How to Build a Sustainability Strategy From Scratch

Imagine this: you’ve just been tasked with creating the first-ever sustainability strategy for your company. Exciting? Absolutely. Overwhelming? Definitely.

Where do you start? What should you prioritize? How do you avoid greenwashing while building something credible and actionable?

The good news is: sustainability strategy doesn’t have to feel abstract. It can be built step by step — with clarity, structure, and impact. Here’s a guide to building a comprehensive sustainability strategy, even if it’s your company’s very first.

Step 1: Understand the Business Context

Before you dive into goals or frameworks, you need to understand where the company is starting from.

Questions to ask:

• What are the company’s core products and services?

• Where are the biggest environmental or social impacts across the value chain? (Think: energy use, supply chain, materials, labor practices, waste, emissions.)

• What are the company’s growth goals — and how might sustainability support or challenge them?

  
  

👉 Action: Conduct an internal review. Gather data from operations, procurement, HR, and finance to map your current baseline.

Step 2: Engage Leadership and Stakeholders Early

A sustainability strategy won’t succeed if it lives only on your desk. It requires buy-in from leadership and alignment across teams.

• Meet with executives to understand their priorities.

• Talk with employees — what issues matter to them?

• If possible, connect with external stakeholders (customers, investors, community members).

  
  

👉 Action: Create a short stakeholder map highlighting who needs to be informed, consulted, or actively involved.

Step 3: Conduct a Materiality Assessment

Not every issue matters equally to every business. A fashion retailer’s priorities differ from a software company’s or a utility provider’s.

A materiality assessment helps you identify which environmental, social, and governance issues are most relevant to your business and stakeholders.

Steps to conduct one:

1. Identify a long list of potential sustainability issues (emissions, water, labor rights, diversity, waste, etc.).

2. Interview stakeholders to rank which matter most.

3. Plot them on a materiality matrix (business impact vs. stakeholder importance).

   
   

👉 Action: Use this matrix as the foundation for your strategy. It shows where to focus, rather than trying to tackle everything at once.

NOTE: Before you dive into prioritizing issues, it helps to know what’s out there. There are well-established lists of ESG topics that companies use as a starting point when building a strategy. These come from widely recognized frameworks such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB), the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Together, they provide a structured view of potential topics — from greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity to labor practices, diversity, cybersecurity, and board governance.

Using these lists as a reference ensures that your strategy is aligned with global standards and not just built in isolation. From there, you can evaluate which topics are most material to your company and stakeholders.

Step 4: Benchmark Against Peers

Don’t reinvent the wheel. Look at what similar companies (competitors, leaders in your industry, or peers in other markets) are doing.

• What goals have they set?

• Which frameworks are they using (GRI, SASB, TCFD, CDP, UN SDGs)?

• How do they communicate progress?

  
  

👉 Action: Collect 3–5 peer sustainability reports and highlight best practices. This will help you see what’s expected and where you can differentiate.

Step 5: Define Your Vision and Priorities

Now it’s time to start shaping the actual strategy. A strong sustainability strategy usually has:

• A vision statement — A clear declaration of what sustainability means for your company.

• Key priority areas — Based on your materiality assessment (e.g., carbon reduction, circular economy, diversity & inclusion, ethical supply chain).

• Strategic pillars — Organize priorities under 3–4 focus areas to keep it manageable.

  
  

👉 Action: Draft a 1-page sustainability vision & pillars document to share with leadership for alignment.

Step 6: Set SMART Goals

Vague commitments like “We care about a greener future” don’t build trust. Goals need to be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.

Examples:

• Reduce Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 40% by 2030.

• Achieve gender parity in leadership roles by 2028.

• Ensure 90% of suppliers meet sustainability standards by 2026.

  
  

👉 Action: Pair each goal with a metric, deadline, and accountable owner.

Step 7: Integrate Into Business Operations

A sustainability strategy can’t live in a silo. It must be embedded into how the business operates.

• Procurement → Introduce supplier standards.

• Product design → Incorporate eco-friendly materials or processes.

• Finance → Track and disclose ESG performance.

• HR → Build inclusion and employee well-being into culture.

  
  

👉 Action: Create cross-functional working groups (e.g., sustainability + finance, sustainability + operations) to ensure integration.

Step 8: Create a Roadmap and Governance Structure

Strategies fail when they lack clear accountability. Decide:

• Who will lead sustainability at the executive level?

• How will progress be tracked and reported?

• What’s the timeline for key initiatives?

  
  

👉 Action: Build a 3–5 year roadmap with milestones. Assign clear owners for each priority.

Step 9: Communicate With Transparency

Don’t wait until the annual report to share progress. Regular, transparent communication builds trust and avoids greenwashing.

• Publish updates on the website and in internal newsletters.

• Share stories alongside data — show the human impact.

• Acknowledge challenges as openly as successes.

  
  

👉 Action: Develop a communications plan for sustainability that includes employees, investors, and customers.

Step 10: Review, Improve, Repeat

Sustainability is a journey, not a one-time project. Regulations, technologies, and expectations will evolve. Your strategy should, too.

👉 Action: Set up an annual review cycle to track progress, refresh goals, and realign priorities.

A Final Word: From Obligation to Opportunity

If you’re building a sustainability strategy for the first time, it’s easy to think of it as an obligation — a report to publish or a requirement to check off. But the real power of sustainability is strategic.

A strong sustainability strategy can:

• Strengthen brand reputation.

• Reduce costs and risks.

• Attract talent and investors.

• Drive innovation and resilience.

  
  

In other words: sustainability isn’t just good for the planet. It’s good for business.

Where StoryCurrent Fits In

At StoryCurrent Marketing Agency, we help companies at every stage of this journey. From running materiality assessments to setting measurable goals and turning ESG data into compelling narratives, we ensure sustainability strategies are both credible and impactful.

Because the companies that thrive in the future will be those that see sustainability not as an add-on, but as a core part of their story.

Closing Thought

If you’re new to sustainability, start small, stay focused, and build step by step. You don’t need to have all the answers today — you just need to start asking the right questions.

Your first sustainability strategy won’t be perfect. But if it’s thoughtful, authentic, and built on real priorities, it will be the foundation for lasting impact.