Why workflow management can scale nature-based solutions

Global carbon markets have evolved dramatically in the last 5 years. Soaring demand for high quality nature-based carbon credits has opened an exciting window of funding opportunities for teams restoring nature. Competition amongst project developers and investors looking to originate nature-based projects, however, is steep. As environmental markets evolve, teams restoring nature are finding new strategies to get ahead.

In this post, we explore how workflow management systems can help teams scale portfolios of high quality nature-based projects.

What is workflow management?

Workflow management refers to the tools and processes a company uses to streamline its operations. In the past, these systems were set-up and managed by entire teams. Today, technology enables easier ways to automate this end-to-end process. Teams managing the complexity of nature-based project development are adopting robust operating systems to grow their businesses at speed.

There are many advantages to implementing a workflow management system that’s designed to navigate the unique nuances of nature-based projects, but these 6 benefits stand above the rest.

6 reasons why teams are using workflow management systems to restore nature

1. Increase operational efficiency

It’s becoming standard practice for teams developing nature-based carbon projects to adopt workflow management systems. These platforms make work more accessible for entire project teams, while also reducing the number of external parties that would otherwise need to rely on for support or information. This efficiently reduces base operating costs through increased productivity.

Workflows can be automated using trusted project templates and flexible data management, decreasing time spent on each project task. This minimises the risk of projects going off course and helps lay foundations for organisations to scale.

2. Build trust with stakeholders

As workflows become more integrated within nature-based team workplaces, the process of keeping external stakeholders updated on progress becomes easier to manage. From investors funding project development to local communities, teams can easily share access to their centralised workflow management systems to drive trust. Increasing transparency for all project followers drives confidence in the project developers and asset managers running projects, enabling more opportunities for funding and further scaling impact over time.

3. Improve internal & external collaboration

After successfully implementing a workflow management system, your employees and external delivery contractors can work to deliver nature-based projects effectively together.

With a single view of the end-to-end project lifecycle, all contributors have a clearer understanding of how project pieces fit comes together. When project participants can see who their activities directly influence, they can proactively reach out to relevant team members and resolve potential blockers sooner rather than later, eliminating bottlenecks at critical project stages such as pre-feasibility and baselining.

4. Streamline project audits

Collaborating across a shared workflow means that teams can build a history of project activities as their portfolios scale. This creates a ‘system of proof’ and auditable track record of all project events for teams to refer to when independent verifiers come to audit projects. With information organised neatly all in one place, ongoing verification processes become easier to manage.

A single view of key project milestones reduce the time it takes to aggregate key documents and evidence, significantly reducing the time and cost of audits in the process.

5. Reduce costly data errors

For nature-based project developers and asset managers, efficiently managing complex environmental data sets can be one of the biggest barriers to scale. Errors arising from manual data handling can lead to lengthy (and costly) delays caused by painful back and forth requests for further information from market regulators.

Workflow management systems help increase project accuracy by streamlining the collection and aggregation of project data in one place. With data management support, work can be completed faster whilst maintaining compliance with relevant market standards to drive quality outcomes.

6. Make better decisions

Workflow management systems deliver insights that lead to better decision making. Bringing your projects and data into one place makes it easier to extract portfolio insights in real-time, eliminating the need for a dedicated resource to conduct bespoke analysis.

Empowered with new sources of information, teams of project developers and asset managers no longer waste time sifting through endless spreadsheets. Instead, they can proactively take control of their portfolios, enable new opportunities and look to grow their operations alongside the evolving global environmental markets.