Developing collaborative and sustainable organisations

One of the defining characteristics of humankind is that we are, by nature, a social species. This makes the individualistic behaviours that increasingly characterise our society and culture both “unnatural” and it tends to create imbalances and conflicts between individuals, groups and organisations. This paper presents two approaches to build stronger and more Sustainability oriented organisations through collaboration. The first one is the Japanese concept of Kyosei, or “spirit of cooperation”, which invokes collaboration among labour, companies, customers, governments, and others. Kyosei is complemented with a Multi-dimensional Sustainability Influence Change (MuSIC) memework as a means of understanding and promoting integrated progress towards Sustainability. The MuSIC memework explores the complexity and interconnectedness of the three types of attitudes: (1) informational, (2) emotional, and (3) behavioural, within three organisational levels: (a) individuals, (b) groups, and (c) the organisation.