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Purpose: This paper aims to understand why higher education institutions (HEIs) struggle to become sustainable institutions themselves despite providing relevant teaching and research on sustainability. Design/methodology/approach: Using 17 open-ended, semistructured interviews to determine common themes (codes) regarding sustainability, the authors mapped those codes to the adaptive cycle from social innovation theory. Findings: Using the adaptive cycle offered a framework for understanding sustainability at HEIs as a cyclical process where innovation occurs in ebbs and flows. Differing perceptions of power by students and faculty slow down the process, and cross-collaboration is the key to further sustainability. Practical implications: Insights from the adaptive cycle can contribute to HEI assessment of its sustainability initiatives by identifying the stage of the adaptive cycle relevant to the institution's present sustainability work. Originality/value: Applying the adaptive cycle is an original way of understanding the process of anchoring sustainability at HEIs providing concrete insights into advancing this process.