Perspectives · PMO
What matters most to your organization?
It’s a deceptively simple question—until you realize how much is riding on the answer. Investors are asking it. Regulators are demanding it. And your communities are watching to see if your impact matches your intent.
That’s where dual materiality comes in.
If your business is only measuring what affects you—without accounting for what you affect—you’re only seeing half the landscape. And in a world where risk, trust, and transparency are converging fast, that’s a costly omission.
Dual materiality recognizes two distinct but interconnected lenses of significance:
Outside-In: These are ESG disclosures—external expectations, regulatory requirements, and risk-based reporting that address what is material to the business. This includes climate-related financial disclosures, supply chain disruptions, resource scarcity, and workforce dynamics—anything that may influence enterprise value or the long-term viability of the business.
Inside-Out: These are sustainability reports—voluntary, impact-focused narratives about what the business contributes to or affects in the world. These reports explore the organization’s environmental and social footprint, including emissions, biodiversity loss, labor equity, community displacement, and resource use.
The two together form the full picture. This is dual materiality. And it matters.
Why? Because external pressures may influence shareholder confidence, but internal impacts shape the organization’s long-term license to operate. Without an honest look at both sides of the coin, organizations risk being out of step with stakeholders—and out of alignment with their own values.
Dual materiality isn’t a theoretical shift. It is already codified in policy, particularly in the European Union’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), and it’s influencing frameworks well beyond Europe. Financial institutions, rating agencies, and insurers are rapidly adopting this mindset, moving the concept from the margins to the mainstream.
But here’s the critical point: materiality must come from across the business—not just from operations or compliance. And yet, that’s where most assessments begin and end.
Too often, organizations approach materiality like a one-time audit exercise. A consultant is brought in. A stakeholder survey is distributed. A few interviews are conducted. Topics are scored. A matrix is drawn up.
The result? A polished visual that often says more about perception than reality.
The problem isn’t the matrix itself—it’s the lack of depth behind it. If your materiality process doesn’t involve procurement, finance, human resources, product design, and especially project delivery, it’s missing the operational heartbeat of the organization.
Materiality must be experienced, not just analyzed. It must reflect how the organization behaves, not just what it declares.
It must become part of the business, not a footnote to it.
One of the most overlooked areas in materiality discussions is the project environment.
Every business is shaped by the projects it funds—new facilities, supply chain upgrades, IT transformations, community initiatives, capital expansion, policy rollouts. Every one of those projects carries risk. Every one carries impact. And every one is a potential source of material insight—if we’re paying attention.
Yet in many organizations, materiality doesn’t reach the project level. It’s confined to annual reports and ESG dashboards. That creates a disconnect between what the organization says is important and what it actually chooses to build, fund, or prioritize.
If dual materiality is to be meaningful, it must be integrated into the systems that turn strategy into reality. And that means rethinking how the Project Management Office (PMO) participates in defining and informing materiality.
Projects are not immune from materiality. They are often where materiality emerges.
Think of a new infrastructure build. If it bypasses community input, disrupts local ecosystems, or reinforces inequities—those impacts are inside-out materiality. If it’s designed without considering energy efficiency, future regulation, or changing climate norms—those risks are outside-in. Both are relevant. And both are visible at the project level long before they make it to a corporate risk register or sustainability report.
This is where PMOs become not just delivery engines—but strategic partners.
The PMO holds visibility across the portfolio. It sees patterns. It connects dots. It’s uniquely positioned to gather data, flag blind spots, and highlight emerging impacts from the front lines of implementation.
Here’s what organizations leading in this space are doing:
Embedding dual materiality considerations into project charters, procurement criteria, and performance indicators
Equipping project managers to identify and escalate potential material risks or opportunities
Feeding project-level data into enterprise-level ESG and sustainability assessments
Creating feedback loops where project insights inform strategic direction and stakeholder engagement
When materiality is embedded in how projects are scoped, designed, delivered, and reviewed, it becomes real. It moves from aspiration to practice.
The dual nature of materiality demands a shift—not just in what we measure, but in how we think.
Materiality isn’t something to report once a year. It’s something to live daily. It’s dynamic, relational, and context-dependent. What was immaterial yesterday may become critical tomorrow. Stakeholder expectations shift. External risks evolve. Internal impacts ripple outward in ways that spreadsheets can’t always capture.
That’s why dual materiality must be treated as a living system—something that is constantly refreshed through real engagement with the business, the environment, and society.
This requires organizations to do more than conduct assessments. It requires them to listen, to learn, and to lead.
Operationalizing dual materiality doesn’t require reinventing your business overnight. It requires honest integration. Start with the basics:
Define what is being asked of your business. These are your ESG disclosures—externally driven, risk-focused, and often regulated.
Clarify what your business chooses to share. These are your sustainability reports—internally motivated, values-based, and impact-focused.
Engage functions beyond sustainability and compliance. Bring in finance, procurement, HR, product, and the PMO. Each holds a key part of the materiality story.
Equip your project teams to see and track materiality—not as an add-on, but as a core consideration.
Treat materiality as strategic infrastructure, not a communications tool.
Dual materiality isn’t a reporting requirement. It’s a shift in how businesses understand their place in the world.
When you combine what affects your business with what your business affects, you don’t just get a better report. You get a better business.
A business that listens deeper. Acts smarter. And leads with integrity.
And in a future defined by complexity, interdependence, and accelerating change—that’s not a luxury. It’s a necessity.
Understanding dual materiality isn’t just a reporting upgrade—it’s a leadership mindset. One that sees beyond silos, moves beyond compliance, and starts building the systems we actually need.
If you’re ready to lead from that place—where strategy, sustainability, and integrity align—take the next step.
Enroll in our Professional Certificate in Regenerative Leadership to go beyond the checklist and learn how to embed purpose, resilience, and impact into every part of how you lead. This is where the shift begins.
Perspectives · Project Management
Every so often, someone drops a comment in a conversation that completely reframes the way you see something.
Recently, I was in a meeting when someone mentioned that the term “stakeholder” has roots tied to colonialism—and for a split second, the air in the room changed. It was like someone unplugged the matrix. I paused and thought, wait a minute, is that true?
Well, yes—and no. Like many terms in our professional lexicon, “stakeholder” has evolved over time. But its origins are worth examining. The word is believed to have originated from gambling—a person who holds a “stake” in a wager, someone who’s neutral. Yet it was also used during land claims in colonized territories—staking land as a declaration of ownership, often without the consent or inclusion of Indigenous populations. And here’s the thing—we can’t claim to champion sustainability, equity, and justice on one hand, and ignore how our language might perpetuate systems of exclusion on the other.
So, I ask a bold question:
Should we, as a global project management profession, move away from the term “stakeholders” altogether?
Words matter. They shape how we think, who we include, and how we approach projects. In the last decade, our industry has made great strides in shifting from simply delivering outputs to delivering outcomes that are sustainable and inclusive.
We’ve adopted ESG disclosures, integrated the SDGs, and many of us now apply tools like GPM’s (err PMI GPM's) P5 Standard or the PRiSM methodology to evaluate the social, environmental, and economic impacts of our work. But while we’re measuring carbon footprints and assessing community impact, we may be overlooking something foundational—the lens through which we view people.
If our language excludes, it undermines everything else we're trying to build.
“Stakeholder” may seem innocuous in the U.S., Europe, or Australia, but for many Indigenous communities, it’s a reminder of a time when land was claimed by driving stakes into the ground—often without consultation or consent. This is not ancient history—it’s a lived, ongoing experience.
When we roll out projects in post-colonial or Indigenous contexts, continuing to use this term can feel more extractive than collaborative. For project managers working globally, language that alienates even a small group of participants threatens the success of the entire initiative.
Let’s say you're launching a renewable energy project in a rural community in Latin America. Opening the community meeting with a slide that reads, “Stakeholder Engagement Plan,” can trigger suspicion. Replace it with “Community Partnerships” or “Collaborative Interests,” and the conversation shifts from top-down to side-by-side.
The term “stakeholder” is so broad it borders on meaningless.
It’s a catch-all that includes executives, team members, customers, end users, regulators, and local communities—and sometimes even the environment is personified as a stakeholder. That might work in abstract models, but it dilutes real engagement.
Wouldn’t it be more effective to replace it with clearer, contextual terms? For example:
Precision helps teams prioritize and communicate more effectively. Isn’t that what project management is about?
If we’ve learned anything from sustainable project management, it’s that process is as important as product. The way we engage people—the language we use, the assumptions we make—shapes the outcome.
Our mission at GPM has always been to embed regenerative thinking into every phase of the project lifecycle. That means moving beyond compliance, beyond "do no harm," into models that heal, uplift, and restore. That applies not only to ecosystems, but to systems of power too.
If we’re calling on organizations to rethink their approach to procurement, hiring, energy, and equity—why wouldn’t we question our vocabulary too?
Now, I know what some of you are thinking:
And I hear you. “Stakeholder” is deeply embedded in the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK), ISO standards, and corporate governance. It’s in our charters, our risk registers, our communication plans. Heck, it’s in our job descriptions.
Changing it could:
And here’s the kicker—there isn’t a universally agreed-upon alternative yet. “Interested parties” works in some contexts, but falls flat in others. “Rights-holders” might apply in human rights-based projects, but not in enterprise IT implementations. So the debate is real.
Plus, if we start questioning every term with historical baggage, where does it end? Should we stop using “milestones” because they stem from colonial roads? Should we avoid “command and control” because of its military roots? This is a slippery slope, right?
Or is it an evolution?
This isn’t just a project management dilemma. Other fields are re-evaluating legacy terms too:
The shift isn’t about being politically correct. It’s about being professionally current.
Maybe we don’t need to cancel “stakeholder” tomorrow. But what if we:
I’m not here to wag a finger. I’ve used the term “stakeholders” in more projects, slide decks, white papers, and workshops than I can count. But I’m also open to evolving. That’s part of being in a profession that claims to be future-ready.
So I’ll leave you with this:
Are we bold enough to rethink how we engage with people?
Could our language be part of the solution—or part of the problem?
Has the word evolved over the years so this is all moot?
Perspectives · Regeneration
The way businesses operate has always followed an unspoken framework—one that dictates how they engage with markets, resources, and people. Whether they realize it or not, organizations function within three distinct paradigms: Ego, Eco, and Seva. The question is, which one will define the next era of business?
Ego-thinking is what built the modern economy. It’s the "me-first" model, where success is defined by how much you can extract, control, and grow—without factoring in the long-term consequences. From the industrial revolution through the late 20th century, the business playbook was simple: maximize output, minimize cost, externalize the damage.
And let’s be honest—Ego-thinking worked, at least in the short term. It built industries, created wealth, and scaled businesses at an unprecedented rate. But it also left behind a legacy of pollution, resource depletion, financial crashes, and systemic inequality. Every major crisis we face today—climate instability, social unrest, supply chain fragility—is not a failure of the system. It’s the inevitable outcome of Ego-driven business.
As the costs of Ego-thinking became impossible to ignore, businesses shifted to Eco-thinking—the era of corporate responsibility, ESG metrics, and sustainability initiatives.
Eco-thinking is still about business success, but it introduces risk management, reputation protection, and regulatory compliance into the equation. It’s why companies started adopting carbon reduction targets, circular economy models, and ethical supply chains—not necessarily out of altruism, but because investors, consumers, and governments demanded it.
This shift was important. It helped bring sustainability into the mainstream. But here’s the uncomfortable truth: Eco-thinking is still reactive.
And despite 30+ years of sustainability efforts, climate indicators are still getting worse, biodiversity is still declining, and global supply chains are still vulnerable. The Eco phase has plateaued.
Seva isn’t just a philosophical idea—it’s a business strategy.
In Sanskrit, Seva means “selfless service.” In business, it means flipping the script from minimizing harm to actively creating value—for customers, employees, communities, and the planet.
This isn’t about "doing good for the sake of it." Seva is about winning in the long game. Companies that embrace this mindset are more resilient, more profitable, and better positioned for the future. Here’s why:
Seva creates competitive advantage.
Seva builds loyalty and attracts investment.
Seva drives innovation.
Seva makes businesses future-proof.
Some will read this and think, “Sounds nice, but capitalism doesn’t work like that.” But that thinking is outdated.
The businesses that will dominate the next decade are not the ones playing defense—they’re the ones leaning in. Seva-thinking companies will define the next economy because they understand something fundamental:
You don’t win by extracting the last bit of value from a dying system. You win by designing a system that thrives indefinitely.
This shift isn’t hypothetical—it’s happening now. The only question is: Will you lead it or fall behind?
Perspectives · Project Management
In the last month alone, I’ve been on multiple panels, podcasts, and interviews. Each time, I’m asked variations of the same question:
"Is sustainability really cost-effective?"
It’s the classic argument. People hear “sustainable project” and immediately assume “expensive project.” That perception comes from years of bad implementation—where sustainability was an afterthought, bolted onto a project instead of built in from the start.
But here’s the reality: sustainability is not inherently more expensive. Bad project management is.
A project manager who integrates sustainability properly—at the right phase, with the right approach—can cut costs, increase efficiency, and mitigate risk. The trick is knowing when and how to do it.
Let’s say you’ve just been handed a project charter. You’re responsible for delivering on time and on budget, and now you need to figure out how sustainability fits in without derailing the whole thing. Here’s what you do.
The first thing you do when you get a project charter is figure out where you actually have control.
Is the budget already set in stone? Have contracts with vendors been signed? Are the designs final? If the answer is yes, then your options are limited. But if procurement, planning, and scoping are still open, you have opportunities to build in sustainability without adding costs.
Many project managers assume they have to fight for sustainability as an “extra” deliverable. That’s the wrong approach. Look at what the project already requires, and integrate sustainability into those areas:
The key here isn’t to add sustainability to the project—it’s to use sustainability as a tool to achieve what the project already needs to do.
If you only take one thing from this, make it this: Sustainability is not a design decision. It’s a procurement decision.
By the time a project is being executed, 80% of costs have already been locked in through procurement. If sustainability isn’t part of that conversation, you’ve already lost your biggest opportunity to cut costs and improve outcomes.
Here’s what to do:
Push for lifecycle costing. Vendors love to pitch the cheapest upfront option. But what about maintenance costs? What about replacement frequency? Sustainable materials and systems often have lower lifecycle costs because they last longer and require less upkeep.
Look for efficiency over “green” labels. Forget flashy marketing. Ask vendors: Can this reduce energy costs? Does it create less waste? Can it be delivered in a way that lowers logistics costs? Those are sustainability factors that also happen to save money.
Negotiate contract flexibility. If your suppliers can’t meet sustainability goals now, structure your contracts so they have incentives (or penalties) to meet them later. Give them room to adapt rather than locking yourself into a bad deal.
Many project managers treat procurement like a check-the-box process. Instead, think of it as your best opportunity to make sustainability work for the project without blowing the budget.
Sustainability doesn’t have to mean solar panels and recycled materials. Sometimes, it just means not being wasteful.
The amount of money that gets thrown away in projects due to inefficiency is staggering. This is where sustainability and cost-cutting go hand in hand:
A project manager doesn’t have to “sell” sustainability to leadership if they can show that it directly reduces waste and cost overruns.
One of the biggest reasons sustainability feels expensive is that it’s often brought in too late in the process. This is the “retrofit trap.”
If sustainability measures get added after designs are finalized, contracts are signed, and budgets are allocated, they almost always increase costs. That’s because now you’re making changes that weren’t planned for, rather than building them into the scope from the beginning.
A great example of this is energy efficiency in construction. Retrofitting a building to be more energy efficient is expensive. But if efficiency is included in the initial design, it actually lowers long-term costs. The same applies to sourcing, logistics, and material choices.
So if sustainability measures feel like a financial burden, ask: Did we try to add them too late? If the answer is yes, then the problem isn’t sustainability—the problem is bad timing.
Project sponsors don’t care about sustainability for sustainability’s sake. They care about budgets, risks, and business goals. If you want to integrate sustainability, you have to speak their language.
Instead of saying, "This will reduce carbon emissions," say: "This will lower long-term operating costs by 20%."
Instead of saying, "This reduces waste," say: "This saves us $500,000 in excess material costs."
Instead of saying, "This improves environmental impact," say: "This reduces our risk of regulatory fines and compliance costs."
When sustainability is framed in financial terms, it stops being a “nice-to-have” and starts being a business advantage.
The myth that sustainability is expensive comes from bad implementation, poor timing, and weak planning. In reality, sustainable project management is just good project management. If you’re a project manager handed a new charter and trying to figure out how to make sustainability work without breaking the budget, remember this:
Sustainability isn’t an extra cost. It’s a competitive advantage—but only if you know how to use it.
And if anyone still asks you whether sustainability is cost-effective, tell them this:
"It’s not sustainability that’s expensive. It’s inefficiency."
Perspectives · COP30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYtmc2JPIfM
Perspectives · Leadership
The world feels like it’s on a knife’s edge. Wars rage. Global markets swing unpredictably. Political leaders stoke division instead of solving problems. Democracies, once seen as stable, now teeter as strongmen and populists rewrite the rules to serve themselves. Trust in institutions—governments, corporations, even the media—has plummeted, and for good reason.
Too many so-called leaders have abandoned integrity for power. They lie, manipulate, and deceive—because they can. Because they know that accountability is now little more than a PR exercise. We have watched, time and again, as those in charge make reckless decisions, dodge responsibility, and cash out, leaving chaos in their wake.
This is a crisis of leadership. And it’s playing out in real time.
We know what happens when leaders put self-preservation over service. When power becomes a game rather than a responsibility. When those in charge refuse to act until they’re forced to.
But here’s the real question: Who is going to fix it?
Who is willing to lead—not for personal gain, but because the world needs leaders with integrity, courage, and vision?
The good news? There’s a framework for leadership that actually works.
At GPM, we define ethical leadership as more than just personal integrity. It’s about inspiring and guiding organizations toward a sustainable future. It means:
So, what does this look like in action?
Despite all the failures, there are leaders proving that integrity, transparency, and long-term thinking lead to real success.
They aren’t just making promises. They are exhibiting the core elements of ethical leadership:
You don’t have to be a CEO to lead with integrity. Every decision you make—no matter your position—shapes the world around you.
Ask yourself:
If the answer is no, it’s time to change that.
This isn’t about trends or reputation management. It’s about survival.
The companies and leaders who embrace ethical leadership will define the future. The ones who don’t? They’ll be left behind.
So, what kind of leader will you be?
Because the future isn’t waiting. It’s being built and as Sammy Haggar famously said "right now–it's your tomorrow".
Perspectives · Project Management
Sustainability in project management isn’t just a buzzword—it’s a necessity. I say this a lot. Organizations are making commitments to sustainability, but if those commitments don’t translate into actual project decisions, they don’t mean much. That’s why we’ve added Sustainability Impact Thresholds to the latest version of our Sustainability Management Plan (SMP) Template (v3.0), which is available as a free download here! Projects need clear guardrails to ensure they stay on the right side of what the organization has set limits for, and this update takes that into account.
For too long, project sustainability has been treated as a vague concept—something we hope happens rather than something we actively manage. The reality is, without clear boundaries and accountability, sustainability goals are just words on a slide deck. We wanted to change that. By introducing Sustainability Impact Thresholds, we’re giving project teams clear sustainability guardrails—real, measurable limits that ensure projects align with sustainability goals before they go off the rails.
Put simply, Sustainability Impact Thresholds define the line between what is acceptable and what is not when it comes to sustainability impacts. They ensure project teams take into account the thresholds that organizations proactively set on key environmental, social, and economic factors.
Think about it like this:
Without thresholds, sustainability efforts are reactive at best. With them, they become integrated into decision-making from the start.
Sustainability impacts aren’t some abstract concept we "hope" projects "take into account." They have to be defined, planned, monitored, and managed just like cost, schedule, and scope.
Every year, organizations publish sustainability reports full of commitments to net zero, diversity and inclusion, and ethical sourcing. Yet when you look at individual projects, many of them fail to align with those commitments.
I roll my eyes when I see papers and books just toss around the word “sustainability” and not go any deeper than that. It’s happening more and more. Not with us. We get as granular as you can, and then some.
Why? Because sustainability is often an afterthought—something reported on, rather than something controlled at the project level.
By embedding Sustainability Impact Thresholds in project planning, we:
We’re not just making this up—global sustainability standards already push for impact thresholds. The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), one of the most widely used sustainability reporting frameworks, stresses that organizations should not only measure sustainability impacts but actively manage them within defined boundaries.
GRI standards like GRI 103 (Management Approach) and GRI 306 (Waste) emphasize that organizations need to set clear materiality-based thresholds—basically, limits that define when an impact becomes too severe to ignore. We took that same logic and brought it into project management, because if sustainability matters at the corporate level, it should matter at the project level, too.
At GPM, we’ve spent years helping organizations integrate sustainability into project management. And I have to say—I enjoy seeing academic models about sustainable project management that completely disregard how organizations actually operate. Most of what’s out there is based on citations of I-don’t-know-what, written in a vacuum with no real connection to the reality of delivering projects in corporate environments.
What we’re giving you isn’t theory. It’s built on years of working directly with corporations that are accountable for results. We know that sustainability efforts fall apart when they aren’t embedded into real decision-making processes. That’s why it is important to take these into account—to ensure that sustainability isn’t just a report at the end of the project, but a hardwired part of how projects are planned, executed, and measured.
Without clear thresholds, sustainability gets lost in the noise of budgets, deadlines, and competing priorities.
So, we made sure that our SMP v3.0 included guidance on:This isn’t just an update to our SMP template—it’s a shift in how sustainability should be approached in project management.
Think about it. We don’t leave cost or schedule up to interpretation—so why do we do that with sustainability? If a project is over budget, we act. If a project is delayed, we act. But if a project is exceeding safe carbon emissions or contributing to supply chain exploitation, organizations often say, “We’ll report on that later.”
That has to change. And with Sustainability Impact Thresholds, we’re making sure it does.
If you’re serious about integrating sustainability into your projects, you don’t have to start from scratch. Download our Sustainability Management Plan Template (v3.0) for free on the P5 page at gpm.org.
Perspectives · Project Management
I grew up in the 80s. Back then, at least for an American kid, one of the coolest things you could own was a Hard Rock Café “Save the Planet” T-shirt—except maybe a Members Only jacket and Jordache jeans.
But this article isn’t about fashion or the Hard Rock. It’s about that phrase on the shirt: Save the Planet.
Here’s the truth—the planet doesn’t need saving. It has survived asteroid impacts, ice ages, and mass extinctions. It will continue to exist, long after we’re gone.
The real issue isn’t whether Earth will endure; it’s whether we will.
For decades, we’ve used the word sustainability to define our environmental goals. Reduce emissions. Cut waste. Conserve resources. But what if sustainability isn’t something we can just do?
What if sustainability is something we can only achieve once we fix what we’ve broken?
Sustainability, as we’ve been practicing it, is about minimizing damage—reducing our footprint, using fewer resources, polluting a little less. But when you think about it, sustainability should mean something entirely different.
To sustain something means to keep it going. But how do you sustain a world that’s already been damaged? You can’t sustain a forest that’s been cut down. You can’t sustain an ocean choked with plastic. You can’t sustain a society plagued by inequality and environmental collapse.
You can only regenerate.
Sustainability assumes balance, but we’re already off balance. Before we can sustain anything, we need to repair, restore, and rebuild.
Imagine you’re drowning in financial debt. If all you do is cut spending, you might slow the damage, but you’ll never truly get ahead. You need to generate new income, pay off the debt, and build long-term wealth.
The same logic applies here. We’ve overdrawn on our ecological and social accounts. Simply sustaining what’s left won’t cut it.
We need to regenerate first. Then we can sustain.
Regenerative sustainability means designing systems that don’t just avoid depletion but actively restore and enhance the world around them. It means projects, businesses, and economies that leave places and people better than they were before.
Simply put it is "The practice of restoring, renewing, and revitalizing natural, social, and economic systems to create conditions where life can thrive indefinitely." It goes beyond minimizing harm by actively replenishing resources, strengthening ecosystems, and enhancing the well-being of communities.This isn’t just a theory—it’s completely achievable. But to make it real, we need a new approach to how we plan, execute, and measure success.
PRiSM: The Project Method for Regenerative SustainabilityIf we want regeneration to be more than a buzzword, we need a way to ensure that projects actively improve the world around them. That’s where PRiSM (Projects integrating Sustainable Methods) comes in.
Most project management frameworks focus on time, cost, and quality—delivering a product or service efficiently. But efficiency alone isn’t enough if the result is a net-negative impact on society or the environment.
PRiSM is different. It embeds regenerative sustainability into every phase of a project by using the P5 Standard—a set of five impact areas that redefine what success looks like:
Instead of asking, How can we do less harm? PRiSM asks, How can this project create net-positive impacts?
Let’s take an example from the energy sector:
Or look at urban development:
This is the difference between sustainability as a constraint and regeneration as an opportunity.
For too long, we’ve been told that sustainability is the goal—the ultimate achievement of responsible development. But sustainability isn’t the destination—it’s the result of doing the right things first.
If a system is already broken, you can’t sustain it. You don’t sustain a failing economy; you rebuild it. You don’t sustain a polluted river; you restore it. You don’t sustain an ecosystem in collapse; you regenerate it.
Sustainability only becomes possible once we’ve repaired the damage.
This is why regenerative sustainability is more than just an environmental concept—it’s a fundamental shift in how we build, develop, and manage projects. Whether it’s infrastructure, energy, urban development, or industry, we can no longer afford to measure success by traditional metrics of cost, time, and efficiency alone.
Regenerative sustainability forces us to ask:
These aren’t theoretical questions. They define whether the future we are building will last.
That’s where PRiSM (Projects integrating Sustainable Methods) comes in. It provides the structure to move beyond sustainability as a concept and turn regeneration into a measurable, actionable outcome.
For the last century, progress has been measured in economic growth, industrial expansion, and technological advancement—often at the expense of environmental and social stability. Now, we have the knowledge, technology, and frameworks to redefine what progress means.
In a regenerative future:
We don’t need to scale back our ambitions—we need to aim higher.
This isn’t a radical idea. It’s an inevitable shift. Companies, governments, and industries that embrace regenerative sustainability will outperform, outlast, and out-innovate those still clinging to outdated sustainability models.
Because here’s the truth:
We don’t need to “save the planet.” We need to redefine our role within it—not as consumers of resources, but as stewards of regeneration.
That means changing how we think about success, not just in sustainability efforts, but in every project, every investment, and every innovation we pursue.
Regenerative sustainability isn’t a niche concept—it’s the foundation for a livable future.
The real work isn’t in sustaining what’s left. It’s in reversing the damage, rebuilding stronger systems, and setting a new standard for progress.
Let's do big things!
Perspectives · By Dr. Michael Young
Project portfolio management is entering its next evolutionary phase. Sustainability has provided the governing logic for more than a decade. Regenerative design is what comes after it — and the organizations that recognize this distinction now are the ones that will be positioned to act on it before it becomes a compliance requirement.
If you follow this blog, this argument won't come as a surprise. Regeneration has been a consistent theme here for good reason. For years, sustainability has been the guiding principle in project portfolio management — reducing harm, improving efficiency, ensuring compliance. That framing has value, but it describes a floor, not a ceiling. The pressure is mounting for something more demanding: investors want clearer ESG commitments, communities are requiring accountability, and regulatory frameworks are tightening across jurisdictions. Organizations that continue treating sustainability as a checkbox will find themselves behind those that have already embedded regeneration into how they select, govern, and evaluate projects.
Regenerative design in PPM does not simply mean doing less harm. It means structuring portfolios so that projects actively restore ecosystems, strengthen communities, and generate value that compounds over time rather than being extracted once. This requires rethinking how value is defined, how risk is assessed, and how investments are prioritized at the portfolio level. The following eight areas show where this shift is already happening.
Aligning project portfolios with sustainability goals is now a baseline expectation, not a differentiator. Organizations are evaluated on their ESG performance by investors, regulators, and clients. Regenerative design pushes this further, shifting the question from "does this project reduce harm?" to "does this project contribute positively to ecosystems, economies, and communities?" Answering that question requires robust frameworks — tools like the PMI-GPM P5™ Standard, which assesses projects across People, Planet, Prosperity, Processes, and Products, enable organizations to evaluate portfolio impact holistically rather than through a single financial lens.
Nature-based solutions leverage natural processes to address environmental and operational challenges. Their applications extend well beyond urban development — from manufacturing to healthcare, these approaches reduce environmental impact while delivering measurable operational and social benefits. For project portfolios, incorporating nature-based solutions creates alignment between ecological restoration and operational value: lower resource costs, improved resilience against climate disruption, and stronger social license to operate.
Traditional project selection methods prioritize financial metrics, leaving limited room for environmental and social considerations. Regenerative PPM requires multi-criteria frameworks that evaluate projects on economic viability, environmental contribution, and social outcomes simultaneously. This is not about trading off financial performance — it is about recognizing that long-term financial performance is itself dependent on ecosystem stability and social license. The analytical tools exist; the governance structures to support complex portfolio evaluations are the harder change.
One of the more consequential features of regenerative design is its time horizon. Traditional project evaluation concentrates on immediate returns. Regenerative initiatives consider impacts across decades, sometimes longer. In industries where resource depletion or ecological degradation is a material risk, this longer horizon is not idealism — it is a more accurate accounting of the conditions under which future projects will have to operate. Investors, consumers, and regulators are increasingly requiring this kind of transparency.
The transition to regenerative PPM places different demands on leadership than sustainability did. The governance structures, stakeholder relationships, and decision frameworks required are more complex. Leaders managing this transition need to be capable of holding multiple value dimensions simultaneously, communicating tradeoffs clearly, and making the case for investment horizons that extend beyond the typical reporting cycle. In sectors undergoing rapid transformation — technology, logistics, energy — this kind of leadership is the rate-limiting factor in adoption.
Regulatory frameworks including ISSB disclosures and the EU CSRD are compelling organizations to integrate regenerative principles into their reporting and, by extension, their portfolio decisions. This is often framed as a burden, but the organizations doing this well have found that compliance requirements create design constraints that produce better solutions — not just more compliant ones. The discipline of accounting for environmental and social impact forces a more rigorous analysis of what a project actually does.
Implementing regenerative design at the portfolio level requires overcoming two recurring obstacles: aligning existing governance frameworks with regenerative criteria, and managing the perception that these approaches cost more. Both are real. Neither is insurmountable. Cross-sector collaboration — between project managers, ecologists, communities, and supply chain partners — has consistently produced more durable solutions than any single organization working alone. The cost question resolves differently when the time horizon extends far enough to capture the full value of restored ecosystems and avoided degradation.
Adopting regenerative principles in portfolio management produces a competitive position that is difficult to replicate through compliance alone. Organizations operating at this level attract employees, investors, and clients who understand that long-term value requires long-term thinking — and that the organizations demonstrating this through verified action rather than stated intent are the ones worth working with. The brand effect is real, but it is downstream of the operational change, not a substitute for it.
Regenerative design is restructuring project portfolio management across sectors. The eight areas above share a common underlying logic: projects that actively restore the conditions they depend on — ecological, social, economic — produce more durable outcomes than projects optimized only for near-term returns. The organizations recognizing this are not waiting for it to become a compliance requirement. They are building it into how portfolios are designed, evaluated, and governed before the regulatory floor arrives.
The shift from sustainability to regeneration in PPM is not a values question. It is a structural one. The question for practitioners is where in the portfolio governance cycle to start.
About the Author
Dr. Michael Young is a serial entrepreneur with more than 25 years of experience in portfolio, program, and project management across government, defense, engineering, information technology, and logistics. He was awarded the Order of Australia in recognition of his contributions to the profession. He is a co-author of the PMI-GPM Practice Guide for Sustainability in Project Management and has contributed to ISO standards, IPMA’s ICB4, and the IPMA Research Board.
Perspectives · Climate Change
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