Course Highlights

• Learn through interactive lectures, case studies, games, diagnostic exercises, and deep reflective work
• Explore how current business practices apply in a socioeconomic context
• Walk away with well-grounded strategies for making sustainability a reality in your organization, industry, and community
• Earn a certificate of course completion from the MIT Sloan School of Management

Please note: The application deadline for this course is 4 days prior to course start.

Course snapshot

Why attend Strategies for Sustainable Business?

For decades, MIT and MIT Sloan have been business sustainability thought leaders, from Jay Forrester’s work on World Dynamics, to our groundbreaking research on high performance work systems, to the formation of the Sustainability Initiative at MIT Sloan—an effort that is shaping modern discourse on sustainability.

Strategies for Sustainable Business connects executives with MIT professors and researchers who are currently breaking new ground in sustainability thinking and practice. Faculty combine interactive lectures, case studies, games, diagnostic exercises, and deep reflective work for a highly engaging experience. Participants place current business practices in a socioeconomic context and walk away with well-grounded strategies for making sustainability a reality in their organizations, industries, and communities.

Course Curriculum

• WHY: This first day focuses on why sustainability is THE challenge of our generation and its materiality to participants’ particular business. Case studies reveal how industries are changing to adapt to the business risks, and opportunities, presented by megatrends like climate change and globalization.
• WHAT: Through lectures, discussions, and a hands-on system dynamics simulation (“EnRoads”), participants will learn about available business sustainability strategies at the operational level, in their extended supply chain, and across their industry. They deepen their understanding of the environmental and social dimension of sustainability and the limits of voluntary action.
• HOW: Participants chart a course toward the “hardwiring” of sustainability in their enterprise by building coalitions for change and undertaking process improvement. Lectures and discussions draw on the latest research by program faculty and include lessons on how to influence organizational culture, run experiments, conduct difficult conversations, and engage people to undertake important projects. Participants will leave the classroom knowing their next steps to move the ball forward.
   

Course experience

This innovative business sustainability course applies a unique MIT Sloan framework to the topic of environmental and socioeconomic sustainability and uses an engaging mix of interactive lectures, simulation games, and action learning.

Participants leave with practical and impactful sustainability strategies for building consensus and making change and are empowered to take action on sustainability from the personal through enterprise level.

Learn more about the in-person course experience.     

Learn more about the live online experience.

We do not recommend this course if you have already completed Business Sustainability Strategy, unless you are seeking a refresher of the content.

Guest speakers

Zeyneb Magavi
Co-Executive Director, Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET)

In collaboration with gas utilities, Zeyneb focuses on transitioning the natural gas distribution system to a geothermal energy distribution system using the GeoMicroDistrict concept. Zeyneb previously led HEET’s Large Volume Leak Study, which developed a method to rapidly cut emissions from leaking gas pipes. She is committed to creating and driving forward just and wise solutions to the urgent challenge of climate change through multi-disciplinary problem solving, co-creation, and innovation. 

David S. Miller
Executive Managing Director, Clean Energy Venture Group (CEVG)

David is co-Founder and Executive Managing Director of Clean Energy Venture Group (CEVG), a leading early-stage venture capital fund focused on investing in companies commercializing disruptive advanced energy technologies that can grow to scale to address global climate disruption. David has helped lead investments into and/or served on the board of dozens of clean energy companies, which have raised hundreds of millions of follow-on capital and have led to successful growth and acquisitions. He is the founder of several companies, including Quantum Telecom Solutions. David is a Research Affiliate and Advisory Board Member for the Sustainability Initiative at MIT Sloan. David received his PhD, MS and BS from MIT.

Richard Wilner
Head of Business Excellence and Sustainability, BioLife Plasma Services at Takeda Pharmaceuticals

Richard is the Head of Business Excellence and Sustainability, BioLife Plasma Services at Takeda Pharmaceuticals. At Takeda, he is responsible for delivering transformation business performance targets in growth, cost of goods reductions, and environmental sustainability. Richard received his BS in Electrical Engineering from Tufts and MS in Electrical Engineering at Northeastern, as well as his MBA at MIT. 

Applying to the course

Please note: The application deadline for this course is 4 days prior to course start. We accept enrollments until the offering reaches capacity, at which point we will maintain a waitlist. Many of the courses fill up several weeks in advance, so we advise that you enroll as early as possible to secure your seat.

You can begin the application process by using the red 'Enroll Now' bar at the bottom of the screen.

Health and Safety

See our on campus healthy and safety policies.

Have questions?

Contact us if you would like to speak with a program director or visit our Frequently Asked Questions page for answers to common questions about our courses.

Hear from a past participant

"I joined this course with the highest expectations, and both professors exceeded them by far. Their work and ideas on the different dimension of sustainability gave me a different way to reflect about my professional goals and even personal beliefs."—Froylan Hernandez-Ruiz, Senior Attorney for the Latin America Region, The Nature Conservancy