Erratum to: ‘Activists in a Suit’: Paradoxes and Metaphors in Sustainability Managers’ Identity Work

Both sustainability and identity are said to be paradoxical issues in organizations. In this study we look at the paradoxes of corporate sustainability at the individual level by studying the identity work of those managers who hold sustainability-dedicated roles in organizations. Analysing 26 interviews with sustainability managers, we identify three main tensions affecting their identity construction process: the business versus values oriented, the organizational insider versus outsider and the short-term versus long-term focused identity work tensions. When dealing with these tensions, some interviewees express a paradoxical perspective in attempting to accept and maintain the two poles of each of them simultaneously. It emerges in particular that metaphorical reasoning can be used by sustainability managers in varied ways to cope with the tensions of identity work. We read these findings in light of the existing literature on the relation between paradoxes and identity work, highlighting and discussing their implications for both research and practice.

Research on green identity work has so far concentrated on sustainability managers and/or top-management actors. How lower-level green employees cope with identity tensions at work is, as yet, under-researched. The paper uses an identity work perspective and a qualitative empirical study to identify four strategies that lower-level employees use in negotiating and enacting their green identities at work. Contrary to expectations, lower-level green employees engage substantially in job crafting as a form of identity work despite their limited discretion. In addition, the study demonstrates that lower-level green employees make use of identity work strategies that uphold rather than diminish perceived misalignment between their green identities and their job context.

Climate change discourse permeates political and popular consciousness, challenging the ecological sustainability of our economic system and the business models that underpin it. Not surprisingly climate change has become an increasingly divisive and partisan political issue. While a growing literature has sought to address how business organizations are responding to climate change, the subjective perceptions of managers on this issue have received less attention. In this article we contribute to an understanding of the dynamic interaction between identities and organizations, by showing how sustainability managers and consultants balance tensions and contradictions between their own sense of self and the various work and non-work contexts in which they find themselves. Based on a qualitative, social constructivist method, we examine how these individuals develop different identities in negotiating between conflicting discourses and their sense of self. We explore how these different identities arise, interact and inform responses to climate change in different settings, and then demonstrate how individuals seek to overcome conflicts between identities in constructing a coherent narrative of themselves and their careers. In doing so, the article highlights how identity work is central to the micro-political enactment of business responses to climate change, and how, for some, the climate crisis provides an impetus for personal reinvention as a moral agent of change.

Purpose Despite growing interest in sustainable human resource management (HRM), limited attention has been given to how sustainability is enacted through everyday human resource (HR) practice. This study aims to examine how HR professionals define sustainability within HRM, interpret and position their role in sustainability work and engage in and reflect on learning related to sustainability in everyday practice. Design/methodology/approach This qualitative study draws on interviews with 13 municipal HR professionals in Sweden and workplace shadowing of eight. Using reflexive thematic analysis within a workplace learning perspective, this study explores how the meanings, roles and practices of sustainability unfolded in context. Findings HR professionals view sustainability primarily as a moral and relational responsibility, rather than a technical or policy-driven task. Through situated practices of trust-building, ethical reflection and value-driven dialogue, they translated abstract goals into locally meaningful concerns. Their connective work bridged tensions across competing demands, acting less as policy implementers and more as relational enablers. Learning related to sustainability emerged informally, through negotiation, role experimentation and everyday interactions that shaped professional identities and required strong social competence. Practical implications Organizations must recognize and support HR’s connective work by legitimizing reflexive practices, enabling HR to mediate across stakeholder groups and embedding supportive infrastructures for everyday workplace learning. Originality/value This study advances sustainable HRM and workplace learning by shifting focus from formal strategies to HR’s relational and connective practices. It emphasizes how sustainability is enacted through micropractices and how HR professionals’ learning and identity work are integral to sustaining organizational change.

Founders of new sustainable ventures have to balance economic, social, and ecological goals simultaneously. To investigate why those founders perceive sustainability tensions in fundamentally diffe...