Organizational ambidexterity (OA)—the simultaneous pursuit of explorative and exploitative innovations—engenders nested (paradoxes manifesting across organizational levels) and knotted paradoxes (intertwined co-occurring paradoxes at the same or across organizational levels). Both nested and knotted paradoxes are managed by internal stakeholders using approaches that are socially constructed by influences emanating from within and beyond an organization. External stakeholders also help shape organizational innovations but their influence on the management of paradoxes has largely been overlooked. In this study, we collected and analyzed data (...) from internal ( n = 19) and external stakeholders ( n = 18) in organizations pursuing explorative and exploitative clean energy transitions at nine Canadian energy utilities. We find that the external stakeholders engage with knotted inclusivity–efficiency and existing–emerging needs paradoxes. Our findings add to OA and business and society literature by revealing how the approaches that internal and external stakeholders adopt for paradox management have implications for each other, and thus OA. We also provide practical insight into how external stakeholder paradoxes can be managed through stakeholder inclusivity and enhanced transparency of innovation plans, with positive implications for OA. (shrink)

Sustainability challenges typically occur across sectoral boundaries, calling the state, market, and civil society to action. Although consensus exists on the merits of cross-sector collaboration, our understanding of whether and how it can create value for various, collaborating stakeholders is still limited. This special issue focuses on how new combined knowledge on cross-sector collaboration and business models for sustainability can inform the academic and practitioner debates about sustainability challenges and solutions. We discuss how cross-sector collaboration can play an important role (...) for the transition to new and potentially sustainability-driven business models given that value creation, delivery, and capture of organizations are intimately related to the collaborative ties with their stakeholders. Sustainable alternatives to conventional business models tend to adopt a more holistic perspective of business by broadening the spectrum of solutions and stakeholders and, when aligned with cross-sector collaboration, can contribute new ways of addressing the wicked sustainability problems humanity faces. (shrink)

Scholars are increasingly exploring community-supported businesses (CSBs) as promising alternatives to conventional ones. However, researchers are so far overlooking that CSBs vary in their underlying business models, that is, how they propose, create, and capture value. We apply a multi-staged qualitative research process to carve out the differences between community-supported business models (CSBMs) that exist in practice. Our research shows that transactional and relational CSBMs differ in how they propose, create, and capture value which, in turn, has implications for the (...) resources required to thrive. (shrink)

This article investigates how firms address the stability-change paradox inherent in sustainability transitions through the maintenance and utilization of a portfolio of sustainability-oriented partnerships. Drawing on a retrospective case study of Dong/Ørsted, a Danish energy company, we demonstrate the varying manifestations of the stability-change paradox during different phases of the company’s transition, influenced by both exogenous and endogenous factors. Furthermore, our findings reveal how Dong/Ørsted employed their partnership portfolio to implement diverse responses to manage the paradox. Based on these findings, (...) we argue that partnership portfolios can serve as spatiotemporal pockets, enabling organizations to effectively address and leverage the temporal and spatial aspects inherent in sustainability paradoxes. In addition, we highlight how partnership portfolios facilitate sustainability transitions by creating and leveraging different forms of collaborative value. (shrink)