability.

Over the last decade sustainability, corporate social responsibility and stakeholder management practices have become paramount for companies as well as for the society at large. Although most companies have developed sustainability programs over the years, as they’re cutting carbon emissions, reducing waste, and otherwise enhancing operational efficiency, we are witnessing a mishmash of sustainability tactics that does not add up to a sustainable strategy. To endure, a sustainable strategy has to cope with the competing – and apparently divergent – interests of all stakeholders: investors, employees, customers, governments, NGOs, and society.

In this context corporate Performance Measurement Systems (PMS) play a key role as they help companies to formalize and implement their sustainable strategies as well as to proactively identify new trajectories that help companies to appropriately reconcile the trade-offs between different stakeholders’ wants and needs.

Overall aim of this course is to cover the most important aspects of value chain, including those aspects that concern interorganizational/supply chain or intraorganizational issues, e.g., sourcing and distribution, and to explain how sustainability-oriented innovation needs to be considered across all the aspects. Above all, instead of sustainability being treated separately, the intention in this course is that sustainability-oriented approach is considered in the context of each topic.

You may want to start a new green and sustainable venture. You may find yourself starting a new green and sustainable venture in the future. You may find yourself working for an entrepreneur, funding entrepreneurs, or having to work with them. Or you may simply want to be more entrepreneurial in your own career. The ultimate purpose of the course is to explore the many dimensions of new venture creation & growth in independent as well corporate settings looking at both process and people involved in assessing ideas, exploiting opportunities, and converting concepts into green and sustainable businesses that can really 2 add up to a global sustainable strategy agenda. The candidates will develop a
methodological toolkit to design, understand, and evaluate green business projects.

Introduction to social innovation and concrete practices for transforming the organizational culture of sustainability from the reputational to the productive area.

The course will be composed of five sections. The first part will be an introduction to renewable energy as a global economic sector and how it was possible to transform a set of political, social and environmental targets into a thriving and growing global sector. The second part will present the common key variables of renewable energy business and how the main associated risks are tackled. The third part will delve specifically on the debt financing techniques applied to the green economy. In particular, the students will learn how a renewable energy project can raise debt to finance during the different phases of its lifecycle: from development, to construction and operations. The fourth part will expose students on how an equity investor looks at this sector and how to evaluate the opportunities within a certain risk/return spectrum. A special focus will be devoted on how investors calculate investment returns of renewable energy projects taking into account commercial, legal, governmental, technical and business aspects. In the last part of the course a real life business case will be analyzed with particular attention to which key performance indicators can be used – financial, social, environmental – for analysing such an investment.

The course highlights the risks of greenwashing and emphasizes the significance of ethical communication in sustainability matters. Students will learn to recognize and combat deceptive practices while promoting genuine and transparent sustainability efforts. The goal is to equip students with the skills needed to foster honest sustainability communication, ensuring a responsible corporate governance and avoiding reputational and legal risks.

Moving from linear to circular economy needs a complete rethinking of products, processes and supply chains. This transition calls for the adoption of an anticipatory approach based on which the life-span, the functions, and the generation of waste should be kept in mind in the design stage to identify and prevent potential impacts in each step of the value chain but also maximize, add and maintain value in the further loops. Despite the existence of waste management systems, materials are still a pervasive presence in the environment, with resulting social concerns. By reconnecting societal needs and environmental pressures with company value proposition, externalities can be reduced, and value can be shared. Circular economy is the way to embrace corporate responsibility: reuse, repair, refurbish, remanufacture and repurpose, over than recycling, are among the circular strategies that support organizations to address a socio-technical innovation and change the business models in a sustainable way.