Knowledge Systems and Knowledge Management for the Sustainable Enterprise

Dear Colleagues,

Sustainability will publish a Special Issue focusing on recent developments in the field of "Knowledge Systems and Knowledge Management for the Sustainable Enterprise". We seek papers that are clearly and concisely written, raising innovative ideas rigorously formulated in terms of problem statements and their treatments. We welcome a diversity of paper types including empirical research, action research, design science research, case studies and applications, literature surveys or theory development. The goal is to identify and disseminate state-of-the-art research on how Enterprise Sustainability can benefit from well-articulated knowledge-based systems and practices, as well as associated methods from related disciplines—business process management, enterprise modeling, risk management or quality management.

Enterprise Sustainability raises challenges regarding complexity management, sustainable process management, and multiperspective analysis of systems or policies adopted toward the goal of meeting the “triple bottom line” of balancing social, environmental, and economic goals. A well-designed sustainability program needs strategy, systems thinking, and process thinking based on manageable knowledge assets and articulated knowledge management practices. Sustainability is about meeting the needs of the future in terms of positive social and environmental change, while preserving or enhancing operations performance; in order to accomplish this, a convergence of methods and disciplines—e.g., enterprise architecture management, business process management, quality management—is expected to support the analysis, simulation, and transformation of enterprise systems. Conceptual and computational methods in support of dedicated management approaches and action research projects are expected to disrupt the traditional way of strategizing and dealing with the complexity of sustainability initiatives. Digital transformations are expected to converge with sustainability goals, thus establishing a new generation of systems that assimilate socially and environmentally-aware indicators and processes in their operation. We hereby employ the umbrella term of Knowledge Systems for information systems that satisfy such requirements, integrate specific knowledge assets, and facilitate a knowledge-driven approach to sustainable development.

Within this context, this Special Issue aims to publish scientific work that deals with knowledge processes, systems, and management practices in support of Enterprise Sustainability. The addressed topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Knowledge processes and knowledge work towards a sustainable enterprise;
• Knowledge-based systems and artificial intelligence disrupting sustainability;
• Knowledge networks and knowledge conversion for sustainable development;
• Open knowledge systems in support of sustainability;
• Sustainable knowledge management;
• Modeling methods, simulation, and decision support for a sustainable enterprise;
• Sustainable enterprise architectures;
• Design thinking and service engineering for the sustainable enterprise;
• Digital transformation for sustainability and sustainable digital transformation;
• Ontology and content management for the domain specificity of sustainability;
• Sustainability policies in business process management and quality management;
• Reshaping organizations with knowledge-driven sustainability policies;
• Operations management and business process re-engineering for sustainable value chains;
• Trade-offs and risk management for sustainability;
• Measuring sustainability.

Prof. Dr. Robert Andrei Buchmann
Guest Editor

References

1. Spangler W., Sroufe R., Madia M., Singadivakkam J., Sustainability-focused knowledge management in a global enterprise, in Journal of Computer Information Systems 55(1):70-82, 2014
2. Von Brocke J., Seidel S., Recker J. (eds.), Green Business Process Management: towards the Sustainable Enterprise, Springer, 2012
3. Abbas J., Sagsan M., Impact of knowledge management practices on green innovation and corporate sustainable development: a structural analysis, in Journal of Cleaner Production 229, p. 611-620
4. Kienzle J., Mussbacher G., Combemale B., Bastin L., Bencomo N., et al., Towards Model-Driven Sustainability Evaluation. Communications of the ACM, ACM, 2019, pp.1-10
5. Alves D. F. R., de Campos R., Souza F. B., Sustainable development within Enterprise Architecture, in Advances in Production Management Systems, p. 552-559, Springer, 2016
6. Mirghani M., Stankosky M., Mohamed M., An Empirical Assessment of Knowledge Management Criticality for Sustainable Development. Journal of Knowledge Management 13 (5): 271–86, 2009.
7. Utz W., Woitsch R., A model-based environment for data services: energy-aware behavioral triggering using ADOxx, in Collaboration in a Data-rich World, pp. 265-275, Springer, 2017
8. Cash D. W., Clark W. C., Alcock F., Dicskon N. M., Eckley N., Guston D. H., Jager J., Mitchell R. B., Knowledge systems for sustainable development, in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 100(14):8086-01, 2003
9. Lozano R., Orchestrating Organisational Changes for Corporate Sustainability. Greener Management International. 57: 43–64, 2012.

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• knowledge systems
• knowledge management
• enterprise modeling
• business process management
• sustainable development
• sustainable enterprise architectures