First published in 1992 and updated most recently in 2009, Management for a Small Planet provides a roadmap for what the authors term "sustainable organizational management". Stead and Stead provide the "principles, frameworks and practices" (p7) necessary for managers to move beyond definitions of traditional managerial success toward a sustainable organizational management perspective. In this view success is defined not by simply profit, efficiency and effectiveness but by a wider perspective where success includes consideration of the use of "economic, social, and natural capital in wise ways to create products and/or services that provide both economic benefits to their firms and social and ecological benefits to the planet and its people (p189). Stead and Stead have divided the book into two main sections. Part I establishes the interrelated or coevolutionary relationship of business, society and the environment. The authors examine past and current perspectives about these relationships and then make the case for why many of these perspectives must be changed if we are to survive. Part I consists of four chapters: 1. Management Meets a Small Planet 2. Management Happens on Earth: The Biophysical Dimension of Sustainability? 3. Economics as if the Planet Mattered: The Economic Dimension of Sustainability? 4. Searching for Equity: The Social Dimension of Sustainability With an understanding of the coevolutionary nature of the role of business, the authors proceed to pull together the theories, practices and frameworks that can deepen the understanding of managers and allow them to engage in sustainable organizational management. Part II consists of five chapters: 1. Coevolution and Sustainable Organizational Management 2. Leading the Way to Sustainable Organizational Management 3. Creating Sustainable Stakeholder Value 4. Sustainable Strategic Management? 5. Capabilities for Managing on a Small Planet: A Final Look Clearly written as a management text, Management for a Small Planet builds its case upon classic business education theory, practices and models. Reading this book after having completed an MBA it almost felt like reading a capstone course text or perhaps what should have been one. This text pushes one's thoughts beyond the standard MBA courses and pulls together theory from marketing, economics, organizational behaviour and strategy. Until the ideas of sustainable organizational management are simply de facto organizational management, the text should be a requirement for every MBA student or professional manager. -- Michelle Bishop CSR International, November 2009 I found this book stimulating and very good at drawing together current and lateral thinking on sustainability. However, it is bordering on an academic treatise which I think many managers would find long-winded in getting to the point, or giving them practical ideas to work with. The book is spilt into two parts:- Business Happens on a Small Planet and Managing on a Small Planet. Within Part 1, the authors discuss key concepts such as sustainability and manager's divergent dilemmas; pursuing the Triple Bottom Line; the Coevolving earth; carrying capacity and the human footprint; inequity; and economic, social and environmental justice. Part 2 moves on to being more management theory orientated and blends in sustainability with current "MBA-speak". It includes coevolution and sustainable organizational management; stakeholder value; sustainable management systems, eco- and socio-efficiency and a concluding section on redefining managerial success. The book is split into fairly short sections which do help in working through the concepts, some of which are geared to first world economies and, to my mind, are really not always relevant in an African context. The authors are very good at presenting their concepts, diagrammatically, but they use too few opportunities to do this. I found the half a dozen or so diagrams in the book really enlightening but I would have appreciated more in some of the other areas of the book where they could have added to the understanding of some of the concepts. Although this book is rich in content, it is still, to my mind, too complex for the average manager and is really better suited to the Sustainability or Environmental Manager who has the background and training to understand and apply the complex principles presented. -- Arend Hoogervorst Eagle Bulletin 19.5 (March 2010)
