Entrepreneurial lean thinking for sustainable business modeling: a workshop design for incumbent firms

Abstract

In times of increasing concerns and extensive political debates about social and environmental problems, incumbent firms are obliged to reduce their negative environmental impact by implementing sustainable business model innovation. Yet, realizing more sustainable business model variants entails several complexities and associated challenges that need to be overcome. To support this task, this article takes an entrepreneurship perspective on sustainable business model innovation and combines literature of business models and entrepreneurial lean thinking (ELT). In doing so, it derives a workshop design grounded in contemporary theory with state-of-the-art tools and methods. The workshop is framed as a stage-gate process facilitating the notions of ELT with iterative cycles of ‘create, test, and improve’ and spans the phases of opportunity identification, opportunity evaluation, opportunity development through sustainable business model design, and decision of opportunity exploitation. The article shows that ELT is an appropriate yet underutilized approach for sustainable business modeling. Further, it discusses how the workshop supports opportunities and mitigate pitfalls of ELT for sustainable business modeling. As such, the findings have theoretical implications for the intersection of sustainability and lean approaches in innovation research as well as implications for practitioners by providing a comprehensive framework to support sustainable business model innovation.

Sustainable entrepreneurship on digital platforms and the enactment of digital connectivity through business models

“…This can lead to different experimental approaches regarding how the value is presented and how digital actors are incorporated into these processes. We recommend to use reliable tools such as lean thinking, entailing a continuous testing of new assumptions, and learning processes (Schwarz et al, 2021; Weissbrod & Bocken, 2017). Platform choice is another crucial decision that includes trade‐offs.…”

“…Combining heterogeneous practices into a coherent value logic is not without its tensions and challenges. Engaging and communicating with multiple stakeholders, forming the necessary connections, and carrying out value-creating activities for non-economic gain increases the complexity (Gregori et al, 2019;Laasch, 2018;Schwarz et al, 2021).…”

“…We recommend to use reliable tools such as lean thinking, entailing a continuous testing of new assumptions, and learning processes (Schwarz et al, 2021;Weissbrod & Bocken, 2017). Platform choice is another crucial decision that includes trade-offs.…”

“…To investigate (non‐)economic value creation involving novel technologies, we build on the intersection of entrepreneurship and business models (Lüdeke‐Freund, 2020; Schaltegger et al, 2016). Specifically, we consider business models as value logics consisting of interlocking components of value proposition, value creation, and value capture (Bocken et al, 2014; Holzmann et al, 2020; Laasch, 2019; Schwarz et al, 2021). When taking society and the environment into the equation, business models' value logics become increasingly complex (Gregori & Holzmann, 2020; Laasch, 2018, 2019).…”

“…Combining heterogeneous practices into a coherent value logic is not without its tensions and challenges. Engaging and communicating with multiple stakeholders, forming the necessary connections, and carrying out value‐creating activities for non‐economic gain increases the complexity (Gregori et al, 2019; Laasch, 2018; Schwarz et al, 2021). While there is a large body of work on digital technologies, knowledge of how they make a difference pertaining to business models of sustainable entrepreneurs is only just emerging (George et al, 2021; Gregori & Holzmann, 2020; Holzmann & Gregori, 2023).…”