(Re)Searching Sustainable Project Management

Sustainability is settling as one of the key values for our future. An eloborate understanding of sustainability identifies both 'planet', 'people' as 'profit' views to the concept.
As follow-up of the Project Management 2027 research Van Aetsveld and Utrecht University of Applied Sciences started an exploratory study into the concept of Sustainable Project Management. It is argued that projects add to the sustainability of organisations because they realise innovations, but there is more to it. Not all organisational changes can be considered sustainable and not all products or services produced with the results of projects add to sustainability.
Therefore we need to create a common understanding of the complex concept of Sustainable Project Management.

A first publication from this research, "Views on Sustainable Project Management", is published in "Human Side of Projects in Modern Business" by Kalle Kähkönen, Abdul Samad Kazi and Mirkka Rekola (Eds.), IPMA Scientific Research Paper Series.

We also contributed to the August 2009 special issue of the Dutch IPMA magazine Projectie, that was dedicated to the impact of sustainability on project management.