Although present research shows that ambitious corporate sustainability objectives improve employee engagement in business organizations, there is scarcity of research showing how employees engage in corporate sustainability objectives and become autonomous sustainability thinkers. We suggest that a strong, individual level of psychological ownership of corporate sustainability is a precondition for the development of sustainability thinking, and examine the factors that influence the emergence of such feelings of ownership. Our qualitative study, based on 29 interviews conducted in seven Finnish local business units from three different technology-oriented multinational enterprises (MNEs), shows that several key factors can have contradictory effects, both strengthening and hindering the routes to psychological ownership of corporate sustainability. While these contradictory effects may potentially lead to confusion among employees, our findings may help managers to avoid pitfalls in developing a more sustainability-oriented organizational culture. Moreover, by applying the theory of psychological ownership, our study contributes to the business sustainability research by providing new theoretical opportunities to understand the process of how individuals may become engaged in enhancing business sustainability.

尽管目前的研究表明，雄心勃勃的企业可持续发展目标可以提高员工在商业组织中的参与度，但很少有研究表明员工如何参与企业可持续发展目标并成为自主的可持续发展思想家。我们认为，企业可持续发展的强烈的个人心理所有权是可持续发展思维发展的先决条件，并研究了影响这种所有权感出现的因素。我们的定性研究基于对来自三个不同的以技术为导向的跨国企业 (MNE) 的七个芬兰当地业务部门进行的 29 次访谈，表明几个关键因素可能产生相互矛盾的影响，加强和阻碍企业可持续性心理所有权的途径。尽管这些相互矛盾的影响可能会导致员工之间的混淆，但我们的研究结果可能会帮助管理者避免在发展更加以可持续发展为导向的组织文化方面的陷阱。此外，通过应用心理所有权理论，我们的研究通过提供新的理论机会来理解个人如何参与增强业务可持续性的过程，从而为业务可持续性研究做出贡献。