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Defining a sustainability-driven business modeling strategy with a storytelling science approach

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Abstract

This chapter will provide a general conceptual overview of a sustainability-driven business modeling (SBM) strategy from a "storytelling science" perspective. Storytelling science uses C.S. Peirce’s abduction-induction-deduction (AID) approach in a self-correcting series of cycles in order to get closer to what is true for the ecology as a whole, and what regimes of truth can be deconstructed for particular stakeholders (business, government, living systems of nature (ecosystems), and so on. In doing so, we discuss SBM in relation to various truth regimes, aiming to develop new approaches to multiple dimensions of sustainability modeling. Our purpose is to demonstrate how storytelling science can be helpful in exploring differences between sustainability strategies and their connections to some other aspect of business modelling, so that the SBM approach can be better understood, implemented and communicated. We examine several examples to illuminate multiple dimensions of SBM strategies that stand to benefit from the use of storytelling science. We organize our conceptual understanding into three sections: (i) SBM and storytelling in socially responsible capitalism that focuses on what is socially and ecologically sustainable, rather than only what is profitable to particular stakeholders; (ii) methodological and philosophical perspectives; and (iii) drivers, enablers, and barriers in the implementation of an SBM strategy. A general "storytelling science" blueprint of SBM strategy deployment is also included. The benefits of ecologically and socially-sustainability-driven models is they can utilize the storytelling method of AID cycles to find ways of business that do not exceed planetary carrying capacities. In conclusion, we describe potential ways of implementing storytelling science, which can be useful for studies in strategy, entrepreneurship, marketing, management, international business, and a global value chain that focuses on sustainability.