Keywords

1 Introduction

Digital transformation and the related broader concept of digitization are seen as a current necessity for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) to stay competitive. Besides the purely economic necessity of the digital transformation of SMEs, it is reasonable to assume that digitization will help reduce the negative environmental impact of business activity. Contrarily, digitization plays an ambivalent role in this field of tension since it allows products to be manufactured more (resource-)efficient, but using digital technologies is also associated with a considerable input of resources.

According to Chen et al., the effects of digitization on sustainability in the corporate context can be traced back to two areas. The first is the impact of digital technologies on the life cycle of the manufactured product and the second is the life cycle impact of the hardware used for digitization [1]. Their research conducts that a positive effect of digitization on environmental sustainability is assumed or established in most publications. However, the authors also report that it has been challenging to find publications that present both positive and negative impacts of digitization on sustainability.

In a review of six companies in the logistics industry, Kayikci found that the efforts of the companies studied with regard to their digital transformations were mainly aimed at improving economic sustainability and the influence on environmental and social sustainability was rather low [2]. Brozzi et al. can confirm this assessment in a study of Italian SMEs. At present, most companies in the manufacturing sector do not see digitization primarily as a tool for improving economic and social sustainability [3].

Hence, manufacturing industry, especially in Germany with a predominant share of SMEs, requires support and guidance to handle these new challenges. To cope with these requirements, we propose the extension of an extensively tested strategy development process that engages a maturity model for digitization in its center and we extend it for sustainability considerations. The objective of the model is to provide more options in strategy development processes that incorporate sustainability in terms of social, economic and ecological aspects.

2 Maturity Models for Corporate Strategy Development

2.1 Maturity Models for Digitization and Sustainability

Maturity models can be used as a tool for assessing organizational capabilities in a specific domain [4]. They can be applied to assess the current position of a company and aid companies in their continuous improvement by showing expected, desirable or characteristic development patterns of certain objects or processes within a company [5]. Due to their structure, a prioritization of improvements is simple.

Basic and well-established models for the elaboration of a current digitization status and appropriate improvement measures exist in many versions. Examples are the web-based Industry 4.0 Readiness Model [6] and the scientifically grounded model by Schumacher et al. [7]. Either of them serves as a static document with qualitative description of different digitization levels. Mittal et al. give a comprehensive review on maturity models for Industry 4.0 and their implication on SMEs [8].

Furthermore, a range of sustainability-oriented maturity models with different scopes have been established. Baumgartner and Ebner [9] examine specific aspects of corporate sustainability strategies. They identify different types of strategies and a maturity model helps them to characterize each strategy within the sustainability dimensions more precisely. They derive different sustainability aspects from international standards and guidelines as well as academic literature and focus on economic, environmental and social dimensions to frame the aspects of corporate sustainability.

Golinska and Kübler [10] propose a framework for the sustainability assessment of SMEs of the remanufacturing sector. The maturity model is based on ISO/IEC 15504 Information technology - Process assessment [11]. It is embedded within a questionnaire and also utilizes the three dimensions of sustainability. The questions serve as description of the maturity levels and each level requires the former level to be fulfilled.

Müller and Pfleger [12] contribute a maturity and decision model as a support tool for sustainable corporate decisions. They provide improvement strategies by considering corporate activities, the sustainability dimensions and their respective maturity level (Sustainability Maturity Cube). The model itself is a blueprint that enables the development of specific maturity models. Hence, a set of levels and their respective characteristics are not provided.

Other sustainability maturity models set a more specific application focus. Pigosso et al. [13] and Hynds et al. [14] developed maturity models exclusively for product development. Cagnin et al. [15] provide a maturity model to support companies move towards sustainable development. The 35 introduced levels extend the three main pillars by spatial and institutional-political sustainability. Reefke et al. [16] focus on decision-making stages of sustainable supply chain management and propose specific maturity model with corresponding goals and requirements to implement a sustainable supply chain strategy.

In conclusion, many of the introduced models embed the three pillars of sustainability to define dimensions and maturity levels. The development of the dimensions, categories and levels is mainly motivated by existing standards and academic literature. In addition, empirical studies are conducted to identify relevant evaluation categories. These findings implicate that the three pillars of sustainability are a well-known and widely applied approach for maturity models.

3 Extending the Existing Maturity Model and Analysis Process

3.1 Methodical Approach of the Existing Potential Analysis

The already developed procedure to identify and enhance digitization potentials consists of the following three major steps as shown in Fig. 1, which are elaborated in [17] and [18]. Step 2 is designed as a workshop-oriented analysis of the self-assessment and the internal processes according to the maturity models TOP-dimensions Technology including the product and process view, Organization and Personnel with its 120 levels in total to describe the state of digitization. The dimension of Energy has been included to examine the awareness of energetic aspects in companies.

Fig. 1.
figure 1

Current workflow scheme of potential analysis

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Based on Finnerty et al. [19], Benedetti et al. [20] and catalogues of measures by [21] and [22], 25 additional levels were identified and structured in the following categories:

  • Record, processing and analysis of energy data,

  • Measurement tools,

  • Load management and peak loads,

  • Activities for participation and fostering of energy awareness among employees,

  • Energy supply systems of a company.

The elaborated gaps between actual and target state of digitization are a mean to generate ideas on how to define project concepts. This includes the use of the St. Gallen Business Model Navigator [23] in step 3. Therein, we adapted the dimensions towards the description of digitization strategies as follows:

  • Who are the stakeholders of the digitization solution (e.g., involved personnel)?

  • What is the value for the stakeholders (e.g., a new digital assistance system)?

  • How is the project realized (e.g., what is necessary to implement the solution)?

  • What is the created value for the stakeholders (e.g., ergonomic improvements)?

By applying these questions to the generated ideas, a conceptual roadmap for the realization of each idea is established that serves as a future project concept. The existing potential analysis procedure does not incorporate sustainability aspects and will therefore be extended by this aspect subsequently. Since it is designed for evaluating manufacturing companies and not to support strategy development for e.g., supply chains or service providers, sources of these domains will be excluded in the next steps of model development.

3.2 Extensions Towards Sustainability-Related Aspects

In Sect. 2 identified maturity models serve as a source of dimensions and respective categories for our model extension. The models incorporate the pillars of sustainability, which are underpinned with specific categories, e.g., social sustainability addresses the health and safety of workers. In order to cover the effects more comprehensively, we extended the review of maturity models by reviews and case studies with focus on digitization and sustainability.

Exemplarily, Chen et al. [1] give an extensive insight into the tension field of digitization and environmental sustainability in manufacturing. They discussed the implications of digitization on the Triple Bottom Line. Beltrami et al. [24] performed a review on Industry 4.0 technologies and their effect on environmental, social and economic performance. Stock et al. [25] elaborate the potential for sustainable value creation in Industry 4.0 the literature review and expert interviews. Sartal et al. [26] examine the influence of Industry 4.0 on sustainable manufacturing. They describe the evolution of sustainable manufacturing over time and applied tools (e.g., Life Cycle Assessment), standards and metrics (e.g., ISO14001) and concepts (e.g., Triple Bottom Line). They include Industry 4.0 technologies (e.g., Simulation systems) and their main benefits towards sustainable manufacturing and pointed out other relevant frameworks within this area. One of these frameworks is authored by Trianni et al. [27] who empirically elaborated a wide range of Triple Bottom Line indicators among 26 SME across Germany and Italy in various sectors. In sum, 18 indicators across the three dimensions were identified with the result that the majority only focus on the economic pillar of sustainability while the social and environmental are only addressed for compliance reasons.

The focus in both, reviews and maturity models are on the three pillars of sustainability, respectively the Triple Bottom Line concept as a variation of this approach [28]. Also, the categories within the dimensions address similar topics. Hence, we utilize these intersections to extend our model by the main categories of the conducted review in Sect. 2 and 3. In the following Table 1 we give an overview on the intersecting (and renamed) categories that are used to extend our model.

Table 1. Overview on the identified generic categories
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With respect to similar categories within the three dimensions, a distinction based on the definitions by Chen et al. is used to clarify the scopes of each dimension. For the detailed definitions, please refer to [1].

3.3 Implications on Potential Analysis Process

Based on our assumptions, we extended the potential analysis by energetic and sustainability considerations. More specifically, an energetic perspective extends the maturity model for analysis and self-assessment and the extracted sustainability dimensions extend the workflow of value analysis of project concepts. The final process is structured as presented in Fig. 2. To evaluate the method, it was applied on a project concept of a workshop. The investigated company produces brake lines for several automotive companies and supplies them by just-in-time principle. The process is characterized by bending, joining, heating and assembly processes, the facilities have a low level of digital surveillance and assistance systems. The work of the labor is mainly manual with a lot of paper-based documentation regarding process parameters, quality results and order tracking. For the company it is crucial to ensure supply reliability and therefore the production itself is heavily reliant on the process quality to reach this goal. Thus, the reduction of quality losses is a main concern.

Fig. 2.
figure 2

Updated workflow scheme with energetic and sustainability consideration

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We therefore developed a concept for an eddy-current testing with automatic result feedback loops in a critical joining process according to our version of the St. Gallen business model triangle. The initial “Value”-dimension focused on economic targets, e.g., decreased production planning cycles. An extension towards economic sustainability aspects may be cost savings in material purchase as well as less recycling costs [EC1] and better process integration into the workflow of the workers [EC2]. By correlating process parameters with quality states, a quality improvement can be assumed [EC3] as well as new opportunities for further data-driven process improvement are possible [EC5]. Hence, the initially identified cost reduction [EC4] also fosters revenue by less scrap and recycling costs [EC5]. Environmental sustainability is improved regarding less usage of resources and less energy consumption when stable production output is assumed [EN4]. Additionally, emissions are reduced within the production processes whereas additional emissions by the installation of the new sensor system and software can be assumed as comparably low [EN1]. Dangerous inputs and wastes [EN2] are a minor concern and therefore not contemplated in detail. Waste management benefits from less scrap materials [EN3] and the process adaptions do not foster major health risks for workers or environmental risks [EN5]. Social sustainability is enhanced in terms of better working conditions due to less secondary processes, e.g., documentation [SC4]. Workers are supported by a digital solution, which also requires labor training and therefore improvement of skill sets [SC3]. Furthermore, it is important to also ensure an ethical usage of the digital solution, e.g., by avoiding employee tracking [SC2]. External effects of [SC1] and [SC5] are less relevant for the use case. The analysis of the dimension Energy revealed a high level of energetic maturity, established by retrofitted machines but not used further, that is contrary to the levels of digitization across TOP-dimensions. Energy-intensive processes were controlled by organizational measures in terms of energy efficiency. The further digitization of the contiguous processes offers more options for data-driven measure application in various production areas.

4 Conclusion

The implications of digitization on sustainability gain increasing attention in academic literature, the estimation of positive and negative effects remains difficult and case specific. The prevailing view is that sustainability can be affected positively and adequate assessment methods need to be provided for companies. Thus, we proposed an extension of an existing and in many workshops approved potential analysis workflow for digitization by aspects of economic, environmental and social sustainability. We extended the component of business model evaluation in the workflow by sustainability considerations and evaluated the adapted workflow with a case study. The extension helped to clearly determine boundary conditions within the evaluation process.

Next steps can be the modular extension of the maturity model itself by sustainability domains. Also, concrete use cases with detailed descriptions of technologies, transformation processes and the evaluation of influences between sustainability and digitization would be helpful for practitioners. In addition, more use cases with environmental and social focus may be identified and scrutineered in the future.