Stand-alone Courses
Stand-alone Courses in Strategic Leadership towards Sustainability
SPRING SEMESTER 2023
Distance Courses
Behaviour change for sustainability 7,5 credits
Are you interested in learning how to support behaviour change for sustainability? This is half-time distance course that provides learners with a theoretical grounding in, and practical experience of designing, behaviour change interventions for sustainability.
The purpose of educating students in behaviour change for sustainability is to provide organisations and communities with knowledge and skills that are useful for promoting sustainable development. Transitioning towards sustainability is a complex challenge and considering human behaviour is important for succeeding with the transition. The knowledge and skills are applicable in many contexts, such as in commercial or public sector sustainability work, in grass-roots action or in other work seeking to contribute to sustainable development.
Foundations for Strategic Sustainable Development 7,5 credits
The purpose of the course is for the student to
• develop knowledge about and understanding of society’s sustainability challenges and the basic reasons for these.
• develop knowledge about and understanding of a structuring and coordinating methodology for strategic sustainable
development, including its scientific foundations.
• develop skills in applying the methodology and in utilizing it in relation to commonly cited concepts, methods and
tools of relevance to Strategic Sustainable Development.
• develop skills in presenting and academic writing.
Social Sustainability in Product- and Service Development 7,5 credits
The purpose of the course is to provide organizations with graduates having knowledge and skills that are useful for promoting social sustainability through product and service development. By product and service development we mean development of any type of offering, including physical products, digital products, services, and any mixture of these. Product and service development has a key role for society’s transition towards sustainability and the social dimension of sustainability is currently under-developed in this context. Improved knowledge and skills in how to systematically and strategically integrate also social sustainability aspects in product and service development makes more optimized, whole-systems solutions possible.
Theory of change for sustainability transformations 7,5 credits
This course aims to provide participants with a foundation in systems thinking, which will be used as a basis to explore different theories about how sustainability transformations can happen. The course will focus on bringing theory to the practical realities of how individuals can make change in business, organisations, and other social(-ecological) systems. The course also aims to equip course participants with the skills to apply ‘theory of change’-methodology to a real-life sustainability challenge; an understanding of a range of tools, methods, and concepts used to support change-making for sustainability transformations; and a methodology to assess which of these are best suited to different contexts.