Sustainability knowledge utilization: challenges from internal and external perspectives

The issues of sustainability have been acknowledged to be in the heart of the 21^st century innovations and competitive business. In a rising extent companies need to report their activities and levels of sustainability. The motivation rises from external sources (e.g. regulators, stakeholders, media) but also from companies´ internal goals and management actions. The importance of sustainability measurement actions is widely recognized in modern companies. In best cases, measurement information guides in managerial decision-making, but only if the knowledge is analyzed properly and further utilized. Previous research does not focus on knowledge utilization beyond the measurement and reporting actions of sustainability. Practitioners in companies are also struggling with the utilization of large amounts of measurement data and ways to argue the sustainability value to their stakeholders. Our study discusses the challenges and reasons behind the insufficient utilization of sustainability measurement knowledge in management actions based mainly on the Finnish qualitative expert data. Practically, we take a step towards effective argumentation of sustainability value to promote the management of technologies and business.