Framing Sustainable Practices

This paper develops and clarifies social intrapreneurship theory by examining the “how” of effective intrapreneurial championing. More specifically, the authors consider the following research question: How does the manner in which middle managers frame sustainable practices influence successful championing outcomes? The authors integrate the natural-resource-based view of the firm with research on middle management championing behaviors and issue-contingent models of ethical decision making to propose a model of sustainability championing for social intrapreneurs. To that end, propositions are developed concerning the relationship between the types of sustainable practice championed, how the argument for a given practice is framed, and successful championing outcomes. This paper contributes to a growing body of literature on social intrapreneurship, providing insight into how intrapreneurial championing can be more effective and building a foundation for future research.