Implementing an Environmental Excellence Program: Encouraging Personnel to Go Beyond Compliance and Environmental Performance Metrics

Abstract

Abstract The majority of companies strongly support and encourage the active commitment of all their employees to protect our environment. This commitment is in the best interests of customers, employees, stockholders, and those in the communities in which we live and work. How can a company demonstrate going beyond the traditional, but absolutely paramount, routes of compliance programs and metric measurement? Line management can fulfill its leadership in this area by empowering employees to incorporate environmental initiatives into their normal course of business. The difficulties arise when trying to capture what local environmental initiatives have been conducted, especially if one operates in a global reach. This paper will demonstrate how one service company implemented and encouraged an employee-driven Environmental Excellence Program. Since the inception of the Environmental Excellence Program in late 2001, more than 20 projects have been recognized. In the following pages we share some of these success stories.