What it is
The bridge between what a project does and what an organization promised
Every organization with a sustainability commitment has the same gap: the commitment is made at the top, and the work that keeps or breaks it happens inside projects, where it is rarely written down as a requirement. The Sustainability Management Plan (SMP) closes that gap. It is the one document on a project that records what the project's impacts are, what the project has committed to do about each material one, who owns each commitment, how it is monitored and verified, and what the outcome was.
The PMI GPM Practice Guide for Sustainability in Project Management describes it in one paragraph. The SMP, introduced by GPM in 2009, is the bridge between project activities and sustainability commitments. It is a living document that evolves with the project. It consolidates impacts, commitments, monitoring, verification and outcomes. By project end, it becomes the single source of truth for disclosures. And it is a governance instrument: the mechanism by which sustainability considerations are brought into the decisions sponsors already own. The sponsor is named in it, and the thresholds in it are decision triggers.
Three things follow from that description. The plan is written early, at Pre-Project, so that it can change the design rather than describe it. It is kept current, with one section added in each of PRiSM's six phases. And it is a decision document, on the table at every gate beside the schedule and the budget, rather than an appendix read at closure.
Origin
A plan on one project in 2008, a published method by 2013
The plan came before the organization. In 2008 Joel Carboni wrote a Project Sustainability Management Plan and used it on a live project. He has written the story of that first plan. In May 2009 he founded GPM as a think tank of practitioners around two things: the P5 framework for identifying project impact, and the Sustainability Management Plan toolkit for governing it.
The plan was published in May 2013 in The GPM Reference Guide for Sustainability in Project Management, first edition, with the template released as a free download at the same time. A 2017 article in the Journal of Cleaner Production cites GPM as the developer of the Sustainability Management Plan, and a 2021 ProjMAN conference paper cites GPM as its developer within PRiSM. The current template, Version 4.0, was published in April 2026 with the Practice Guide, Fourth Edition, by the PMI GPM joint venture, and is also distributed by PMI. The dated record is on the Provenance page.
The six sections
One section per phase, each with a purpose and a reporting hook
The plan grows in step with the project. Each PRiSM phase adds one section, so at any moment the plan is the current statement of what the project has found, promised and delivered. The table shows the six sections, the phase that produces each, what it holds, and the disclosure it supplies evidence for.
| Section | Phase | What it holds | Reporting hook |
|---|---|---|---|
| Preliminary impact screening | Pre-Project | An early scan of sustainability risks and opportunities before approval, with the early P5 impacts noted (high water use, potential displacement, emissions hotspots). | The first evidence base for GRI 3-1, the process for determining material topics |
| Impact register and materiality matrix | Discovery | The project's full sustainability inventory from the P5 Impact Analysis, then filtered by the materiality test: stakeholder significance against financial relevance, with high on both making a material topic. | GRI 3-1 and 3-2 |
| Material topics management table | Design | For each material topic: the policies and standards referenced, the actions to be taken, SMART targets and KPIs, responsible parties and resources, and monitoring methods. The Practice Guide calls this the point where sustainability stops being abstract and becomes operational. | GRI 3-3, management of material topics |
| Implementation and monitoring | Delivery | Progress against each material topic, integrating data from progress reports, safety logs, procurement records and stakeholder updates. The second P5 Impact Analysis is recorded here. | Evidence of how commitments are implemented and monitored, GRI 3-3 |
| Verification checklist | Closure | Each material topic confirmed against its commitment, with evidence attached: certificates, reports, regulatory approvals, community validation. The organizational materiality report is produced from it. | Accountability at project close, GRI 3-3 |
| Benefits tracker | Post-Project | Baseline, target and actual outcomes compared six to twelve months after delivery, with stakeholder validation through surveys, audits or assurance. | Data for disclosures such as GRI 201, 305 and 413 |
How to write one
From the first screening to the benefits review
Open it before approval. At Pre-Project, screen the project against the P5 elements it is likely to touch and note the obvious hotspots. Put the first sustainability impact thresholds into the business case draft, agreed with the sponsor, so that the gate that authorizes Discovery already knows what would bring the project back for a decision.
Fill the register at Discovery. Run the P5 Impact Analysis on the candidate solution and on the process that will deliver it. Log each distinct impact with its lens, cause, potential effect and a 1 to 5 score against the baseline. Apply the materiality test and record the matrix. Impacts above threshold are accepted, mitigated or cause the option to be dropped at the Discovery gate.
Turn impacts into commitments at Design. For every material topic, write the commitment as a SMART target with an owner, the resources it needs, the monitoring method and the verification method. Carry the commitments into procurement criteria, supplier requirements and acceptance criteria so that they bind the people who will do the work. Nothing proceeds to Delivery without an owner for each commitment.
Record evidence through Delivery. Log monitoring results as they arrive and re-perform the P5 Impact Analysis on the solution as built, because suppliers, sites and designs have become concrete. Any change that moves an impact across a threshold goes back to the sponsor; the Practice Guide is direct about this: a threshold breach is a trigger for a decision.
Verify at Closure. Confirm each commitment against its evidence, attach the evidence, and produce the organizational materiality report so the project's impacts flow into the organization's sustainability reporting. Agree the benefits realization schedule with operations or the PMO before the team is released.
Close it after the benefits review. Six to twelve months after delivery, compare baseline, target and actual, validate with stakeholders, and record the result. A shortfall with an owner is a lesson for the next business case; a confirmed benefit is the organization's evidence that the commitment was kept.
Who owns it
The sponsor decides, the project manager maintains, the organization reports
The plan names the sponsor because the sponsor owns the decisions it triggers. The PMI GPM Guide to Responsible Project Sponsorship sets out seven accountabilities for that role, and the plan is where several of them become concrete: the tolerances and thresholds in the mandate, the trade-offs weighed at each gate, the escalation point when a threshold is crossed, and the value protected after delivery. The guide's own phrase applies: crossing a sustainability threshold should trigger governance escalation in the same manner as exceeding financial tolerances.
The project manager owns the analysis, the plan and the evidence, and brings them to every gate. Because the plan uses the same 52 elements and the same 1 to 5 scale on every project, program and portfolio views can aggregate impacts, thresholds and benefits across projects without translation, which is how the PSM3 maturity assessment reads an organization's practice.
The organization reports. The Project Sustainability Reporting Guide structures the plan's artifacts so they can be integrated into organizational sustainability reports and disclosures under GRI, ISSB, TCFD, CSRD, the EU Taxonomy and the SDGs, and it adds the context-based test, S = A ÷ N, that measures an impact against a carrying-capacity threshold rather than against last year. Each report declares its maturity: Incremental, Context-Based or Regenerative.
In the ecosystem
Where it sits among GPM's publications
The interactive ecosystem map shows the plan as the interchange of the whole system: every PRiSM phase drops an artifact onto it, the impact line terminates at it, and the reporting line carries its evidence across the disclosure boundary to the organization. Choose a station below to light it up on the map.
The planPreliminary screeningImpact registerMaterial topics tableImplementation and monitoringVerification checklistBenefits trackerThreshold breachThe reporting line
Click a line to follow one publication; click any station for its definition. The full-size map is on the ecosystem page.
Common misreadings
Where plans fail
Written after the design is fixed. A plan that arrives at Delivery cannot change the design. The first section is written before approval for that reason.
Treated as an appendix. If the plan is filed with the project documents and never appears at a gate, it is a report, and the method is not in use.
Commitments without owners. A target with no named person and no resources is a wish. The material topics table exists to attach both.
Thresholds without consequences. A threshold that produces a note rather than a sponsor decision has no governance value. The Practice Guide makes them binding triggers.
One analysis. The register from Discovery describes a solution that no longer exists by Delivery. The plan records both analyses so that the change itself is evidence.
Closed at Closure. The plan closes after the benefits review, when the organization knows whether the business case was true. Leaving that section blank is how sustainability claims go unverified.
Template and tools
Everything needed is free
Template
Sustainability Management Plan, Version 4.0
Word. The six sections with guidance, published with the Practice Guide, Fourth Edition. Also available at PMI.org.
Analysis
P5 Impact Analysis workbook, Version 8.0
Excel. Every element listed, the 1 to 5 scale, materiality fields and the cap-at-worst roll-up that feeds the register.
Standard
The P5 Standard, Version 4.0
The 52 elements, two perspectives and five lenses the plan measures against. Free.
Guide
The Practice Guide, Fourth Edition
The full method: PRiSM's phases, the plan's sections, governance, benefits management and the standards the method supports. 209 pages, free.
Online
The P5 Impact Analysis tool
GPM Ambassadors run the analysis online from their dashboard and export the register into the plan.
Learn
The CSPP at PMI
The exam-based certification that teaches the analysis, the plan and the method, delivered through the Project Management Institute.
Questions
Frequently asked
What is a Sustainability Management Plan?
A single document, kept through the whole project, that records the P5 Impact Analysis, the commitments and targets agreed for each material impact, who owns each one, how it is monitored and verified, and the outcomes. In the Practice Guide's words, it is the bridge between project activities and sustainability commitments, and by project end it is the single source of truth for disclosures.
Who invented it?
Joel Carboni, founder of GPM, wrote the first Project Sustainability Management Plan in 2008 and used it on a live project. GPM was founded in 2009 around the plan and the P5 framework, published the plan in its first reference guide in May 2013 with the template as a free download, and academic literature since 2017 cites GPM as its developer.
Who owns the plan on a project?
The project manager maintains it and brings it to every gate. The sponsor is named in it and owns the decisions its thresholds trigger: authorize, continue, change or stop. At Closure the PMO or operations inherits the benefits tracker.
How is it different from a sustainability report?
A report describes what an organization did, after the fact, at the organizational level. The plan decides what a project will do, while the decision is still open, and then collects the evidence that it did it. Organizations report; projects supply the verified evidence, and the plan is where that evidence lives.
Does it work with agile delivery?
Yes. In sprint-based delivery the plan is updated incrementally each sprint, impacts are reviewed at sprint review, and thresholds are checked before each release. The six sections stay the same; the cadence changes.
Is there a template?
Yes, free. The Sustainability Management Plan template, Version 4.0, is a Word document published with the Practice Guide, Fourth Edition, and is also available at PMI.org. The P5 Impact Analysis workbook that feeds it is free as well.
What are impact thresholds?
Levels agreed in the business case for specific impacts, beyond which the project must return to the sponsor for a decision. The Practice Guide is explicit that they are decision triggers rather than performance targets, escalated in the same way as a breach of financial tolerance.
Author
Dr. Joel Carboni is the founder and president of GPM and the architect of the standards, methods, and certifications behind Sustainable Project Management®, delivered through the PMI-GPM joint venture. He created the P5 Standard, the Sustainability Competence Standard, the Sustainable Project Management® Practice Guide, the Project Sustainability Reporting Guide and the PMI GPM Guide to Responsible Project Sponsorship. For over 30 years, his work has moved the profession in a different direction. A Forbes Business Council member and Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) contributor, he was shortlisted for Thinkers50's inaugural regenerative business award in 2025 for his book Becoming Regenerative.
Published 5 September 2026. Corrections through the contact page.
P5™, PRiSM™, GPM®, Green Project Management® and Sustainable Project Management® are trademarks of GPM Ltd. PMI is a registered mark of Project Management Institute, Inc.
Also on this site
PRiSM: the six phases that produce the plan. The P5 Standard: the 52 elements it measures against. The Reporting Guide: from the plan to disclosures. Responsible Project Sponsorship: the decisions the plan triggers. The origin of the plan: the 2008 story.