Multidimensional environmental social governance sustainability framework: Integration, using a purchasing, operations, and supply chain management context

Academics and practitioners promote integration as the thread that holds processes together and is pursued by those who seek efficiency and effectiveness. Integration may be described as any activity, or group of activities, concerning interaction and collaboration, in which individuals, and or organizations, work together in cooperative ways, to achieve mutually acceptable outcomes. Consistent with this notion, this paper proposes a unique, innovative, comprehensive, multidimensional environmental social governance (ESG) sustainability framework to inform on the relationships among integration concepts, ESG sustainability initiatives, distinct management processes, and key supply chain members. Using stakeholder theory as the underlying referent theoretical base, this manuscript informs on the alignment and integration of sustainability reporting and financial reporting to help researchers and practitioners overcome many of the shortcomings of current sustainability frameworks, as well as enable companies, which do not yet have an established sustainability strategy, to define potential initiatives and interventions towards sustainability.