In the context of growing concerns regarding the deterioration of the environment and the increase in social inequalities, the concept of sustainability emerged as a response of companies, in order to contribute to community goodwill. The drivers and obstacles for the businesses engaging in sustainable policies have been explored at large by scientific literature. However, research gaps were observed, namely regarding SMEs, that tend to have a less formal and more fragmented approach to sustainability. The goal of our study is to determine the main barriers and facilitators for sustainability that Romanian SMEs face, and the connections between them and with the firms’ characteristics. Our study identifies the main barriers and facilitators for adopting sustainable practices in SMEs located in Romania, based on a study on a panel of 71 firms. The association rule method of data mining and quantitative statistic methods were used to explore barrier–facilitator relationships and how they vary depending on the firms’ or managers’ characteristics. The results show a wide range of drivers and obstacles for implementing sustainability in SMEs, while identifying connections between different barriers and facilitators and correlations with the firms’ characteristics. Our findings contribute to a better understanding of factors that impact sustainable behavior in SMEs and identify further aspects to be explored.

In any competitive economy, the risk of bankruptcy is pervasive. The research aims to contribute in improving the predictive power of bankruptcy and insolvency risk among companies by introducing new methods of processing and validation. This paper investigates the extensive application of the Z score model for predicting the economic-financial stability of Romanian companies in the manufacturing and extractive industries. A list of 37 financial indicators determined on the basis of the balance sheet data of 80 companies for the period 2015–2018 was used. Stepwise Least Squares Estimation through the Forward method allowed the identification of the most relevant ones. Canonical discriminant analysis and sensitivity analyzes were introduced to test the predictive power of the model. The new model identified allows both the prediction of bankruptcy and insolvency risk. This study contributes to the literature by testing variables in relation to financial difficulties and by including other classification information. The robustness of the determined canonical discriminant function was verified by testing the model on two other samples.

Current research shows that SMEs’ social and environmental actions are fragmented and informal, and few have formal policies and intentions. At the same time, many SMEs are engaged with environmental policies, often not knowing it. Concurrently, there is a gap between the pro-environmental attitudes of the SMEs managers, who are often seen as the main drivers for the firm’s behavior, and the policies implemented in reality in their firms. To this end, our research’s objective is to explore pro-environmental behavior, both at the individual and firm level, to identify connections between these levels and measures but also with firm’s and managers’ demographics, based on a study of Romanian SMEs. The descriptive analysis and factor analysis including tetrachoric correlation methods were used to explore these behaviors and the associations between them. The results confirm the research’s hypothesis and show that there are positive connections between the “green” behaviors at the individual level and in the SME context. Moreover, comparative analysis provided evidence of differences in the adoption of environmental practices, which were based on the firm’s demographics and manager’s characteristics. Simultaneously, five typologies of pro-environmental behavior in SMEs were identified and described, depending on the additional investment necessary and allocated resources, on the changes in organizational structure, and on the manager’s personal involvement. These findings contribute to a better understanding of the environmental improvement policies in SMEs and may help policy-makers tailor interventions and SMEs managers learn from good practices of their peers.

Considering that international projects with teams in the virtual environment (IPTVEs) contribute to the reduction in the carbon footprint and, at the same time, become life-saving solutions in extreme global situations, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations familiar with this type of project will have a substantial advantage in their ability to operate efficiently and to achieve their sustainable goals. An important aspect of project management is to identify the factors that influence the success of an international project, increasing its performance. Our first research hypothesis was that the decision to create a project team in the virtual environment is a factor with a major influence on international project success. Data collection was performed through an online survey conducted within international project team members and managers. The success factors were explained through factorial analysis which revealed two main factors and the neural network algorithm on a dataset through IBM SPSS Modeler software. The predictive model revealed that the most important field is setting up a virtual team, followed by organizational culture. These results support our hypothesis.

Under the growing complexity of manufacturing processes, supply chains, markets and stakeholder expectations, enterprise risk management (ERM) has become an extremely important, probably yet still underdeveloped, management function. Enterprise risk management theory and practice should keep pace with the changes of rapidly changing environments, through new, more adaptive approaches. The article presents some of the results of a longitudinal survey at Eastern-European manufacturing organizations made on risk management techniques. The goal of the research was the study of risk management techniques under rapidly changing environments in highly standardized industries (pharmaceutical and automotive). The research was focused on the role of human resources in handling technology-related/operational risks and to what extent a decentralized risk management is present. Multidisciplinary cooperation, the selection of the teams, communication and the decision making within the team was analysed. During our research few common risk analysis routines were identified at the studied organizations. Through an interview-based qualitative survey, possible weaknesses of common risk identification techniques were identified. The article presents three risk evaluation methods with the same features. The answers provided during the interviews indicate that risk assessment techniques are mostly centralized (coordinated by a single person/unit), linear (based on If-Then construct) and rigid, definitively not suitable when quick changes are in the organization environment.

The new approaches of risk and crisis management of organizations point to corporate responsibility and corporate sustainability. In the ‘Internet of Everything’ era, when the new media and social networks create the possibility to ruin in a few seconds the reputation of a company built in decades, it is important to afford the maximum attention to risk management and crisis communication. Long-term sustainability requires a transparent, trustful communication in due time. In our study, we propose a crisis management model that leads to sustainable corporate behaviour. We consider organizations as complex systems, and we use the holonic multiagent modelling concept to depict the emergent behaviour of these systems. This theoretical paper has as its main result a crisis communication model, based on the adaptability feature of holons. In our non-linear approach for unpredictable situations we merged some findings of sustainability theory, corporate social responsibility (CSR) management, crisis communication, the holonic manufacturing concept and the latest security standards in computer communication.