=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-2382/ICT4S2019_paper_21
|storemode=property
|title=Exploratory Case Study on Sustainability Analysis with a Startup for Business Models
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2382/ICT4S2019_paper_21.pdf
|volume=Vol-2382
|authors=Birgit Penzenstadler,Anoushka Mara,Stephanie Nam,Brian Budzinski
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/ict4s/PenzenstadlerMN19
}}
==Exploratory Case Study on Sustainability Analysis with a Startup for Business Models==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2382/ICT4S2019_paper_21.pdf
Exploratory Case Study on Sustainability Awareness
with a Startup for Business Models
Birgit Penzenstadler Anoushka Mara Stephanie Nam Brian Budzinski
CSU Long Beach, USA CSU Long Beach CSU Long Beach, USA Partneur
Lappeenranta Univ. of Techn., Finland Long Beach, USA Los Alamitos High School, USA Long Beach, USA
birgit.penzenstadler@csulb.edu anoushkamara@gmail.com stepha789@gmail.com brian@partneur.com
Abstract—Start-up businesses are often not primarily con- curriculum and standards of business planning [18] nor re-
cerned with the overall sustainability impact of their business quirements engineering [23]. Despite showing up in research
idea. However, designing sustainability into the start-up business over the past ten years, there is little strategic support by
idea from the start may improve their long-term impacts and
success but requires additional knowledge and time. In this RE for integrating sustainability into the subsequent design
paper, we perform a case study of the start-up Partneur, who process [3]. As a result, there is no strategic support tailored
are developing an online platform for developing business ideas towards explicitly integrating sustainability into the subse-
according to the Business Model Canvas. We show the usage of quent design process of a start-up business plan. In order
our artifact-based analysis approach and discuss observations to incorporate sustainability into the long-term vision of a
and lessons learned. The approach provided new insights to
Partneur, and might, in turn, inform their future users on how business, we apply an artifact-based approach that visualizes
to incorporate sustainability into their business idea as well. the potential goals and their impacts on sustainability in the
Index Terms—sustainability awareness; requirements engi- different dimensions.
neering; evaluation research; artifact orientation; Our contribution to easing the challenge of limited resources
and sustainability knowledge when developing a business idea
I. I NTRODUCTION is a set of diagrams (e.g., stakeholders, goals, use cases) and
guidelines for sustainability awareness (e.g., five dimensions
Society’s innovation and progress has come with many of sustainability) as initially proposed in [23].
costs whether in environmental, economic, societal, technical, We contribute a case study that serves as an example to
and many other dimensions. In general, sustainability is a start-ups demonstrating how they can visualize the goals of
concern of rising importance for companies [5]. There is their business and align them with sustainability. While we
an increasing number of startups, yet these new businesses do this for a business that uses the Business Model Canvas
have limited resources and lack extensive knowledge on (BMC) as their main guideline to develop their prototype, we
sustainability. As a result, they resort to focusing on the are not attempting to constructively critique any specific type
development of a minimum viable product [27]. The rise of business model but instead offer an artifact-based approach
of startups has radically changed not only the tech industry rooted in requirements engineering to explore any type of
but also commerce as a whole. The startup scene is fed business model with regards to their sustainability impacts.
by young developers and entrepreneurs, many of which are The diagrams and models serve as a mapping of concept to
just about to graduate from college. To give them a better clarify and help in the development of their business idea in the
foundation in skills that are relevant to getting a business short run and long run. The implementation of sustainability
off the ground, CSULB founded the College of Business principles (as proposed, e.g., in the Karlskrona Manifesto [4])
Administration “Business Incubator” (https://www.csulb.edu/ from the start of a business idea diminishes long run risks
cba-graduate-programs/cob-incubator). The Business Incuba- and allow for greater success [15]. This paper completes a
tor consists of a group of engaged young entrepreneurs that case study with a local startup, Partneur (www.partneur.com)
leads a series of talks on topics relevant to startups. The and provides models of their stakeholders, goals, system
Business Incubator is advised and supported by a business vision, use cases, and sustainability awareness diagram. They
administration professor, Prof. Wade Martin. Over the course give an overview of the most important requirements for the
of a semester, interested students can participate in the talks system development of Partneur. With the analysis, Partneur
and receive mentorship. is equipped with the resources and knowledge needed to gear
Designing sustainability into a start-up business idea from their business toward a resilient and sustainable business.
the beginning may improve the long-term impacts and success The impact of this case study of an artifact-based approach
of the business. The problem is that such efforts require to systems engineering for sustainability serves as an example
additional knowledge and time in terms of research, and then for other companies in early development stages, or even
integrating the acquired knowledge into business plan drafts, companies that are further down the road and want to improve
while sustainability is not yet integrated into the traditional the long-term plan for their business. The case study of this
paper can be followed and replicated to provide businesses to three orders of impacts or effects of software systems [4],
with the guidance they may otherwise not yet have available. [6]. Immediate effects are attributed directly to the lifecycle
Thus, the study contributes to a knowledge base [29], [3] and of the system through the resources used for its production,
facilitates designing sustainability into new business idea and usage, and disposal. Enabling effects are caused by the usage
systems development. of the system in its application environment, and potentially
by many users over a period of time (months to a couple
II. R ELATED W ORK AND BACKGROUND of years). The structural effects show when accumulating the
We introduce our foundation work on Requirements Engi- aggregated effects of usage by many users over an extended
neering for Sustainability and sustainability awareness diagram period of time (years or decades) [13].
that helped assess the Partneur prototype. The work by Seyff et al. [29] presented a tabular version
of the sustainability analysis using as elicitation method a
A. Requirements Engineering for Sustainability (RE4S) modified WinWin Negotiation Model and the EasyWinWin
Partneur is developing a software system to support their method to support the negotiation of requirements and their
business process, and requirements are the key leverage point impact on sustainability. This includes identifying affected
for practitioners who want to develop sustainable software- sustainability dimensions, discussing how immediate, enabling
intensive systems [3]. We use the term RE4S as defined in pre- and structural effects are manifested, and how these effects
vious work [21]: Requirements Engineering for Sustainability should be taken into account in the development of a system.
(RE4S) denotes “the concept of using requirements engineer- The results support the authors’ view that every requirement
ing and sustainable development techniques to improve the affects sustainability and each such effect should be considered
environmental, social, and economic sustainability of software if the full view of the system’s impact on sustainability is to
systems and their direct and indirect effects on the surrounding be observed [29].
business and operational context” [21]. In order to develop
such systems, we need awareness (by education) and guidance C. Case Study: Partneur
(e.g., by training), and creativity (to find better solutions). This explorative study was conducted with the start-up
The RE4S approach uses an artifact model, guiding questions, company Partneur. They were selected upon discussion with
checklists, and reference models to elaborate the requirements various start-up companies based on the common interest
for a system under development. The entire approach is of learning more about how Partneur could strengthen their
described in detail in [21] and example specifications have business vision in terms of sustainability. Furthermore, the
been provided in [26], [7]. Furthermore, example artifacts are Partneur founders are involved in the Business Incubator that
provided in the results section of this article. A customized serves as multiplier and knowledge disseminator amongst
version of the AMDiRE artifact model [10], the RE4S artifact aspiring start-up founders on campus but also from the public
model as adapted for this case study is depicted in a simplified community in and around Long Beach.
manner in Fig. 1. It contains a stakeholder model, a goal Their main business idea is to provide an online platform
model, a system vision, a usage model, and a sustainability for collaboration on the development of business plans. The
awareness diagram (explained in detail in the next section). underlying model they use for these business plans is the
Business Model Canvas (BMC) [18].
B. Sustainability Awareness Diagram
The Sustainability Awareness Diagram (SuSAD) [3] is a D. Business Model Canvas
diagram to provide an overview of the impacts of system As explained in [18], a business model can “best be de-
on the five dimensions of sustainability [24] in the three scribed through nine basic building blocks that show the logic
orders of effect [13]. The dimensions are environmental, of how a company intends to make money”. The nine blocks
economic, social, individual, and technical [3]. The environ- cover the four main areas of a business: customers, offer, in-
mental dimension refers to the usage and protection of natural frastructure, and financial viability. The business model is like
resources. The economic dimension refers to the ability to a blueprint for a strategy to be implemented through organiza-
preserve value and capital. The social dimension refers to tional structures, processes, and systems. The original business
the ability of societies to preserve the solidarity and services. model canvas is a template with blocks for customer segments,
The individual dimension refers to the ability of the people value propositions, channels, customer relationships, revenue
to live their lives and express themselves in freedom. The streams, key resources, key activities, key partnerships, and
technical dimension relates to the longevity of socio-technical cost structure. An organization serves one or several customer
systems. Impact on sustainability can be observed via impact segments. It seeks to solve customer problems and satisfy
on one or more of its dimensions. As a result, it is advocated customer needs with value propositions. Value propositions are
that sustainability requires simultaneous consideration of these delivered to customers through communication, distribution,
interrelated dimensions [4]. Nevertheless, interdependencies and sales channels. Customer relationships are established and
exist between these dimensions including tradeoffs that may maintained with each customer segment. Revenue streams re-
have to be negotiated for a system under analysis [3]. In sult from value propositions successfully offered to customers.
addition, we can also consider the five dimensions in relation Key resources are the assets required to offer and deliver the
previously described elements by performing a number of key Information providers, Regulatory, Implementers, End Users
activities. Some activities are outsourced and some resources and Post Implementation support [25]. A stakeholder model
are acquired outside the enterprise to key partnerships. The is used to define the various stakeholders of a system, and
business model elements result in the cost structure [18]. visually represent them along with their connection to the
Note that this paper does not endorse one type of business system. It can be represented through UML actor hierarchies,
plan over another but that our case study partner Partneur is informal hierarchical graphics or natural language [25].
developing an online platform to enable people to collabo- The stakeholder diagram is a UML representation of the dif-
ratively work on a business model canvas, and that is the ferent classes of stakeholders of Partneur. Here, the stakehold-
business idea that we are analyzing using the artifact-based ers are classified into groups based on their role in the system.
requirements engineering for sustainability (RE4S) approach. Firstly, we have the founders of Partneur who presently have
a majority stake in the system. They are the founders and key
III. R ESEARCH D ESIGN innovators of this tool. They are responsible for the planning,
This exploratory case study [9] was carried out in the Fall decision-making, execution and control of the system. They
semester of 2018 at the California State University, Long are advised by a team of Experts, namely Business Analysts
Beach. The research objective was to perform a structured and Domain Experts. Business Analysts advise the Owners on
approach to requirements engineering and a sustainability the best ways to optimize the business, predict future trends for
awareness diagram for a local startup company. the system and improve the decision-making process. Domain
The selection of the case study partner was based on Experts provide feedback and solutions about a specific topic
availability and potential for impact. Partneur is a local start- or area of interest in this industry.
up company in its first steps that is founded by four young Next, we have a team of developers who are collectively
entrepreneurs who graduated from CSULB and run the Busi- responsible for the creation, maintenance and security of the
ness Incubator on campus. Thus, a successful application of Partneur website and online tool. They include Engineers, IT
the RE4S and SuSAD approach could inform many start-ups in Security, Troubleshooting team and Testers. We also have a
the making and support their business and system development Marketing team to analyze the positioning of the product,
as the Business Incubator serves as a knowledge disseminator. devise strategies to gain more users and effectively reach out
The research objective was to apply the artifact-based re- to the target market. Further, there is a Legal team and a team
quirements engineering approach including the sustainability of Online regulators to check the decorum of the users in using
awareness diagram to the case of a local start-up company in the tool, safeguard the intellectual property of the system and
their early development stages, and to evaluate the usability keep a check on disruptive teams or negative activity.
of the approach for the (inexperienced) requirements engineers The primary users of Partneur are individuals with little
and usefulness of the results for the founders. or almost no background in business. The aim of the tool
is to guide the users through a step by step process in a
IV. C ASE STUDY: R ESULTS creating a business plan for their idea and assisting them until
This section presents the results from the requirements they launch the product. The secondary users are students
elicitation that was performed by analyzing an early prototype in universities across the country. The tool would serve as
of the Partneur online platform and in interview sessions with an educational tool in building a business plan for initiatives
two of the founders. or student clubs encouraging entrepreneurship. Mentors are
experienced individuals with several years of experience in the
A. Stakeholder model field of Entrepreneurship. They voluntarily take the initiative
In the requirements engineering domain, a stakeholder is to provide guidance to the teams and advise them in their
commonly defined any individual, group or a business who key decisions. Educational institutions, Partners and Sponsors
has a stake in the system, i.e, an entity who is affected by the provide visibility and support to Partneur. They assist in
system and/or affects the system through some component [1], marketing efforts to gain more users and help in growing
[28], [12]. But this doesn’t mean that every stakeholder is the platform with insights and/or monetary aid. Finally, Com-
interested in the project’s success. For example, although petitors are other online platforms that provide support for
legislators influence the way a company or system works, they creating a business plan from scratch. A few of Partneur’s
are usually unaffected or little affected by the system’s success key competitors are liveplan.com, businessplanpro.com, and
or failure. Stakeholders can be identified through iteratively planbuildr.com. However, Partneur are the only ones who
analyzing the goals to deduce key role-players who influence focus especially on team building around a business plan in
the system, inspecting the business and operational context of the making.
the system under development, instantiating a generic refer-
ence list, and so on. In general, stakeholders can be classified B. Goal model diagram
based on their roles and function. A generic list of categorizing Goals are targets for achievement, which determine the
stakeholders by their roles are: users, creators, developers, driving force behind the system. They help in establishing
institutions etc. Based on their functions, stakeholders can a framework for the system. They define the high-level ob-
be categorized into the following groups: Decision makers, jectives of the system and guide decisions at various levels
Fig. 1. Stakeholders of Partneur
within the enterprise [10], [32]. Goals are subdivided into three several Business goals (which are highlighted in blue). The
categories: Business goals, Usage goals and System goals. business goals include: attracting possible investors to fund
Business Goals are the key goals of the business that lay the the projects, impacting the Long Beach community with the
foundation for other goals. They have a direct impact on the launch of these innovative projects, creating a reliable interface
entire system and provide motivation for the system. Usage for users to connect and build these projects, providing a trans-
Goals determine how the primary, secondary and tertiary users parent, financial model to users so that they know exactly what
work with the system. They are related to the functional they are paying/signing up for, and finally aiding educational
context of the system. System Goals explain how the system institutions and users by providing them Partneur as a learning
is supposed to work to achieve the above goals. They are tool.
system-related goals that target system characteristics [22]. The Usage goals (highlighted in yellow) tell us about what
Each goal can be further decomposed into smaller sub the users can achieve with the system. By attracting investors
goals. These sub goals ensure that certain pre-requirements (Business Goal), the users can network and make connections
are met before moving on to achieving the larger goal. This with the investors and can create a pitch deck of their project
helps in addressing issues and resolving conflicts during the to show them. Users can create innovative, impactful projects
implementation of the system. Further, the goals are analyzed which will in turn benefit the Long Beach community at large.
to see if they have a sustainable factor, i.e., does the goal bring Using the reliable interface of Partneur, users can connect with
out sustainability in any of the five dimensions (individual, a team, discuss and share skills and information securely, and
social, technical, economic and environmental). legally protect their project ideas. Transparency in the financial
A goal model diagram is used to depict the decomposition of model can be achieved by having few economic variables
goals into subgoals, and the respective interdepencies between for the membership pricing: i.e. the membership pricing may
the goals. This forms the basis for early identification and depend only on a few key factors like number of projects etc.
resolution of conflicts, and defining the rationale of a require- Users can learn and apply real-life skills in their projects and
ment. In most cases, a Primary Goal is subdivided into several receive mentoring. This way, Partneur succeeds in providing
Business goals which are further decomposed into Usage goals an online learning tool for individuals.
followed by System goals. Further, every goal improves the The System goals (highlighted in green) are broad system-
sustainability factor of the dimensions listed at the top of the related goals, which relate to the overall functioning of the sys-
goal. tem. They include high availability the total system (includes
The goal model diagram depicts the goal model for Partneur. website, security, privacy and mentoring), excellent system
At the top, we have the primary goal of Partneur. This is the security to protect user’s information and privacy, and easy
mission statement of Partneur which is to “formulate, build and navigation features which will enable the system to be a user-
execute business ideas”. This primary goal is decomposed into friendly interface.
Fig. 2. Goals of Partneur
Usually, the parent goals and subgoals work toward im-
proving a common sustainability dimension. For example,
the Business goal of impacting the Long Beach community
helps in expanding the Social dimension of sustainability
by improving the community and standard of living. It also
positively enhances the Environmental aspect of sustainability
by launching projects which are aimed at being eco-friendly
and bringing about a “green” change in the society. This
can be followed by the Usage goal of connecting a team of
entrepreneurs. It positively impacts the sustainability of the
social dimension by bringing people closer in a community
and creates an environment where people can work collectively
to achieve a common goal. Lastly, the Usage goal can be
achieved by having a user-friendly interface (which can be
achieved by having an easy navigation amongst other things)
and a high availability of the system. These goals enhance the
technical aspect of sustainability by ensuring that the system
functions according to the requirements set by the developers
and/or expectations set by the users.
C. UML use case overview diagram
Use cases are used to represent a business function, process,
or activity performed in the modeled business. A business actor
represents a role played by some person or system external to
the modeled business, and interacting with the business. A Fig. 3. Use case flow of Partneur
business use case should produce a result of observable value
to a business actor [22]. An adapted UML depiction of these
use-cases (Fig. 3) outlines all the possible use-case scenarios primary user is an individual user, who is seeking to utilize
of the primary, secondary and tertiary users of the system. the Partneur tool in bringing his business idea to life. He can
Partneur has three types of end users: Individual users, choose to initiate a project or simply join an existing team. He
Investors and Mentors. Each of these users are business actors takes the first step by creating an account with the website.
to Partneur and play a particular role in the system. The Next, he can choose to create a project of his own and choose
a Business model best suited to his idea. This is followed In addition to individual users, we also have students from
by the Team Development process which includes connecting schools/educational institutions who are the secondary users
with people to create a team. If an individual user doesn’t of Partneur. Thus, Partneur has partnerships with a few local
choose to initiate a project, then he can request to join an schools/institutions who utilize Partneur as a learning tool to
existing project. The Team Development phase is followed by enhance the teaching process. Next, we have the Mentors
the Development phase. It includes Market Research, choosing who overlook the teams and projects and provide guidance
a Financial Template, creating a Business plan and choosing throughout the process. Some Mentors might belong to an
the Services required to develop the project. A Mentor is educational institution but not necessarily. Next, we have mo-
a secondary user of the system who provides his valuable tivated, passionate individuals who have signed up and created
insights and assists the team in making key decisions in the an account with Partneur. They may belong to an educational
Development phase of one or more projects. Service providers institution, but not necessarily. Since these individuals usually
are tertiary users of the system. They are not key business have little or no prior experience in entrepreneurship, they
actors since they don’t create an account with the system and have concerns such as how to identify suitable partners, how
are not personally involved with the project which the goal to obtain funding, and how to estimate operating costs. Further,
of success. However, they do impact the system by providing these individuals form separate teams to create their projects.
their services (such as Accounting, Website development etc.) Each team member has concerns like “I hope this team sticks
to various teams who contact them for their services. Finally, together”, “I hope our ideas are not stolen” etc. Every team
Investors are important business actors of the system. They are works on one or more projects. They create a Business model
secondary users of the system who launch the various projects and pitch deck. Investors fund the project if they like the pitch
after they are completed. First, they create an account with deck. Investors think about factors such as Does the project has
Partneur. Next, investors choose certain criteria about the kind a high ROI, low risk etc. A legal team backs the project pitch
of projects they would be interested in funding. And finally, deck to ensure that the Intellectual Property (IP) is protected.
they select one or more project and help in launching them by After the investment in the project, the project proceeds to
providing monetary funding. becoming a final product. The final product ends up having a
positive effect on the community at large.
D. System Vision as Rich Picture
A system vision diagram is a joint vision of the system E. Sustainability Awareness Diagram (SuSAD)
agreed by all stakeholders. One way we can create this big Now that we have a clear picture of the whole system,
picture is through graphically depicting the entire system in its processes, stakeholders and motivation, we can combine
a rich picture format. A rich picture is a holistic thinking our insights to create a sustainability awareness diagram of
approach for a complex system with several stakeholders [22]. the system. This is a diagram which details the immediate,
It consists of text, symbols, icons and thought bubbles to enabling and systemic effects of the entire system. A SusAD
illustrate the main elements and relationships that need to diagram can be graphically represented in several forms. Here,
be considered in trying to intervene in order to create some we have utilized a pentagon radar diagram. Each side of the
improvement. It includes a broad view of the stakeholders, pentagon represents one of the sustainability dimensions.
processes and elements of the system. The thought bubbles The diagram is split into three levels. At the innermost level,
are queries/thoughts/ideas of the specific stakeholder in this the immediate effects of the system are listed, according to
situation. A rich picture helps in understanding the complexity the dimensions of sustainability that they impact. Immediate
of an entire situation. It points out relationships and connec- effects include the direct effects of the production, use and
tions that we may otherwise miss. A rich picture helps to disposal of the software systems. The middle level and the
open discussion and come to a broad, shared understanding of outermost level detail the enabling effects and systemic effects
a situation. We have used icons from the sustainability library of the system. Enabling effects arise from a system’s appli-
that was created at the ICT4S 2018 conference [31]. cation over time. This includes the opportunities to consume
The system vision diagram (Fig. 4) depicts the system vision more or lesser resources amongst the other changes induced
of Partneur in a rich picture format [17]. Firstly, let’s begin by the system. System effects represent the “persistent changes
with the owners of Partneur. They overview and manage all observable at macro level”.
the processes and key decisions of the system. They own the One way of making use of the contents of the SuSAD is
Partneur website and are responsible for its overall functioning to connect this to sustainability patterns, which can be found
and issues. The owners are usually concerned about issues in the Sustainability Pattern Catalogue (https://patternscatalog.
such as: How to get more users? How to get more schools on herokuapp.com) [8]. Table 1 shows which patterns we have
board with Partneur? How to achieve credibility of the system? identified as applicable for Partneur.
How to manage legal issues? How to get more funding? In detail, these patterns are characterized by the following.
Next, we have the team of IT Developers who develop the For details on examples from companies where these patterns
code and database to build the website. They work together have been successfully applied, please see [8].
with the Support team to ensure that the system has a HR 2: Data Privacy and Security Policy — With the raise
reliable, secure, user-friendly interface with high availability. of the Internet of Everything (IoE), people can now share
Fig. 4. System Vision of Partneur
Fig. 5. Sustainability Awareness Diagram of Partneur
1st order 2nd order 3rd order
individual HR2: Data Pri- reuse materials into the manufacturing process, also known as
vacy and Secu- circular economy. Second, reduce or eliminate the proportion
rity Policy of toxic or harmful materials from the products. In order to
social G3: Collaborate
with peers be even more efficient, this strategy is most of the time com-
technical ENV4: bined with the implementation of an end of life management
Resource program which allows companies to directly refurbish, recycle
Efficiency
economic G5: or reuse the products they sold (see patterns CONS1).
Transparency ENV4: Resource efficiency — To limit their resources’
environmental ENV3: Design consumption companies, and then reduce their environmental
ecological
products negative impacts, companies decided to set up initiatives to
TABLE I economize different type of resources. Most of them decided
PATTERNS FROM CSR CATALOGUE THAT CAN BE USED TO IMPROVE THE to focus on waste generation from office and water efficiency
IMPACTS IDENTIFIED IN THE INDIVIDUAL CELLS OF THE S USTAINABILITY
AWARENESS D IAGRAM . both from office and from operations. We can also notice
that more than half of the companies decided to set up
paper efficiency strategy, mainly by optimizing their printing
policies. To maximize the impacts of this strategy, employees
and access business or personal data from anywhere at any need to be fully aware with environmental issues [8].
time. Therefore, data privacy and especially security is a huge
concern in the world, especially for the IT industry that is V. A NALYSIS AND D ISCUSSION
at the basis of this IoE. To fight these issues, 75% of the This section analyses and discusses the results of the case
companies established a Data Privacy statement where they study summarized in the above presented artifacts.
explain how they use our data. These statements constantly
evolve to meet the new regulations as we saw recently in A. Usability of artifacts & approach by the requirements
Europe. Moreover, since the most private data is the one that engineers
is unreachable, companies also include Data Security in the In creating each diagram for the case study, we found a fresh
conception of their products or services that allows them to perspective in understanding the system. It helped us get a
increase the trust of their customer. thorough big picture of the stakeholders, functions, processes,
G3: Collaborate with peers — According to the UN, collab- goals, possible use-case scenarios and sustainable dimensions
oration is one of the keys to meet Sustainable Development underlying in the system.
Goals. By participating to the creation of laws or standards While creating the Stakeholder model diagram, we started
companies, most of the companies try to increase their co- by categorizing the possible stakeholders of the system into
operativity. Moreover, most of the companies also decided to three groups: Individual, Business and Systemic. Each group
go further than local regulation in different places where they represents an increasingly larger set of people. Individual
operate, especially when they are in the third world. These stakeholders are single body stakeholders who play a role in
initiatives can lead to an international recognition in specific the system such as an owner or an individual user. Business
fields for companies, and even sometimes to be defined as stakeholders are enterprises or organizations that play a role
“an example to follow”. Finally, local and internal cooperation in the system for example competitor businesses, educational
is also very important this is why more than half of the institutions etc. System stakeholders are larger, organizational
companies implemented stakeholder engagement mechanisms bodies that play a role in the system for example the local
to define their own sustainability objectives (see pattern G1). community, environment etc. It was important to remember
G5: Transparency — Publish sustainability data to the that these stakeholders can be affected directly or indirectly by
public audience and make pricing transparent. All of the 20 the system. Not all stakeholders are direct users of the system.
companies investigated in [8] provided environmental data We derived the list of stakeholders by iteratively assessing
such as CO2 emissions, electricity consumption, resources the generic lists of stakeholders based on their functions
consumption, etc. They also published their different dona- and roles and critically analyzing the possible stakeholders
tions, and few even reported their political contributions or that could exist in the three categories (Individuals, Business,
stated that they weren’t involved in it. On one hand, this Systemic). In the future, it is planned to expand the stakeholder
practice, allows companies to keep a track on the level of analysis to include other sustainability actors (environment,
advancement of their different sustainability strategies and give future generations etc.).
the possibility for public institutions to confirm it. On the other Next, we assessed each of the different stakeholders from
hand, they can inform customers about their different impacts the different ways in which they are categorized and derived
on sustainability. a list of goals specific to each stakeholder. Then we organized
ENV3: Design ecological products — In order to reduce the goals into a hierarchy of three categories, Business goals,
their environmental impacts, companies decided to design Usage goals and System goals, based on their overall objective.
more ecological products regarding the materials used to Business goals are usually set by the Owners, Advisors,
build them. This is concretely translated in two ways. First, higher level management etc. Usage goals are the standards
or expectations set by the direct users of the system. System additional insight from the analysis that can be beneficial to
goals are goals about the system-characteristics which are set their company going forward.
by the development team to ensure the success of system. The visual library used for the system vision had been
Collectively, these goals work together to ensure the success developed at ICT4S 2018 [31]. It was perceived as a useful
of the previous higher hierarchy of goals and ultimately the and adequate set of illustration icons by both the requirements
Primary goal or the mission of the system. Finally, for each engineers and the start-up founders.
goal, we noted which dimensions of sustainability satisfied
or improved by it. We noticed that these dimensions of C. Lessons Learned
sustainability are common for related goals in the hierarchical
Looking back on the analysis of the research, there are a
order, i.e., parent and child goals collectively improve common
couple of ways in which we could optimize the research to im-
dimensions of sustainability. Further, every goal higher up in
prove the preciseness of details, results and impact of this case
the hierarchical order (i.e., Business and Usage goals) must
study. An alternative way to initiate the sustainability analysis
have more than one subgoals. This ensured the cohesiveness
part of the research from scratch would be by interviewing the
of the goals of the entire system.
founders of Partneur about their perspectives of sustainability,
We followed this by creating a UML use case diagram.
their sustainability analysis for the system thus far and their
Out of the list of stakeholders, we focused on the direct
future goals. In our case we had a general interview and
users of the system. These are the primary, secondary and
then some document analysis, which also led to a number
tertiary users of the system. We mapped out all the possible
of insights but it would be interesting to compare the two
scenarios and actions they can perform in the system and
ways of approaching the creation of the sustainability analysis
created a consolidated UML diagram. This diagram depicts
and understand which way is potentially more effective and/or
the relations between the direct users and their action flow
efficient.
in the system. Next, we created the Rich picture diagram to
After eliciting the requirements and concepts from the
provide a big picture which is inclusive of all the stakeholders
information given to us, in a replication of this study we
in the system. It details all the processes occurring in the
could equally focus on drafting a clearer picture of the system
system and interdependencies between the stakeholders of
vision in direct iterative collaboration with the founders and
the system. Every stakeholder can impact several processes.
brainstorming the impacts of the system instead of creating
Further, to enhance the big picture, the concerns of every
a draft and checking with them. This could be enhanced
stakeholder are represented in their thought bubbles. This
with several in-depth conversations about the details of the
shows us how different stakeholders have different objectives
processes, the motivations of the stakeholders and creating
from the system.
solutions for the concerns of every stakeholder.
Finally, we consolidate all the insights and information from
In this exploratory case study we have only one system
the above assessment of the system and produce the SusAD
under development and therefore there was no ground to
diagram. We critically assessed the various stakeholders, their
perform any type of quantitative analysis, but once we can
goals, interdependencies and actions to achieve these goals in
replicate this study with several companies [2], it would be
the entire system to derive the possible immediate, enabling
interesting to reuse rating scales for usability and usefulness
and structural effects it creates. We classified the effects based
from previous work in the evaluation of artifact-based require-
on the dimensions of sustainability they impact. This provided
ments engineering [20], [16], [19].
us with the overall impacts created by the system and the
underlying process behind them. This helped in identifying the
D. Limitations and Threats to Validity
ways in which we can optimize the processes of the system and
update the goals to make it more sustainable and impactful. The main limitation of the approach, i.e., what the approach
is suitable and intended for and what exceeds that, is that it
B. Usefulness of the results for the start-up founders looks at a given scenario or situation in a development setting
We elicited and structured information under the dimensions and extrapolates the impacts that could potentially occur if the
of sustainability that the founder team had not previously system was going to be wildly successful. It does currently not
thought about in that manner. Their perspective was more include the support for looking at alternative scenarios, which,
informed by an economics background and therefore applying in the case of Partneur, could involve taking a closer look at
a software and systems engineering approach brought new circular economy informed models [11], [30] or regenerative
insights. In addition, the sustainability awareness diagram gave approaches [14].
more of a long-term view than the planning horizon a start-up The threats to validity include that of the three researchers
would usually analyze. While resources in terms of working working on the analysis, two were only recently introduced to
power and time are limited, just a discussion of 2 hours the techniques that were applied. Furthermore, we could only
brought a more than adequate amount of insights for the time interview two of the four founders of Partneur, but the other
invested in the task. For example, the founders saw some good two were looped in by email to confirm preliminary results
points to highlight sustainable businesses on their platform. and double-check we had not misunderstood anything in our
All together they gave us the feedback that they gained some conversations.
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