Implementing Sustainability through Corporate Education: Learning from Car Producers in GermanyPauline Sprenger

4 December 2017

The importance of sustainability for companies is rising. The literature shows that knowledge is key for the implementation of sustainability, but that hardly any empirical insights on the topic of corporate sustainability education exist yet. For that reason, this master thesis dives into the sustainability-related education activities of German automotive companies based on a qualitative analysis of their sustainability reports and interviews. Therefore, the thesis provides detailed insights on how employees acquire the necessary knowledge on sustainability, enlarges the existing body of literature on corporate sustainability education and offers practitioners starting points to rethink their own sustainability-related education activities. The results lead to seven overarching conclusions: (1) Many sustainability topics are already integrated into education and training, but without a systematical approach and not under the label ‘sustainability’. (2) Corporate sustainability education exists in the tension between centralization and decentralization of educational activities. (3) A need orientation based on the job profile and risk exposure is crucial to provide the right employees with the right topics, competencies as well as formats and methods. (4) Web-based training gain more importance and interactive methods are essential to involve employees. (5) Sustainability competences are generally demanded competences and do not play a significant role in corporate sustainability education. (6) Corporate sustainability education aims to provide new knowledge by improving the employees’ ability to perform their job and trigger a change in mindset and behavior. (7) For the future, strengthening of corporate sustainability education is expected and proving success will become more important.