Defining Sustainability Core Competencies in Business and Management Studies Based on Multinational Stakeholders’ Perceptions

Almudena Eizaguirre, María García-Feijoo and Jon Paul Laka
Additional contact information
Almudena Eizaguirre: Marketing Department, University of Deusto, Hermanos Aguirre, 2, 48014 Bilbao, Spain
María García-Feijoo: Marketing Department, University of Deusto, Hermanos Aguirre, 2, 48014 Bilbao, Spain
Jon Paul Laka: Quantitative Methods Department, University of Deusto, Hermanos Aguirre, 2, 48014 Bilbao, Spain

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 8, 1-21

Abstract: One of the concerns in our time is the need to integrate economic, social and environmental aspects, which is known as sustainable development. The role of higher education is essential for providing future professionals with the necessary profiles to respond to the sustainability challenges in increasingly complex and global contexts. That is why numerous authors have sought to define key competencies, skills and learning outcomes for sustainability. However, there is still no agreement on what these key competencies for sustainability in higher education really are. For that reason, the objective of this paper is to determine which are the sustainability core competencies, considering three different geographical regions (Europe, Latin America, and Central Asia), and the perspective of four different stakeholders (graduates, employers, students and academics). The framework of the research is the development of the so-called Tuning projects, which aim to design comparable and compatible higher education degrees in different regions of the world, based on student-centered and competency-based learning. Using an exploratory factor analysis (EFA), the results of this study reveal the existence of a factor intimately related to sustainability, which includes competencies such as commitment to the preservation of the environment, social responsibility or respect for diversity and multiculturality, among others.

Keywords: education for sustainable development; education for sustainability; sustainability competencies; higher education; business and management education (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (23)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/8/2303/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/8/2303/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:8:p:2303-:d:223535

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().