Mermans, Sarah (2023) Development of a Sustainability Benchmarking Tool for SMEs. Master thesis, Sustainable Entrepreneurship (SE).
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Abstract
As sustainability issues continue to gain importance, companies have to address social and environmental concerns alongside economic profits. Corporate sustainability reporting plays a crucial role in providing stakeholders with an overview of a company's sustainability performance. However, existing reporting practices often lack the necessary context to assess a company's impact on social and environmental thresholds. Therefore, there is a need for a sustainability context-benchmarking tool that enables companies to benchmark their sustainability performance against relevant thresholds. This research aims to identify the requirements of stakeholders regarding the design choices of such a tool. A qualitative questionnaire was administered to companies, financial stakeholders, and governmental stakeholders to analyse their perspectives on the following design choices: the target group, geographical scope of reporting, inclusion of maturity levels, materiality approach, and the need for a sector-specific approach. Four additional key considerations about the tool’s design emerged: the trade-off between transparency about sustainability and sustained competitive advantage, prevention of greenwashing, feasibility for SMEs with limited resources and expertise, and avoiding the addition of another sustainability tool. By addressing these requirements, a sustainability context-benchmarking tool can provide guidance for companies in assessing their sustainability performance and contributing to a more sustainable future.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Master) |
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| Name supervisor: | Long, T.B. |
| Date Deposited: | 12 Sep 2023 10:44 |
| Last Modified: | 12 Sep 2023 10:44 |
| URI: | https://campus-fryslan.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/323 |
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