Managing Process Performance to Enable Corporate Sustainability: A Capability Maturity Model

Sustainability is among the key issues that organisations face today. Sustainability is frequently defined as economic activity that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs. Despite being intensely discussed, however, the concept of sustainability is not as clear cut as is commonly believed. Likewise, neither kind nor scope of the capabilities organisations need to develop in order to become truly sustainable are currently well understood. This chapter proposes that process performance management (PPM) is a vital approach that organisations can use to address their sustainability concerns. Using a quantitative, questionnaire-based approach, the Rasch algorithm, we develop a capability maturity model that allows organisations to determine their current PPM maturity level and to identify required improvements regarding their process performance. The chapter concludes with a detailed discussion of the use of PPM to incorporate corporate sustainability in day-to-day operations.