We face an increasingly uncertain future marked by climate change, biodiversity loss, extreme pollution, rising poverty, and inequality. These collective challenges demand new thinking and vision. The Green Room provides a space for creative conversation during this time of disruption, transition, and transformation.

Presented by Megan Best, Eibhlin Fitzpatrick, Shannen Healy & Ken Lyons, the below is not an exact transcript, but you can listen back to the conversation here.

Q: Can you tell us a little bit about SustainabilityExamples.com? What exactly is this organisation?

A:

SustainabilityExamples.com is a free online platform that highlights real-world sustainability solutions and initiatives from companies around the world. The aim is to make it easy — and inspiring — for people working in sustainability, ESG, or comms roles to see what other organisations are doing and to learn from practical, proven examples.

It’s a resource to spark ideas, build business cases, and avoid starting from scratch every time someone wants to take action on climate, biodiversity, or environmental impact.

Q: How does it work?

A:

It’s really straightforward — anyone working on a sustainability solution and/or an initiative can submit an example through the site. They tell us what they did, why they did it, and what impact it’s had. That might include a case study, a product solution, a campaign, or a broader strategy.

Each post is tagged by topic, mapped to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and includes a short explainer with a link to the source. It’s free to access, searchable, and there’s also a bi-weekly newsletter that curates the latest and greatest examples.

Q: What kind of projects are showcased there? Are they all environmentally-focused?

A:

While a lot of what we cover touches on climate and environmental topics, we’re just as interested in the social side of sustainability — things like equity in recruitment, community partnerships, fair pay commitments, or mental health initiatives. Because we follow the SDG framework, we intentionally showcase the full spectrum: from renewable energy and circular design to employee wellbeing and responsible supply chains.

Q: What made you embark on this adventure?

A:

It started out of frustration. In my previous role, I led a sustainability programme for a company and constantly found myself hunting for credible examples to build internal buy-in — things I could point to and say, “Look, this is how they did it.” It took days / weeks even! I figured if I was struggling, others probably were too. So I decided to create the kind of resource I wished I’d had: practical, searchable, and always growing.

Q: How’s it going so far / how many members have you?

A:

It’s going really well — the platform is still young, but we’ve had submissions from startups, multinationals, nonprofits, and local initiatives. People seem to really value the chance to showcase their efforts in a public, searchable way — and others are using it to discover ideas they can bring into their own organisations. The newsletter is growing steadily, and most of the traction has come organically through LinkedIn.

Q: What are your aspirations for it?

A:

The goal is to become the largest open library of sustainability actions — powered by the people actually doing the work. In time, I’d love to see hundreds of new examples each month, a richer tagging system, and maybe even matchmaking features between organisations with similar goals or challenges. I want it to be the first place people go when they’re asking, “What can we do next?”.

We also want to bring in more gamification and a scoring system that will contribute to better benchmarking and decision-making.

Q: Why do you think this is needed?

A:

Because people are busy, and sustainability teams are often under-resourced. There are incredible sustainability initiatives happening every day — but they’re often buried in press releases or ESG reports.

I also believe many companies, particularly SMEs, are doing great things, but their stories and impact is going untold.

By surfacing them in a simple, accessible way, we help accelerate learning and disrupt the process of being more sustainable by letting the proven solutions dictate our course of action versus flying blind and hoping for the best.

It also helps smaller organisations feel like they can take action too — they can see examples that are bite-sized, scalable, and relevant to them.

Q: Are there international examples of the same thing, or have you truly found a niche?

A:

There are databases and platforms in the ESG or reporting space, but they’re often locked behind paywalls or too technical. What we’re doing is much more focused on storytelling and personal engagement — pulling out tangible, high-impact ideas by PEOPLE and showcasing them in plain English. That blend of credibility and simplicity is the niche.

Q: Tell us about the structure you’ve used, where you’ve mapped examples back against the Sustainable Development Goals. What led you to take this direction with it?

A:

The SDGs give us a universal framework — it means anyone, from any sector or country, can relate to the examples we share. It also helps users search by themes that matter to them — whether it’s Climate Action, Gender Equality, or Responsible Consumption. I chose this approach because the SDGs are widely recognised, proven to move the dial, and mapping real-world actions against them helps turn abstract goals into practical examples of real-world action.

Q: Have you had support from local or national government, grants or schemes for it?

A:

A bit — it’s been entirely self-funded so far, and I’ve built it around a lean model. But I’d absolutely be open to collaborating with local authorities, enterprise agencies, or sustainability-focused bodies who see the value in helping businesses learn from one another. I think there’s a real opportunity for public–private partnerships to scale platforms like this.

Q: In your opinion, what kind of supports are needed for businesses and organisations to make the transition to more environmentally responsible and circular practices?

A:

Honestly, I think the biggest gaps are in solution awareness and accessibility, practical knowledge-sharing and emotional buy-in through examples and storytelling reflecting the commercial benefits of taking action.

Today, this information exists, but it’s incredibly siloed and fragmented online, which is contributing to “the great disconnect,” i.e. companies wanting to take action but don’t know where to start. I believe Government support to help me close this gap would be benedictional to all and very in line with their ESG agenda.

Funding is important, but what many teams really need is help making the case internally, finding credible partners, and knowing where to start. More peer-to-peer learning platforms, better access to success stories, and training that’s rooted in real-life examples would go a long way. That’s part of what I hope this platform contributes to.

Q: What’s next for SustainabilityExamples.com? Can we expect any big launches in the coming months? Or maybe you’re not allowed to tell us that…..

A:

Well… I can say we’re working on making the platform even more user-friendly — things like filters by sector, downloadable collections, and eventually, a submission tool for people to share their own examples. There’s also some potential collaboration with networks and membership organisations to bring this resource into more hands. Watch this space!

Articles

Articles and commentary on ESG related matters for leaders transitioning to, and advocating for, net-zero