Journal of Cleaner Production 207 (2019) 57e66

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Journal of Cleaner Production

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jclepro

The sustainability report as an essential tool for the holistic and

strategic vision of higher education institutions

n
Susana Ya

~ez*, Angel Uruburu, Ana Moreno, Julio Lumbreras
Universidad Polit

ecnica de Madrid, Escuela T

ecnica Superior de Ingenieros Industriales, Madrid, Spain

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Institutions of higher education have a significant role in promoting change to sustainable development
Received 8 February 2018 models as centers of knowledge and innovation. In addition, they are currently facing their own change
Received in revised form management processes, which embrace their core education, research, institution management and
30 July 2018
community outreach areas. This challenge involves a holistic consideration of all activities that are
Accepted 20 September 2018
related to sustainability and can benefit from the support of standardized Sustainable Report business
Available online 22 September 2018
tools. This research presents the case of the “Escuela Te
cnica Superior de Ingenieros Industriales” of
“Universidad Polite
cnica de Madrid,” a prestigious Spanish school of engineering. After eight years of
Keywords:
Sustainability report
experience and three continuous, cyclical improvement processes, the study argues that the Sustain-
Sustainability reporting process ability Report has contributed in outstanding fashion to: i) disseminate and internalize the mission of the
Institutions of higher education center and its alignment with sustainability principles; ii) establish new and robust communication
Sustainable development mechanisms with stakeholders, encouraging their participation in management decision-making pro-
cesses iii) integrate the indicators of sustainability impact in the global management plan; and iv)
develop a more comprehensive and strategic vision of the institution, which is now shared among key
positions.
© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction (Commenne, 2006). Thus, as centers of knowledge and innovation

The increase in the world's population, growing demands for
natural resources, global warming, waste management or social
inequalities are just some of the main sustainability challenges that
society must face in the coming years. Since the Sustainable
Development Goals (UNDP, 2015) were announced, these chal-
lenges have rapidly gained prominence in the agendas of govern-
ments, corporations, multi-actor organizations and public
institutions. As people become increasingly concerned about the
social and environmental related impact, the design and imple-
mentation of sustainable development (SD) models is becoming an
important subject of discussion in all organizations.
The corporate sector has a key responsibility to make significant
progress in SD models, because of its financial, technological and
management resources. However, all society actors must
contribute, especially those that have power and influence
* Corresponding author.

n
E-mail addresses: susana.yanez@upm.es (S. Ya ~ez), angel.uruburu@upm.es

Uruburu), ana.moreno.romero@upm.es (A. Moreno), julio.lumbreras@upm.es
(A.
(J. Lumbreras).
generators, institutions of higher education (HEI) have the potential
to become key drivers of societal change in this regard (Waas et al.,
2010).
One of the priorities that was highlighted by the UN Global
Action Program on Education for Sustainable Development
(UNESCO, 2014), is the whole-institutional approach. This approach
requires that HEI, in addition to transferring content related to
sustainable development, must participate in sustainable devel-
opment practices, such as managing physical facilities sustainably
and changing the ethos and governance structure.
To foster change to a new paradigm of sustainability at HEI, a
holistic integration must consider at least education, research, in-
ternal management (operations) and community engagement
(outreach) as main areas of study and development (Ceulemans
et al., 2015b; Lozano et al., 2015; Ramos et al., 2015; Vallaeys
et al., 2009). In the construction of specific SD models, it is rec-
ommended that related activities be implemented simultaneously
and in parallel. Furthermore, SD should be the “golden thread”
throughout the entire university system, and all areas that are
essential to achieve a transformative change (Barth, 2013; Cortese,
2003; Lozano et al., 2013). The areas are not independent, but are

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2018.09.171
0959-6526/© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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S. Ya ~ez et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 207 (2019) 57e66
interlinked (Ceulemans et al., 2015b).
Regarding management frameworks and tools, ISO26000
(2010), Global Reporting Initiative (GRI, 2018) and Accountability
(Krick et al., 2005) have been adapted to HEI context, whereas
others, such as Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating Sys-
tem (STARS) (Lidstone et al., 2015), Auditing Instrument for Sus-
tainability in Higher Education (AISHE) (Roorda, 2001) and
Graphical Assessment of Sustainability in Universities (GASU)
(Lozano, 2006a) have been designed to help the institutions ach-
ieve a sustainable transformation.
However, despite the large number of tools that are available to
measure social and environmental impact, Sustainability Reporting
(SR) at universities is in an early stage (Alonso-Almeida et al., 2015;
Ceulemans et al., 2015a; Lozano, 2011; Ramos et al., 2015).
Although the topic has been receiving growing attention in busi-
ness and academia (Hahn and Kühnen, 2013), more research needs
to be conducted to explain how to promote SR at universities
(Alonso-Almeida et al., 2015), the link between SR and successful
change to sustainability (Ceulemans et al., 2015a) or the impact of
SR and the influence of data collection on decision-making pro-
cesses (Adams and Frost, 2008).
In this regard, this paper attempts to add more clarity and to
highlight the aspects that are most relevant to how the design,
implementation and systematic review of SR can significantly
support HEI management teams to establish the foundations of
their long-term strategic planning processes, beyond the
commonly related sustainability issues.
For this purpose, it is necessary to respond to the following
questions: What is the true meaning of sustainability in an HEI
context? What aspects should HEI consider for the transformation
to SD? How should SR be designed for this purpose? Which are the
potential benefits of SR process?
Answering these questions firstly requires a problem-oriented
nature, long-term perspectives, multi-stakeholder involvement
and inter-/trans-disciplinary approaches (Yarime and Tanaka,
2012), and also to cope with the lack of studies concerning data
collection for SR in HEI, performance evaluation and strategic
alignment with organizational management systems (Adams and
Frost, 2008).
The “Escuela Te
cnica Superior de Ingenieros Industriales” of the
“Universidad Polite
cnica de Madrid” (ETSII-UPM) has been selected
as a case study due to its special interest in this research context
and, more specifically, because of the gradual importance that the
SR has acquired in the management of the Center in eight years of
implementation, and demonstrating its intrinsic value as a holistic
tool that facilitates a more strategic vision of the Institution.
The paper is structured as follows: Section 2 describes the
literature review, Section 3 (method) analyzes in depth the case
study, Section 4 presents the main findings of the SR process,
Section 5 contains the discussion and Section 6 provides the study's
conclusions.
2. Literature review
2.1. Sustainability at higher education institutions
Since 1990, HEI have demonstrated their commitment to sus-
tainability, gradually embracing different initiatives, declarations
and chapters. In 2011, around 1400 institutions all over the world
had signed at least one of the 31 main declarations (Grindsted,
2011). Next paragraphs show some of these declarations.
Chronologically, the Talloires Declaration (1990) -a ten-point
action plan to foster the sustainability and environmental literacy
into the main areas of the university context, marked the first
global event in which university chancellors and directors
committed to implement the related activities. The initiative is
currently followed by more than 500 universities from around sixty
countries, such as United States, Brazil, Taiwan, Canada, Colombia,
India or Australia as representative examples. The association of
University Leaders for a Sustainable Future (ULSF) is the Secretariat
for signatories of this declaration, (ULSF, 2015).
Similarly, the Kyoto Declaration was developed in the Ninth
International Association Universities Round Table (1993). It was a
two pages statement in which the need of action plans to pursue
the goal of sustainability was stressed (Kumar et al., 2017). It was
endorsed by the International Association of Universities (IAU,
2011), formed by 614 organizations of more than 120 countries.
At the United Nations Summit on Environment and Develop-
ment in Rio de Janeiro (1992), three axes in the final document
were highlighted in relation with HEI's mission: to reorient edu-
cation towards sustainable development, increase public aware-
ness of environmental issues and promote environmental training
among educators.
At European level, the Copernicus University Chapter was
released in 1993 by the Association of European Universities,
providing general guidelines to integrate sustainable development
into the main areas of HEI. Nowadays, the association comprises
320 signatories from 36 countries (University of Groningen, 2016).
More recently, the Principles for Responsible Management Ed-
ucation founded in 2007 (PRME, 2018), and the Higher Education
Sustainability Initiative created in 2012 (United Nations, 2012) are
remarked as worldwide initiatives that focus on sustainable
development through education, research, green campuses and the
consolidation of international networks.
These declarations show the commitment of universities to
sustainable development, as well as the interest of organizations to
guide them in order to incorporate sustainability philosophies and
provide frameworks with which to embed them in their systems
(Larra
n et al., 2015; Lozano et al., 2013; Sylvestre et al., 2013).
The nature of higher education enables universities to train and
develop future professionals by teaching, developing new tools
with which to face new challenges in society due to their structures
and research resources, to share their generated knowledge to
provide value to enterprises and society through the university
outreach, to apply new societal models in center management, and
to maintain consistency with the lessons that are taught in class-
rooms (Barth, 2013; Benneworth and Jongbloed, 2009; Davidson
et al., 2010; Hoover and Harder, 2015). These actions correspond
to the main HEI areas of education, research, operational manage-
ment and community engagement (Vallaeys et al., 2009).
HEI have implemented different actions to a significant extent.
These include transformation of their own missions, inclusion of SD
concepts in their curricula, modification of their research programs,
introduction of new ways of living on their campuses, promotion of
community engagement and assessment through SR (Alonso-
Almeida et al., 2015). However, the holistic implementation of all
of the areas remains a major challenge in HEI (Ceulemans et al.,
2015a; Lozano et al., 2015).
Transformation to a sustainable institution has special features
at universities. Certain barriers, such as academic freedom, incen-
tive structure and conservative administration create challenges
that can turn the HEI transformation back into an SD, in the sense
that the promotion of sustainability cannot be imposed, there are
difficulties in promoting changes economically at the individual
level or that the culture does not embrace significant changes
(Ferrer-Balas et al., 2008). Thus, the evolution to a new status quo of
SD could be difficult because of resistance to change or lack of re-
sources (time, money, access to information and specific

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legislation) (Verhulst and Lambrechts, 2015).
2.2. Change management towards sustainability
Change to sustainability follows the aspects of organizational
change (Hoover and Harder, 2015). Change management has been
studied extensively. However, there are few studies that focused on
management of change to sustainability at HEI (Ceulemans et al.,
2015a; Hoover and Harder, 2015; Verhulst and Lambrechts, 2015).
The 8-step process for leading the change management that was
enunciated by Kotter (1995), has been used in this section as a
framework for analysis of the experiences in implementing sus-
tainability at HEI because of its effectiveness in corporate sector.
Thus, the main steps and principles are identified as follows:
- The first step is to create a sense of urgency. This requires
convincing audiences of the need for change. Change to sus-
tainability is a delicate process that requires the support of a
critical mass of people within the organization who must
internalize the concept of sustainability and the need to
implement it (Barth, 2013; Doppelt, 2003; Lozano, 2006b).
- The second step is to create the guiding coalition. It is important
to count on agents for change to spread the need for change and
to lead it. These early-adopters are called “sustainability
champions” (Ferrer-Balas et al., 2008). It is necessary to
empower and give them means and structure to improving
sustainability (Barth, 2013). These champions can belong to any
position of the organizational chart because it is strong leader-
ship that is needed. Both topedown and bottom-up approaches
are compatible and recommended (Connor and Spangenberg,
2008; Matos and Silvestre, 2012).
- The third and fourth steps are to create a vision for the change
and to communicate this vision. These steps are strongly related
to organizational communication. In SD context, it is necessary
to have acquired a high degree of skill in listening, communi-
cating, relationship building, vision development, responsive-
ness and continuous strategic adaptation (Hoover and Harder,
2015).
- The fifth step is to overcome barriers. It is essential to know the
problems that the organization will face and to attempt to
prevent them (section 2.1).
- The sixth step is to create “quick wins” and is especially
important at universities. Change management processes take
time, and incentive policies can be rigid. Therefore, the change
agents are often motivated solely by the positive effects of the
change (Hoover and Harder, 2015).
- The seventh and eighth steps are related to building on the
change and anchoring the change culture within the organiza-
tion. The SD process acts as a continuous improvement cycle
(Holm et al., 2015). To move to a more sustainable status quo,
institutional framework plays an important role facilitating the
institutionalization of sustainability (Ceulemans et al., 2015a).
In summary, the main lessons learned from the cases studies
have to do with the existence of an inspiring team that share a
common vision of sustainability in HEI, the design of top-down and
bottom-up communication channels, the importance of over-
coming resistance to change and lack of resources, and the neces-
sity to incorporate sustainable development in the strategic plans.
2.3. Sustainability reporting guidelines and tools at universities
SR is a tool that is used to assess the state of an organization's
social, economic and environmental dimensions, as well as to
communicate its advances to stakeholders (Lozano, 2011). The
59
practice of assessment itself has been recognized increasingly as a
driving force to promote efforts to transform HEI into sustainable
directions (Yarime and Tanaka, 2012). As previously mentioned,
some of these tools have been adapted from business and others
have been tailored to the needs of universities. These tools attempt
to include the specific areas of education and research that are not
common in other kinds of institutions.
A total of twenty-six SR tools have been identified and analyzed
in different studies (Fischer et al., 2015; Lozano, 2011; Lozano et al.,
2015; Ramos et al., 2015; Yarime and Tanaka, 2012). The weight of
the needed information for assessment purposes varies by area:
operations (44%e67%), governance (35%e45%), education (8%e
18%), research (5%e10%) and community engagement (from 4% to
6%).
Environmental dimension aspects are commonly provided by
these tools. Other interesting issues concern operational matters
such as resources (physical resources, human resources and insti-
tutionalization), external motivation for reporting (increasing
transparency, enriching brand value, reputation and legitimacy,
allowing evaluation versus competitors), and internal motivation
(supporting corporate information and control processes, motiva-
tion of employees, increased sustainability awareness and
improved communication with internal stakeholders).
However, the tools generally lack indicators in research, edu-
cation and community engagement areas. This highlights the need
for a more holistic approach in the use of these frameworks in HEI,
and for the convenience of considering the particularities and les-
sons of previous experiences in implementing SR at HEI (Barth,
2013; Bullock and Wilder, 2016; Disterheft et al., 2015; Ferrer-
Balas et al., 2008; Larr
an et al., 2015; Verhulst and Lambrechts,
2015).
2.4. Global reporting initiative at universities
The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is an independent, inter-
national organization that was founded in 1979. It develops
guidelines for reporting the economic results of an organization
and also on the social and environmental impact of its activities.
These guidelines provide organizations with a way to measure,
understand and communicate their economic, social and environ-
mental performance (GRI, n.d.; Lozano, 2006a).
The generic methodology that GRI described to develop a sus-
tainability report consists of five generic phases: preparing, con-
necting, defining, monitoring, and reporting. The objectives of the
preparing phase, the objective is to prepare to begin with the
process and identify the main economic, social and environmental
impacts of the organization. The objective of the connecting phase
is to identify, prioritize and establish a dialogue with relevant
stakeholders. In the defining phase, the objective is to select issues
for action and reporting and to define goals to achieve with the
approval of the decision-makers. In the monitoring phase, the
objective is to check processes and monitor the performance.
Finally, the objective of the reporting phase is to finalize the report
and publish it for reading by its stakeholders.
GRI methodology seeks to achieve its reporting goals. It provides
an opportunity of value to the organization, as SR creates tools to
gather together the vision of different stakeholders (inclusiveness)
and to select important issues (materiality).
The most distinguishing and outstanding achievement of GRI in
HEI is that, as a well-structured indicator-based assessment tool, it
has the potential to increase the transparency and consistency of an
organization. In addition, it facilitates its decision-making pro-
cesses (Lozano, 2006a).
In regard to HEI, GRI accounts for 353 reports (GRI, 2018) from
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133 universities. There is no specific supplement to adapt the
methodology to this sector. So, universities are currently using their
own, tailor-made versions (Bullock and Wilder, 2016). In this re-
gard, it highlights the initiatives of the University Leaders for Sus-
tainable Future (ULSF), the Secretariat for signatories of the
Talloires Declaration (ULSF, 2018) and Graphical Assessment of
Sustainability in Universities (GASU), an extended tool that in-
corporates a group of 24 indicators to the GRI standard model
(Lozano, 2006a).
In summary, there is not a great deal of experience in applying
GRI methodology at universities (Alonso-Almeida et al., 2015) and
there is a lack of standardized sectorial indicators related to edu-
cation and research areas. Nevertheless, GRI seems to be the most
appropriate tool to carry out a holistic integration of sustainability
in all key areas (classified by Barth, 2013; Ceulemans et al., 2015b;
Cortese, 2003; Lozano et al., 2013 as: education, research, institu-
tion management and outreach), because of its comprehensive
nature (Lozano, 2006a) and influential guidelines (Pe
rez-Lo
pez
et al., 2013).
3. Method
3.1. Research design
The case of “Escuela Te
cnica Superior de Ingenieros Industriales”
(ETSII) is analyzed in this section from different perspectives,
gathering the main relevant aspects and lessons learned from eight
years of SR implementation (2008e2016).
ETSII is an engineering school with approximately 4300 stu-
dents, more than 300 faculty members, and 150 staff members. It is
part of “Universidad Polite
cnica de Madrid” (UPM), one of the most
important technical and public HEI in Spain.
In 2008 ETSII was an HEI pioneer in developing an SR. More
precisely, the institution was the first University Center in Spain to
achieve GRI certification in applying GRI-G3 methodology. That
meant that a great number of economic, environmental and social
aspects and indicators were systematized and considered for
further follow-up processes. This experience consisted of a
comprehensive approach to sustainability that covered teaching,
research, operational and community engagement areas.
The SR processes were supported by various positions within
the School (general management, SD commission, and specialized
staff), facilitating the access of available information to the authors
of this study. These latter participated in the review stages at the
end of each reporting period in analyzing organizational data,
monitoring results, identifying best practices and drafting action
plans.
The ETSII SR reports correspond to the periods of 2007e2009,
2009e2010, 2011e2013, and 2014e2015 (ETSII-UPM, 2016),
although the study concentrated mainly on the first three. The steps
taken in each reporting cycle, following GRI methodology, are
described below. All reports were certified by GRI and published
every two years.
3.2. Research implementation
First Sustainability Report:
The main challenge in this period (2007e2009) was to adapt GRI
methodology to the special characteristics of the School. Thus, the
five GRI phases were implemented as follows:
Phase 1: Preparing. The main goals of this phase were to create a
work team and to make a preliminary general diagnosis of the in-
stitution's sustainability. Therefore, a faculty member was
appointed as sustainability project manager to work closely with
the board of directors with a team of 20 people (three experts in
sustainability, 10 members of the SD advisory committee and seven
members of the management of the institution).
Once the work group was defined, the first task was to prepare
an exhaustive list of relevant issues for four main areas of the
institution. Based on the academic literature (Vallaeys et al., 2009),
four areas of action that are related to the impacts of the university
were identified. They are: education, research, internal manage-
ment (operations) and community engagement (outreach). This
classification meant that the first conceptual framework under
which the improvement actions could be globally coordinated,
aligned and assigned to responsible people by area, which had been
rather disconnected previously.
Phase 2: Connecting. According to GRI, the stakeholders’
participation is essential to ensure success in the implementation
of the sustainability project. In this regard, the main task for the
team was to identify the stakeholders of the institution, to highlight
their relevance for the organization and to establish specific
communication plans. It was also decided to prioritize the limited
resources with groups with a strong, long standing relationship
with the School.
Phase 3: Defining. Once the first lists of stakeholders and rele-
vant issues were created and prioritized, the objective was to
identify needs and expectations that were aligned with the mission
of the organization for the purpose of creating share value for all
groups involved.
Tools, such surveys, interviews, and focus groups, were used in
the process. Although sustainability aspects were the target sub-
ject, many other issues related to the global management of the
institution appeared. Following the methodology that was pro-
posed by Accountability (Krick et al., 2005), the issues were map-
ped and classified in a two axis chart, by relevance for the
stakeholders and maturity. The output of this analysis was its clas-
sification in four categories: preferential (high relevance, low
maturity), continuous improvement (high relevance, high maturity),
vigilance (low relevance, low maturity), and continuous updating
(low relevance, high maturity).
Phase 4: Monitoring. Implementation of the plans required
concrete actions, persons to be in charge and resources. Once pri-
ority actions were approved and responsible people were assigned,
key indicators were developed for a follow-up system. In addition, a
person to be in charge of the overall SR process was designated and
empowered. Another challenge at this stage was to connect the
identified relevant issues to the internal quality procedures of the
institution, with the objective of regularly monitoring them, along
with the other indicators.
Phase 5: Reporting. Finally, the objective of the last phase was to
communicate to all stakeholders the advances in sustainability. In
this case study, the phase consisted of two steps. The first was to
gain the approval of the School Board and the second was to publish
the first sustainability report, an important milestone in the history
of the institution.
Fig. 1 summarizes the main steps followed in the period prior to
publication of this SR.
Second Sustainability Report:
The second SR period started after the issuance of the first SD
memory, which reflected the main issues of 2007e2009 years. The
specific objectives and tasks were addressed in the new biennial
cycle. The project management team was inspired by continuous
improvement methods. The latter are not only proposed by GRI, but
also by the ISO family of standards (ISO, 2015), or the EFQM model
of excellence (EFQM, 2016).
Phase 1: Preparing. The main aspect here was the creation of an
integrated Vice Deanship of Quality and Social Responsible Man-
agement to manage the entire process under the supervision of the

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S. Ya ~ez et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 207 (2019) 57e66
Fig. 1. First SR cycle at ETSII.
Quality Management Department. Remarkably, this change facili-
tated the raising of sustainability related issues to a level equivalent
to those of the other key aspects of the organization.
Phase 2: Connecting. The launching of “Antenas de Sostenibili-
dad” groups was a milestone in this period. The main goal of this
project was to support the SD Advisory Committee with the inputs
of three different teams: students, professors and faculty staff
members. The name of “antennas” represents the ability of these
groups to receive and transmit information that is related to rele-
vant issues upstream and downstream of the organization, thus
enabling a fluid dialogue between internal stakeholders of the
School.
Each group consisted of 10e20 persons. In the case of teachers,
researches and non-academic staff, the representation of all areas
and departments was ensured. On the other hand, in the case of
students, the group was formed by students of various academic
courses and degrees. It is important to highlight that they all
participated voluntarily in the project, encouraged by their desire
to implement changes in the organization.
The underway project attempted to provide a vision of the
institution from three different perspectives, highlighting one or
two special-interest issues by group and reporting period that are
considered most relevant for careful management by the head of
the center. By doing this, the mechanisms for communication with
the remaining stakeholders were reinforced, enabling the identi-
fication of new issues of interest in the SD context.
Phase 3: Defining. The four SD areas were reviewed again to
update relevant aspects. The identification of materiality was led by
the SR team who, instead of using pre-defined surveys, used the
“antennas” meetings to detect stakeholders’ concerns. The three
groups were first trained in sustainability concepts and dimensions.
The meetings also helped to uncover some issues that could
61
engender risk, if not properly and promptly addressed.
Phase 4: Monitoring. Most attention during this phase was given
to including the sustainability targets by area into the procedures of
the quality assessment system that describe how the organization
works. Processes involved in the continuous improvement plan
were revised, and countermeasures were considered based on the
key indicators that were provided before and after the planned
actions.
Phase 5: Reporting. This phase was conducted in the same way
as the previous period. Consequently, the period ended with the
publication of the second sustainability report (2009e2010).
Fig. 2 shows the main aspects of the process.
Third Sustainability Report.
The SR process began after reviewing the results of the two
previous cycles. The initial picture of the institution was, therefore,
clearer. It facilitated the identification of new goals by area, and the
design of related action plans.
Phase 1: Preparing. The person in charge of the sustainability
project was selected by the Academic Vice-Dean, the second most
important person within the organization. In collaboration with the
Quality Department, this change enabled the plan to gradually
include sustainability competencies and key concepts in the
curricula.
Then, the main purpose of SR was not only redefined by re-
orienting the global management of the institution in a sustain-
able manner, but also by reflecting how the School was providing
future engineers with a solid base of ethical and responsible
knowledge of their profession.
Phase 2: Connecting. In this phase, special training was given to
the antennas groups to reinforce their knowledge of sustainability
and also to help them to acquire leadership, communication and
conflict resolution skills and to motivate personal competences.
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S. Ya ~ez et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 207 (2019) 57e66
Fig. 2. Second SR cycle at ETSII.
The training would allow them to perform better in their mission of
detecting and transmitting key issues that are directly related to
their roles in the school.
A second important action plan was to establish and standardize
communication channels with four external stakeholders (corpo-
rate advisory board members, alumni, social organization members
and public administrators). It was believed that a transparent dia-
logue with these stakeholders would help to garner their support in
the achievement of the institution's mission.
Phase 3: Defining. All information, needs and expectations that
were gathered by the antennas groups and other ways of
communication, such as the suggestion mailbox, were transmitted
to the person responsible, thereby enabling new issues to be
identified by area.
Phase 4: Monitoring. Procedures were compiled for the Quality
Assessment System (QAS) for which action plans also were pre-
pared for review. A great of effort was made to link sustainability
indicators to QAS indicators. The action plans were implemented
under the supervision of the vice deans and those in charge of the
affected areas, with the results communicated to the antennas
groups.
Phase 5: Reporting. In addition to the actions that were under-
taken in the previous cycles, new tools were designed to gather
feedback from the stakeholders. Their ideas on many issues were
included for the first time in SR, and thus submitted to the man-
agement of the Center for final approval.
Like the previous figures, Fig. 3 shows the key aspects of the
third SR period.
Fourth Sustainability Report.
After this research period, the fourth report was prepared. The
phases were completed by the GRI adapted methodology and the
continuous improvement approach. The main aspect of this new
cycle is its more strategic and longer-term approach to the relevant
issues that are identified and/or reviewed.
4. Results
The following paragraphs describe the immediate consequences
of implementation of SR on the ETSII during the eight-year period.
The results have been analyzed firstly, examining the reflections
after each SR cycle; secondly, showing the framework obtained by
materiality process in which relevant management aspects were
classified; and thirdly, describing the evolution in the stakeholder
management process.
In the first cycle, the SR process permitted relevant issues to be
identified for the first time by a participatory process that included
managers, SD advisory committee members and the internal in-
terest groups (students, professors and administrative and service
staff).
The publication of the first report brought the mission and
general values of the School closer to its stakeholders. However, the
action plans that were included didn't enable the internalization of
sustainability values and social responsibility concepts. Hence, the
main findings of SR for this cycle were that to permeate the culture
of sustainability would take time and resources, and that the
communication channels must be analyzed, improved and re-
designed for the purpose of facilitating the participation of key
stakeholders in the SD mission.
After the second cycle, the organization realized that the
traditional communication mechanisms that had been used did not
facilitate a smooth, bidirectional flow with the stakeholders. The
formal channels were slow and insufficient, and useful only for top
management. Therefore, new semiformal and informal, less insti-
tutionalized communication channels were created. This enabled
access to debates and information to representatives of key ETSII
groups.
Leading by the SD advisory committee, “antennas” project was
one (and the most important) of these new channels. The meetings
with the three groups enabled the committee to identify not only
issues related to sustainability, but also other ones of more concern

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S. Ya ~ez et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 207 (2019) 57e66
Fig. 3. Third SR cycle at ETSII.
to general management of the Center. The main finding was that
once they were known, these subjects were reported to each per-
son responsible for the affected area. Therefore, the SR process
began to assume a greater role in defining future strategic lines.
The strategic value of the third cycle was that, after defining the
areas for improvement and creating new channels of communica-
tion in the previous periods, new concrete actions were undertaken
that had a significant impact on the organization. Thus, the SR
process helped to select subjects, such as the elaboration of an
ethical code for teaching, the inclusion of competences for sus-
tainability in the curricula or the institutionalization of communi-
cation with other stakeholders. In addition, to firmly implant the
changes into the university systems, the processes and indicators of
the Quality Assessment Systems were modified to show the in-
stitution's employment of the sustainability reporting process and
principles.
In regard to the relevant issues, the SR process has enabled the
design of an official and standardized framework that has become
more complete and comprehensive after each cycle. The framework
presently includes 17 action lines that are classified into the four
following areas:
Education: integral education, quality education, subject
improvement, and educational results; 2) Research: research and
societal problems, research resources and research results 3)
Community outreach (social impacts): external stakeholders rela-
tionship, volunteering and sustainability awareness and knowledge
transmission to society; and 4) Management: internal stakeholder
management, ethical code and good governance, quality assess-
ment system and human resources, environment, economic man-
agement, infrastructures and services management areas.
Concerning stakeholders’ management, thanks to the SR, the
groups were identified following GRI requirements and the
Accountability Methodology (Krick et al., 2005). An updated list
(with related lines of action) is included every two years in the new
63
published reports.
The latest classification considers six internal and 13 external
stakeholders: students, professors, faculty staff, center manage-
ment, university management and directors of departments in the
first case, and other universities and research centers, collaboration
networks, enterprise-employers, suppliers, unions, associations (of
students and professionals), alumni, social organizations, public
administration and external government entities, neighborhoods,
communication media, and accreditation agencies, for the external
stakeholders.
Only internal stakeholders participated in the first and second
SR processes, whereas in two last processes, alumni, enterprises
and social organizations were consulted for their elaboration. In
addition, a social network analysis identified the stakeholders who
had the most power and influence. They were the first ones to be
convinced to support sustainability implementation and to analyze
the communication channels. These actions led the SD committee
to (re)activate the bidirectional communication by the imple-
mentation of informal and semi-informal ways of communication
like the sustainability antennas project.
At a higher level, the most important results of the SR success
were recognition of the importance of the commitment to and
leadership of senior management of the project and the vision of
SD. Also recognized were the need for the construction of bottom-
up channels to gradually change the organizational culture, the
participation of external groups in the processes, and the stan-
dardization of the materiality methodology to identify relevant
issues. To this end, Table 1 provides the above information, showing
key aspects of the cycles.
5. Discussion
The Introduction underlined the need to indicate how to pro-
mote SR at universities (Alonso-Almeida et al., 2015), how SR is
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S. Ya ~ez et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 207 (2019) 57e66
Table 1
ETSII sustainability reporting cycle evolution.
First SR
Position in Charge of Assistant for Sustainability and Social
Sustainability Responsibility Issues
Stakeholders Internal
Materiality SD Advisory Committee Focus groups
and surveys
Impact of Relevant Goals identification Sustainability
Issues indicators definition
links to successful change towards sustainability (Ceulemans et al.,
2015a,b) and how SR influences decision-making processes (Adams
and Frost, 2008).
In addition, the review of the literature has enabled the iden-
tification of other important challenges such as the holistic
implementation of sustainability in all HEI areas (Ceulemans et al.,
2015a; Lozano et al., 2015), the convenience of consider the par-
ticularities and lessons of previous experiences in implementing SR
at HEI, and the usefulness of GRI methodology to achieve specific
goals towards the SR by consideration of the different approaches
by stakeholder (inclusiveness) and the selection of relevant issues
(materiality).
The description and in-depth analysis of the ETSII case study
following eight years of experience sheds more light on these and
other aspects of SR, thereby enhancing its importance towards SD
of HEI.
Thereby, when the ETSII decided to implement the SR (2008),
the reporting activities differed greatly from the current practice,
especially in HEI. In this way, ETSII was a pioneer in Spain in the
publication of a report that followed the GRI methodology. The first
sustainability report represented a milestone for the organization
and the beginning of a strategic roadmap within the four defined
areas (education, research, management and community engage-
ment). In this new and first strategic framework, the initiatives that
were linked to sustainability were settled down. In addition, other
initiatives of great importance at higher level were undertaken,
with all the related decisions aligned under a common umbrella (a
unifying discourse).
In this way, it has been shown how the promotion of SR in the
Center has enabled the start of a management change towards SD
and for each endeavor to gain more influence in the decision-
making processes of top management. Moreover, during these ef-
forts, the successive sustainability reports have served as funda-
mental tools to gradually communicate essential strategic aspects
of the institution and its progress towards pre-defined targets.
This fact has been especially relevant in this case study, since,
there was no written strategy for the center when the SR began,
except for compliance with the legislation that was established by
the Ministry of Education and the UPM university, as the Quality
Assurance Systems (QAS) for public universities were still in the
preliminary design phase.
In regard to holistic implementation of SR, the biennial reports
under the GRI methodology that has been adapted to the ETSII, has
resulted in referral of the relevant issues that are identified to the
persons who have responsibility for them in each of the four areas.
In this sense, the SR and the materiality studies have been the
main tools with which the head of the center has managed the
action lines and initiatives related to SD and other key issues of the
institution. The proposals of internal and external stakeholders
began to be considered, and the improvement action plans and
countermeasures have had a consensual, longer-term acceptance
by those persons who are responsible by area.
Second SR Third SR
Vice-dean of Quality and Social Responsibility Vice-dean of Academic Affairs
Internal Internal and some external
SD Advisory Committee Meetings with SD Advisory Committee Meetings with Sustainability
Sustainability Antennas groups Antennas groups Suggestions mailbox
Performance measurement through Performance measurement through sustainability
sustainability indicators indicators linked with quality assessment system
indicators
For this purpose, the establishment of new communication
channels with different stakeholders was useful for gathering in-
formation. They have brought to light some of the weak points of
the institution. Organizations that make efforts to improve re-
lationships with their stakeholders are able to increase under-
standing, manage risks and solve conflicts more effectively (Krick
et al., 2005; Uruburu, 2013) For example, discussions in the meet-
ings with antennas working groups produced new ideas to improve
the institution, take advantage of new opportunities, and design
improvement plans were feasible and could efficiently solve the
defects that were detected. Therefore, the SR mechanism also
provided the detection of risks and opportunities for the school in a
comprehensive way.
Commitment to the biennial publication of the reports and in-
clusion of its main indicators in the QAS guarantee the consolida-
tion of the SR as a fundamental tool for the overall management of
the ETSII and support of the audit processes. In turn, this leads to
certifications by national and international agencies (ABET, 2000;
ANECA, 2018). Since the SR indicators have been linked to the
QAS and, therefore, to the organization's process map, every action
plan of a relevant issue is regularly checked, the changes are
registered and updated and the process is reviewed. This is another
potential benefit of the application of SR to HEI.
In summary, SR produced a positive impact in many aspects of
the global management of the organization, in excess of those of
the SD vision. Nevertheless, there were some difficulties and risks.
SR in HEI is commonly driven by internal motivations, which
depend to a large degree on management team sensitivity,
commitment and inspiration. Thus, changes in governing bodies
could reverse some structural attainments.
In the ETSII case, the SR implementation attained an important
level of maturity. It can be argued that its implementation is
definitive in its organizational structures, despite changes in gov-
erning bodies. Moreover, the SR represents a key driver to enhance
values and principles of sustainability that today permeate from top
management to the academic departments and, ultimately, to the
students by various means. One relevant example is the inclusion of
sustainability aspects and Sustainable Development Goals in many
subjects. Another example is the reinforcement of personal com-
petencies, such as the understanding of professional and ethical
responsibility, the consideration of the impact of engineering so-
lutions in a global and societal context, or the knowledge of
contemporary issues.
These actions end up in a graphic way the characterization of SR
influence in a HEI like the ETSII providing answers to research
questions raised.
6. Conclusions
This study has attempted to describe in detail all aspects of the
SR implementation process in a HEI in order to highlight how its
design, implementation and systematic review has produced a

n
S. Ya ~ez et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 207 (2019) 57e66
significantly more strategic and holistic vision of the institution
that is considered.
The case of ETSII has been interesting and appropriate due to its
innovative approach and commitment to sustainability in its wider
meaning. It positively impacts its mission, vision, values and way of
thinking and planning. Other cases that have been reviewed in the
literature have focused more on specific aspects, such as drivers,
barriers and motivations, without analyzing in depth the potential
implications of the SR implementation.
The GRI methodology that was adapted to the institution,
together with the specific stakeholder manual that was proposed
by Accountability, enabled consideration of the relevant issues by
main areas that are common to all HEI and the identification of the
groups that are directly and indirectly involved in or affected by the
decision-making and management actions in the pursuit of SD.
More specifically and in regard with the adaptation of GRI
methodology to HEI, it is highlighted the creation of a new, relevant
position in charge of the process into the management team of the
institution in the preparing phase, the definition of new indicators
in research and education areas in the defining phase, the imple-
mentation of systematic review by including sustainability aspects
into the internal Quality Assessment System in the monitoring
phase and finally, the dissemination of the communication through
the consolidated channels to all relevant stakeholders in the
reporting phase.
The overall SR process has also helped the governing bodies to
better define, develop and improve successive actions lines (not
only related to sustainability), that support the strategic plans and
thereby facilitating a more comprehensive, long-term vision of the
center.
The key achievements of ETSII during these eight years have
been the transmission of sustainability values throughout the
entire organization in a bidirectional way, the increasing partici-
pation by stakeholders in decision-making processes, the devel-
opment of new communication mechanisms and channels, the
definition of key indicators by area and the accountability and
transparence in its monitoring process.
Lastly, it is important to note that the key indicators extracted
from the SR have been included in the center's Quality Assessment
System. This guarantees its permanent contribution to the global
evaluation of the institution, thus anchoring the change to SD.
Although this research consists of one case, what has been
learned can be useful to other HEI that undertake further research
about the meaning of sustainability in universities, relevant issues
and key aspects through SD of the institutions or the potential
benefits of SR.
Acknowledgments
We want to thank many institutions for the opportunity to
conduct this research. We are very grateful for the support of
Escuela Te
cnica Superior de Ingenieros Industriales of Universidad

cnica de Madrid (ETSII-UPM), Fundacio
Polite
n Accenture, Sociedad
de Amigos de la Escuela (SAE), Ministerio de Trabajo e Inmigracio
n,
Consejo Social de la Universidad Politce
nica de Madrid and W.
Michael Hoffman Center for Business Ethics of Bentley University
(Massachusetts, US).
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