The Role of Role Expectations: Exploring How Sustainability Managers Construct Their Role in Light of Competing Role Expectations

Sammanfattning: As organizations increasingly are expected to operate beyond the computations of financial benefit and incorporate social and environmental elements in their strategies, there has been a rise in Sustainability Managers (SMs). Positioned at the center of organizations' sustainable transitions, SMs face multiple competing demands on how to act. However, the role has been problematized as vaguely professionalized with unclear delineations of responsibilities. Despite that, micro-level insight into competing role expectations and the shaping of role focus has been largely overlooked. Through 12 qualitative in-depth interviews with SMs in Swedish-based companies across industries, this thesis investigates how SMs construct their role in light of competing role expectations. By taking a role theoretical lens, three core misalignments of role expectations were identified: conflicting values, ambiguous legitimacy, and conflicting and overloaded strategic expectations. This study further uncovers how these conflicts inform SMs' work and conceptualize the dynamics of adjusting role behaviors to reduce incongruence. The ability to enact different roles based on context was shown to reduce conflictual experiences. Also, SMs with more experience perceived less incongruence, seemingly merging their view with that of their organizations over time. In contrast, SMs forced to change their self-concept endured feelings of discontent. To avoid a scenario where sustainable change is hindered by competing expectations, the authors aim to shed light on underlying dynamics and encourage an active and collective approach in shaping the SM role.