Growing demands from policy and the public urge firms to become more sustainable. Many businesses are reshaping their internal sustainability practices and are changing how they communicate their position on sustainability to external stakeholders. However, there are different combinations between the internal practices and the external communication of sustainability. We conduct qualitative, exploratory research, which combines a large scoping of cases with in-depth analysis to inform our conceptualization of an empirically grounded framework. We contribute to understanding the combinations of internal practices and external communication better and develop four different types of business sustainability: pretending, aspiring, signaling, and fully-fledged. Building on existing literature, we do not present these as better or worse states of sustainability but probe the ethical or pragmatic motives that lead businesses to assume their position. Thereby we uncover that there are justified and ethically questionable reasons for businesses to assume a certain type of sustainability. In contrast to existing literature, which has often assumed a static position, we also scrutinize the transition pathways businesses can take by moving from one type to another. We highlight five potential transition paths and develop strategic recommendations for how managers could foster or prevent such transitions.
