Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka hur projektledare i byggbranschen arbetar med hållbarhet och hur de upplever att EU:s nya hållbarhetsdirektiv som infördes 1 januari 2024 kommer att påverka byggprojekt och byggprojektledning. Studien genomfördes med en kvalitativ ansats och nio semistrukturerade intervjuer med projektledare verksamma i byggbranschen. Datat som insamlats genom intervjuerna analyserades genom tematisk analys vilket resulterade i tre huvudteman: Ekonomin är alltid No.1, Social och miljömässig hållbarhet som incitament och Tung papperstiger i ryggsäcken för små aktörer. Resultatet av studien visar att det är svårt att bedriva ett hållbart projektarbete utan att prioritera det ekonomiska perspektivet av hållbarhet först. Oavsett hur goda intentioner en projektledare har att implementera hållbarhet i projektarbetet behöver den förhålla sig till budgeten allra först även om de globala målen slår fast att de tre hållbarhetsaspekterna ekonomiskt, socialt och miljömässigt är integrerade och odelbara. Vissa projektledare kan använda hållbarhetsarbetet som ett incitament för vinstsyfte. Andra aktörer har svårt att prioritera mer hållbara material och metoder på grund av att det kostar för mycket. Detta är avhängigt storlek på verksamhet samt verksamhetens art. Resultatet tyder också på att små aktörer på byggmarknaden kommer att bli mer negativt påverkade av de nya hållbarhetsdirektiven eftersom det kommer kräva mer administration som är svår att ta ikapp ekonomiskt. Samtidigt upplever de mindre aktörerna att deras möjlighet att påverka hållbarheten i projekten är minimal. Större aktörer på byggmarknaden har ofta specialister anställda för att sköta den typen av arbetsuppgifter och kan ofta använda sig av certifieringar vilket höjer värdet på byggnadsverket och gör att de kan tjäna igen sina administrativa kostnader. Slutsatserna är bland annat att det behövs skallkrav i upphandlingar av byggprojekt för att hållbarheten ska bli verklighet i praktiken men att det samtidigt krävs mod av byggaktörerna att testa nya arbetssätt och utveckla nya hållbara material. / The purpose of this study was to investigate how project managers in the construction industry work with sustainability and how they experience that the EU's new sustainability regulations, which was introduced on January 1, 2024, will affect construction projects and construction project management. The study was carried out with a qualitative approach and nine semi-structured interviews with project managers active in the construction industry. The data collected through the interviews was analyzed through thematic analysis which resulted in three main themes: The economy is always No.1, Social and environmental sustainability as an incentive and Heavy paper tiger in the backpack for small practitioners.  The results of the study show that it is difficult to conduct sustainable project work without prioritizing the financial perspective of sustainability first. Regardless of how good a project manager's intentions are to implement sustainability in the project work, the person needs to approach the budget first, even if the global goals state that the three aspects of sustainability economically, socially and environmentally are integrated and indivisible. Some project managers may use the sustainability work as an incentive for profit. Other actors find it difficult to prioritize more sustainable materials and methods because the costs are too high. This depends on the size of the business and the nature of the business.  The result also indicates that small players in the construction market will be more negatively affected by the new sustainability directives because it will require more administration which is difficult to catch up financially. At the same time, the smaller actors experience that their possibilities to influence the sustainability of the projects is minimal. Larger players in the construction market often have specialists employed to handle this kind of tasks, and can often make use of certifications, which increase the value of the construction work and give them a chance to recoup their administrative costs. The conclusions are, among other things, that there is a need for basic requirements in the procurement of construction projects in order for sustainability to become a reality in practice, but at the same time that courage is required for the building operators to test new working methods and to develop new sustainable materials.

Environmental issues are an increasing concern for various stakeholders in the mining industry. To address these concerns, managements of mining companies should embrace sustainable mining practices in their daily decision making processes. Internal decision making processes are strongly dependent on the quality of data included in reports used by management. Currently environmental issues are only considered as a separate item which is attached to the annual financial statements. No link is made between the environmental performance of the mine and the economic performance that is achieved. To achieve greater acknowledgement by management of the importance of controlling environmental costs on a daily basis, environmental costs need to be identifiable in internal management reports, including management accounting reports. Various methods are available with which the value of environmental inputs and outputs can accurately be determined. If these values are correctly integrated into information systems, reporting these environmental costs will be possible, allowing a mining company to consider triple-bottom-line reporting. The goal of this study is to assist mining companies, specifically platinum mining, in measuring and reporting on environmental costs by setting up a framework. This framework will be formulated by means of conducting a thorough study of the recent and current literature pertaining to the measurement methods of environmental costs upon which a comparison will be drawn between this theory and the actual measurement and reporting of environmental costs by means of case study research. A gap analysis has identified the problems that platinum mines are experiencing, and consequently, the framework created will assist platinum mines in introducing the reporting of environmental costs. A case study on a platinum mine was done in order to evaluate the current measurement methods and reporting on environmental costs. The collected data was analysed through explanation building and an organisational-level logic model was developed in order to understand the reasons that costs are recorded and reported on by using the method currently applied in the case study principal. This organisational-level logic model will assist in identifying problems within the current costing method in relation to environmental cost measurement and reporting. The findings identified by the case study were compared to the theory underlying environmental management accounting after which a gap analysis identified the problems that platinum mines experience. Based on the findings of the gap analysis, a framework was developed to assist platinum mines in closing the gap that has been identified. The framework, if applied within an organisation will assist mining companies in expanding their current reporting on environmental issues to an in-depth review of environmental impacts which can be linked to the achievement of economic performance. This will allow a step forward in triplebottom- line reporting as the value of environmental costs has been identified as the missing link in current financial reports. The framework could not be tested as the application of the framework requires a procedural change within the organisation which needs to be approved at top management level. This limitation does, however, open the possibility for a follow up study. Additional reporting on environmental costs will help management in adding value and quality to daily and overall decision making processes. This hypothesis can be tested in possible future studies which involve multiple-case studies and which will extend the framework to include a decision making matrix. / MCom (Management Accountancy), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Business is arguably the most powerful institution of our society and ever since the publication of the second King Report on Corporate Governance for South Africa (King II) in 2002, South African corporate companies have sharpened their focus on their commitment to the “Triple Bottom Line”, an expanded baseline for measuring a company’s performance which includes, in addition to the traditional financial yardstick, accounting of the impact of their activities on society and the environment. It is impossible for organisations to ignore the impact of social, ethical and environmental issues on their business. This research provides an overview of Corporate Social Investment initiatives in South Africa towards developing education. There is a demand for corporate companies to comply with both the King Report on Corporate Governance as well as Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment. Considering the poor state of education, both Government and the private sector are contributing financially to improve the socio-economic conditions of the country, specifically the state of education. Government’s contribution to public education remains its single largest investment, because it is the key to reducing poverty and accelerating long-term economic growth. However, very little impact can be measured as conditions are still very poor and problems still persist. There is no integrated, sustainable focused approach which can be effectively measured and evaluated. The purpose of this research is to investigate initiatives toward the development of education, the focus and the magnitude and effects of initiatives. Thereafter a more synergetic and integrated plan is presented and recommended to the corporate sector to assist in developing education. / MCom (Business Management), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

Environmental issues are an increasing concern for various stakeholders in the mining industry. To address these concerns, managements of mining companies should embrace sustainable mining practices in their daily decision making processes. Internal decision making processes are strongly dependent on the quality of data included in reports used by management. Currently environmental issues are only considered as a separate item which is attached to the annual financial statements. No link is made between the environmental performance of the mine and the economic performance that is achieved. To achieve greater acknowledgement by management of the importance of controlling environmental costs on a daily basis, environmental costs need to be identifiable in internal management reports, including management accounting reports. Various methods are available with which the value of environmental inputs and outputs can accurately be determined. If these values are correctly integrated into information systems, reporting these environmental costs will be possible, allowing a mining company to consider triple-bottom-line reporting. The goal of this study is to assist mining companies, specifically platinum mining, in measuring and reporting on environmental costs by setting up a framework. This framework will be formulated by means of conducting a thorough study of the recent and current literature pertaining to the measurement methods of environmental costs upon which a comparison will be drawn between this theory and the actual measurement and reporting of environmental costs by means of case study research. A gap analysis has identified the problems that platinum mines are experiencing, and consequently, the framework created will assist platinum mines in introducing the reporting of environmental costs. A case study on a platinum mine was done in order to evaluate the current measurement methods and reporting on environmental costs. The collected data was analysed through explanation building and an organisational-level logic model was developed in order to understand the reasons that costs are recorded and reported on by using the method currently applied in the case study principal. This organisational-level logic model will assist in identifying problems within the current costing method in relation to environmental cost measurement and reporting. The findings identified by the case study were compared to the theory underlying environmental management accounting after which a gap analysis identified the problems that platinum mines experience. Based on the findings of the gap analysis, a framework was developed to assist platinum mines in closing the gap that has been identified. The framework, if applied within an organisation will assist mining companies in expanding their current reporting on environmental issues to an in-depth review of environmental impacts which can be linked to the achievement of economic performance. This will allow a step forward in triplebottom- line reporting as the value of environmental costs has been identified as the missing link in current financial reports. The framework could not be tested as the application of the framework requires a procedural change within the organisation which needs to be approved at top management level. This limitation does, however, open the possibility for a follow up study. Additional reporting on environmental costs will help management in adding value and quality to daily and overall decision making processes. This hypothesis can be tested in possible future studies which involve multiple-case studies and which will extend the framework to include a decision making matrix. / MCom (Management Accountancy), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Business is arguably the most powerful institution of our society and ever since the publication of the second King Report on Corporate Governance for South Africa (King II) in 2002, South African corporate companies have sharpened their focus on their commitment to the “Triple Bottom Line”, an expanded baseline for measuring a company’s performance which includes, in addition to the traditional financial yardstick, accounting of the impact of their activities on society and the environment. It is impossible for organisations to ignore the impact of social, ethical and environmental issues on their business. This research provides an overview of Corporate Social Investment initiatives in South Africa towards developing education. There is a demand for corporate companies to comply with both the King Report on Corporate Governance as well as Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment. Considering the poor state of education, both Government and the private sector are contributing financially to improve the socio-economic conditions of the country, specifically the state of education. Government’s contribution to public education remains its single largest investment, because it is the key to reducing poverty and accelerating long-term economic growth. However, very little impact can be measured as conditions are still very poor and problems still persist. There is no integrated, sustainable focused approach which can be effectively measured and evaluated. The purpose of this research is to investigate initiatives toward the development of education, the focus and the magnitude and effects of initiatives. Thereafter a more synergetic and integrated plan is presented and recommended to the corporate sector to assist in developing education. / MCom (Business Management), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

Sustainability has become an undoubtedly popular and important topic, being discussed among many researchers as well as practitioners. Previous research has focused on the importance of implementing sustainability into organizations’ core business, as well as highlighting potential risk of an inadequate focus on the economic perspective of the triple bottom line (TBL). However, it has still been argued that there is not enough theoretical and practical knowledge on how to implement sustainability with the use of management control systems (MCSs). The aim of the study was thus to explore how traditional management control (metrics and measurements) as well as culture, values and communication can be used to implement the social, economic and environmental perspectives of sustainability into the organization. The authors performed an exploratory study, interviewing six sustainability managers/directors working at companies with a strong sustainability focus, as well as collecting data from the chosen companies’ sustainability reports. The findings suggest that companies implemented and created awareness for the sustainability objectives through the use of both metrics and measurements relating to the TBL perspectives, as well as through communicating and spreading the organizational learning of the culture and values connected to sustainability. The study also provided for challenges and possibilities when implementing the TBL perspective of sustainability.

The decision has been made: The new cruise-ship quay in Visby will soon be an essential part of the Swedish island Gotland. This can be a great deal not only in regard to Gotland’s Vision 2025 and its citizens but also for Gotland as a tourist destination and its sustainable tourism development. Therefore, the aim of this study was to explore which sustainable considerations and goal settings Gotland’s municipality emphasised in the decision process of construction a new cruise-ship quay in Visby. Besides, we intended to raise awareness of discussing the cruise project from a sustainable tourism development perspective. This study explored the decision process through an overarching sustainability lens with the help of the triple bottom line (TBL) concept. The analysis was based on a triangulation of protocols and reports, meetings and semi-structured interviews with different key actors. This study contributes to the existing tourism literature by adopt the TBL concept on a political setting. The empirical contribution was to better understand and explain the results normally used by organisations from a broader, more holistic sustainable tourism development perspective. An overall conclusion from our study is that the planning and decision process for building a cruise quay in Visby has left residents not involved in the industry with split reactions. The case study reveals that public participation and public information throughout the decision process is essential to the public legitimacy.

Vi lever i ett samhälle där arbete för en hållbar utveckling uppmärksammas allt mer. Företag kan påverka samhället och miljön omkring dem både positivt och negativt. Genom en hållbarhetsredovisning kan företagen att redovisa sin påverkan på sin omgivning. En hållbarhetsredovisning är en sammanställning över företagets ekonomiska, miljömässiga och sociala effekter. Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) är en organisation och de tillhandahåller världens mest använda riktlinjer för upprättandet av hållbarhetsredovisningar. Uppsatsens syfte är att skapa en djupare förståelse för om GRI:s riktlinjer för upprättandet av hållbarhetsredovisningar bidrar till hållbar utveckling i företagen. Den teoretiska referensramen innehåller relevanta teorier och begrepp som förklarar varför företag upprättar hållbarhetsredovisningar, samt en sammanfattning av GRI:s riktlinjer. För att besvara uppsatsens syfte och frågeställningar har kvalitativa semistrukturerade telefonintervjuer använts för att samla in data. I urvalet av respondenter har vi använt oss av ett målstyrt urval och kontaktat den person som är ansvarig för hållbarhetsrelaterade frågor och/eller upprättandet av hållbarhetsredovisningen i respektive företag. Alla tillfrågade företagen upprättar sin hållbarhetsredovisning enligt de senaste riktlinjerna utgivna av GRI. Data som samlats in har analyserats med hjälp av tidigare forskning och teorierna i den teoretiska referensramen. Slutsatsen visar att GRI:s riktlinjer kan vara komplicerade att använda i företag som är verksamma inom andra branscher än tillverkningsbranschen men att riktlinjerna bidrar till hållbar utveckling i företagen.

Investors, stock exchanges and financial regulatory institutions can be used as strong levers for making firms accountable for achieving sustainable operational performance and not just maximizing profits. The objective of this research study is to enhance the quantitative tools available to stakeholders for evaluating relative operational performance of firms, thereby encouraging the financial investors to base their portfolio investment decisions on the basis of sustainable operational performance of firms. The study reviews the existing literature on evaluating relative operational performance of firms on sustainability metrics and proposes multi-level multi criteria decision making (MCDM) quantitative methods for measuring the same. The research work demonstrates the research framework proposed in the study by evaluating the 2014 Sustainable Operational Performance of firms in the oil & gas sector. The reason for choosing the oil & gas sector for this case study is in view of the relative large ecological and social impact which this industry has on different stakeholders. Due to the same reasons, the oil & gas sector is a bit more advanced in terms of its sustainability performance reporting standards. The review of past literature and the sustainability reports of firms for the year 2014 is initially used to develop the construct for measuring the firm operational performance on three pillars of TBL i.e. for the ecological, social and economic dimensions. / February 2017

The coffee industry affects both people and the environment in a negative way, which is an aspect coffee producers are forced to relate to. Today, more and more organizations are involved in CSR and communication about CSR. Therefore, the aim of this study is to examine young consumers of Generation Y, their attitudes and opinions towards coffee producers' CSR work and its communication on CSR. The study has two research questions “what does Arvid Nordquist communicates about its CSR work through their official website?” and “what kind of attitudes and opinions does a group of young consumers have on coffee producers' CSR work and communication on CSR?” For this study two theories have been used, the CSR theory Triple Bottom Line as a theoretical starting point and Deegan Unerman’s theory on the social contract, based on Freeman’s stakeholder theory, as a theoretical framework. This qualitative study used two methods of data collection. First, a document analysis of Arvid Nordquists offical website. Secondly, a focus group interview with young consumer of Generation Y. The conclusion that can be drawn from our research is that consumers from Generation Y are positive to CSR as a phenomenon, but that communication of CSR is followed by scepticism in combination with ignorance. This paper sheds light on a issue that in previous research has used quantitative methods, while this study uses qualitative methods. The importance of this paper is its contribution to how organizations can improve their communication of CSR to young consumers.