Evaluation of Corporate Sustainability

doi:10.15302/J-FEM-2014025

Front. Eng

2014, Vol. 1

Issue (2) : 176-194 https://doi.org/10.15302/J-FEM-2014025

ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT THEORIES AND METHODOLOGIES

Evaluation of Corporate Sustainability

Panitas Sureeyatanapas¹, Jian-Bo Yang²(

), David Bamford³

¹. The Department of Industrial Engineering, Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen 40002, Thailand
². Manchester Business School, The University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK
³. The Business School, University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield HD1 3DH, UK

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Abstract

As a consequence of an increasing demand in sustainable development for business organizations, the evaluation of corporate sustainability has become a topic intensively focused by academic researchers and business practitioners. Several techniques in the context of multiple criteria decision analysis (MCDA) have been suggested to facilitate the evaluation and the analysis of sustainability performance. However, due to the complexity of evaluation, such as a compilation of quantitative and qualitative measures, interrelationships among various sustainability criteria, the assessor’s hesitation in scoring, or incomplete information, simple techniques may not be able to generate reliable results which can reflect the overall sustainability performance of a company. This paper proposes a series of mathematical formulations based upon the evidential reasoning (ER) approach which can be used to aggregate results from qualitative judgments with quantitative measurements under various types of complex and uncertain situations. The evaluation of corporate sustainability through the ER model is demonstrated using actual data generated from three sugar manufacturing companies in Thailand. The proposed model facilitates managers in analysing the performance and identifying improvement plans and goals. It also simplifies decision making related to sustainable development initiatives. The model can be generalized to a wider area of performance assessment, as well as to any cases of multiple criteria analysis.

Keywords corporate organization sustainability evidential reasoning evaluation assessment

Corresponding Author(s): Jian-Bo Yang

Online First Date: 05 September 2014 Issue Date: 16 September 2014

Cite this article:

Panitas Sureeyatanapas,Jian-Bo Yang,David Bamford. Evaluation of Corporate Sustainability[J]. Front. Eng, 2014, 1(2): 176-194.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/fem/EN/10.15302/J-FEM-2014025
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fem/EN/Y2014/V1/I2/176

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