Authors

Eva Lundahl, Peter G. Harboe

Abstract

Project managers play a key role in the implementation of change processes, including the transition to sustainable business practices. Despite the mandate to integrate sustainability into organizational practices in both public and private enterprises, many Danish project managers either do not view sustainability as relevant to their practice, or do not possess the necessary knowledge to implement sustainability in their practice. Scandinavian studies with specific recommendations on how to apply sustainability goals to projects currently do not exist. On the other hand, a fair amount of English-language literature on the subject has been published. To better understand if international research can be applied to Danish project management practice, we conducted a scoping review to answer two research questions: 1. How is sustainable project management conceptualized in the literature? 2. What themes exist in the literature regarding sustainable project management practice? Based on the answers to these two questions, we developed a set of recommendations for how Danish project-based organizations can conceptualize and implement sustainable project management. Initially, we collected 188 articles and reports on the subject. The number of materials was then reduced after applying several quality criteria, and the remaining 84 articles were thematically analyzed. We identified five commonly used definitions of sustainable project management and can conclude that although the concept has evolved, we cannot discern a precise and usable definition. We therefore propose a new definition of sustainable project management in this article. Based on the literature, we identified six organizational areas where sustainable project management is meaningful. On this basis, we present a series of recommendations on how project managers in Denmark and other countries can understand and tackle sustainability in a practice-oriented and meaningful way, both in relation to steering groups, their own work as project managers, project management methods, and the establishment of measurable sustainability indicators in projects.

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Suggested Citation (APA 7th)

Lundahl, E., Harboe, P. (2024). Sustainable Project Management in Denmark – Conceptualizations and Recommendations. International Journal of Applied Research in Business and Management, 5(2). https://doi.org/10.51137/ijarbm.2024.5.2.8