COMM 386I - Innovation and Sustainability

This course explores sustainability as an opportunity for innovation. The term sustainable business refers to competitively advantageous strategies and practices that firms adopt to grow revenues, cut costs, improve market share, enhance brands, and redesign products and processes to reduce or eliminate adverse environmental and social impacts. This course will consider and critique the multiple ways that sustainability is contested and understood across various industries, including its biophysical, political, economic, institutional, ethical and technological implications. Students will look at the drivers of corporate innovation, strategic shifts, and new markets; learn to identify innovation opportunities; and recognize the tools, concepts, standards and frameworks used by companies currently pursuing a sustainable business model.