For any company, no matter what size or sector it may be, a more sustainable operation is rising higher and higher on the agenda. Moreover, there is no escaping it as governments set and pursue increasingly ambitious goals, but that should not be the only reason to jump on the sustainable train. Another important driver for companies is that sustainable business also leads to better results in the long run. Despite the fact that few CEOs have yet to be convinced, it is still a big leap and an exciting challenge to link a concrete action plan to the company’s sustainability policy.

We hear you thinking “if only there were an accessible and low-threshold tool for that to get businesses going …” Good news! Such a tool does exist and in this article we will tell you all about it!

Tool to the rescue

Hans Verboven, professor of corporate social responsibility and business ethics at one of our partners, namely Antwerp University, developed the Sustatool in collaboration with the Flemish Knowledge Center for Sustainable Entrepreneurship. By using this tool, companies can simply translate the UN’s SDGs (colloquially, the sustainability goals) into concrete action points a measurable actions.

The tool ideally envisages a management process consisting of 5 phases, which should initiate a circular process of improvement. These include the phases: analyze, provide direction, concretize, implement and report. One of the major advantages is that the Susta tool allows you to work on individual themes. Thus, as a company, you are not obliged to tackle all the challenges at once. We are ambitious but not overconfident, right?

Step by step to a sustainable policy

So when you get started with the sustatool, you make concrete work of your sustainability policy. As mentioned earlier, you will be guided through 5 steps to achieve your predetermined ambitions. In each step, a concrete tool and working method is explained. In addition, you can also follow free workshops that give you the necessary interpretation. In the first step, you “analyze” what you are already doing. Then you indicate the direction you want your company to take and what you want to focus on. You concretize your ambitions by selecting actions from a provided options list. Later you link objectives, project planning and indicators to the various actions. Finally, you check and report whether the objectives have been achieved. In this phase, the tool provides you with an overview of your progress.

Key to success

A key factor to ensure success is building a good Sustatool team within your organization. It is recommended that you choose ambassadors from every level of your company. That way, the Sustatool is more likely to penetrate every department of your company.

Do you want to give your company a push in the area of sustainability policy, but are still looking for a user-friendly process and a concrete guideline on which to base yourself? Then the Sustatool is definitely a must for working in a systematic and practical no-nonsense way.

All information about this tool can be found at https://www.mvovlaanderen.be/sustatool/algemeen.