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Home » Methods » Sustainability

Sustainability

Include the whole project team
easy
1,5 hours
  • Digital whiteboard: Miro or Mural OR shared document (e.g., MS Teams)
  • Video conferencing: Zoom, Microsoft Teams etc.
Best Practices

Explanation of the method

  1. Build groups of 2-4 people depending on the size of your project team.
  2. In these groups, you now brainstorm on how you could exploit your project outcomes so that a sustainable project impact is created.
  3. Therefore, first note down the different outcomes you will achieve with your project and match them with the corresponding target groups.
  4. Then you can brainstorm suitable sustainability strategies that can be used to sustain the impact even after the project itself ends.
  5. Now think about the resources you would need for the realization of the sustainability strategies and assign responsibilities to them. Define metrics on how you intend to measure the success of the strategies and prioritise each idea.
  6. Get back in the group setting and discuss your ideas. Select the most suitable ones to be pursued and finalise the sustainability strategy in one table.
  7. Divide into the small groups again and brainstorm for possible challenges to the sustainability strategy that may occur. Identify ways how you could overcome them.
  8. Discuss the results with the whole group and finalise the ideas in one table.

Advantages

  1. Creates awareness for the impact the team wants to generate.
  2. Ensures that the project impact will remain relevant even after the project or funding ends.
  3. Creates commitment among project partners.

Disadvantages

  1. Static document that needs to be checked regularly to ensure that strategies are executed by the responsible parties.
  2.  Later changes in the project environment may not be considered once the strategy is set up.

Advice from practice

  1. Regularly align on the status of the sustainability measures and adapt if necessary.
  2. Make the strategy accessible for all relevant stakeholders.
  3. Create commitment to the realization of the sustainability measures.
Please note that the tools and methods were created as of August 2024 and all Miro Boards are editable.
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