Managerial applications of corporate social responsibility and systems thinking for achieving sustainability outcomes

There is a gap between organizations'intentionsto adopt corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies and their provision of a clear strategy and management tools for practicallyrealizingsuch intentions. In particular, the literature to date has not yet developed a pragmatic, descriptive summary of firms' designs for CSR adoption, along with a practical menu of ways to implement their designs in organizational systems. To address these gaps, this paper aims to make three principle contributions. First, it defines CSR, sustainability and their relationship in practical terms. Second, it develops a typology of CSR standpoints that incorporates a number of other classifications. Third, it offers a menu of practical methods and measurement metrics based on interpretive and complex adaptive systems perspectives. The result is a hands‐on guide to the process of achieving sustainability goals and objectives from a variety of ideological positions and systems designs, thereby contributing to both managerial practice and sustainability theory.