According to the Sustainable Development Report 2022, cascading and interlinked crises are putting the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in grave danger, along with humanity’s very own survival. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) remain the framework for "building back better" after COVID-19. The European Commission has aligned its strategic priorities accordingly with launching the European Green Deal and anchoring climate, equity, and democracy questions at the heart of ERASMUS+ priorities. The project was initiated under the umbrella of the Finnish-American Research & Innovation Accelerator (FARIA) - a Finnish University network for joint US-engagement. Our focus was on short-term mobility of academics, university staff, and doctoral researchers under the umbrella theme of “Transformative SDG Innovation”. A staff training and teaching week in Finland served as joint, transdisciplinary platform, training Finnish and U.S.-colleagues to a) increase our ability to tackle SDG-related global challenges and b) to deepen individual domain-specific expertise relating to SDGs. With the staff week we tested if such a format could serve in the future as platform that bundles activities and connects actors across institutions.