Posts filed under ‘Change Management’
Using Incentives to Change Habits, Fund Infrastructure
Mark Posson
The San Francisco Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission recently proposed installing global positioning system (GPS) tracking devices on motor vehicles to aid in taxing drivers for vehicle miles traveled (VMT). This proposal is part of a larger trend in how local governments fund transportation infrastructure and encourage people to change their driving habits.
As in most other states, California’s road repair and improvements have historically been funded from gasoline taxes at the federal and state level, which have then distributed the revenue to the local governments. Today, local governments are being asked to pay a larger share of the bill, even as the infrastructure ages and requires more repair.
In the Bay Area, the intent of the VMT is to generate revenues for road repairs and improvements.The basic premise seems sound: The more you use the roads, the more you should pay to build and maintain them. Policy-makers also expect that the financial incentive will encourage drivers to drive less and take public transportation, two environmentally supportive behaviors. This equitable approach has generally worked with fuel taxes (a convenient surrogate for miles traveled) and vehicle license fees. Initial public reaction to the VMT, however, has been very negative. Some attribute the reaction as a sign of bad policy while others speculate that the public is simply resistant to change and new taxation.
In Alameda County, lawmakers have proposed a ballot measure to make a one half cent sales tax permanent. Several counties across the country have similarly used the sales tax approach but historically these measures have a finite life and are brought back to voters every 10 to 20 years for reauthorization. The existing tax is used to fund transportation projects within the Bay Area county and greatly improved transportation and environmental conditions. The shift to a permanent tax represents a recognition that local governments will continue to carry a greater cost for their local transportation.
While tax increases and initiatives such as the VMT may be unpopular, hard times demand bold measures and local governments need to fund more of their own infrastructure. The evolution and debate on these public policy shifts will be interesting case studies for environmental professionals.
Will citizens accept the installation of GPS tracking devices in their vehicles so their mileage can be tracked and they can pay more taxes? Is this government intrusion to one’s right to privacy? How do you tax nonresidents when their enter MTC’s jurisdiction—toll booths? Should hybrids pay the same rate as SUVs? Does this interfere with interstate commerce? How will driving habits change as a result of this new tax and what are the unintended circumstances? How does government equitably distribution fiscal and environmental impacts and how do human react to more aggressive change?
Mark Posson is the former Director of Environment, Safety and Health at Lockheed Marin Space Systems Co. and a current instructor of environmental and sustainability management with the University of California Davis. He recently began offering consulting services to help organizations improve environment, safety and health performance.
Using Change to Drive EHS Improvement
Stephen Evanoff
In a business, change presents an opportunity to eliminate environment, health and safety (EHS) risks, and learning how to initiate and drive necessary change is an important skill for EHS leaders to cultivate.
Here are a few observations on how to reduce EHS risks by taking advantage of change:
- Identify the relevant opportunities: One of the key challenges is to explain which opportunities merit your involvement and why. While this may seem obvious to you, it may not be to your leadership or to the project managers who are under pressure to deliver results on schedule, under budget. There are the big opportunities such as a facility move, consolidation, or expansion, and new or modified equipment. These offer excellent opportunities to implement fire protection systems, machine guarding, electrical safety devices and ergonomic principles. New or reformulated chemicals or materials and changes in chemical use offer a more subtle opportunity to reduce EHS risk by substitution, improved control and more efficient use. New product introduction can be an opportunity to address long-term, regulatory-driven challenges such the European Union Restriction on Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive or the Waste Electronic and Electrical Equipment (WEEE) directive. New customers, contracts and suppliers may be game-changers where EHS requirements are concerned.
Business leaders need to understand the EHS risks and opportunities that come with these new relationships. - Get a seat at the table during the initial planning phase: This requires networking upfront with key process leaders as well as infusing EHS into the policies and procedures of the engineering, manufacturing and procurement departments. It also means engaging in strategic planning and product development processes. These relationship-building investments will pay dividends in the long-term. I have experienced missed opportunities due to lack of upfront involvement, such as failing to conduct a Phase I ESA prior to leasing a manufacturing facility and not specifying fireproof ceiling materials when renovating a building. Typically, trade-offs in material and equipment selection and capital investments are much more palatable when considered as part of a change.
- Make the business case in broad, but tangible terms: When conducting the traditional return on investment analysis that we are all familiar with, consider the financial benefits of EHS- driven investments that improve quality, improve productivity (e.g., more efficient material flow, reduced labor, and shorter cycle time associated with ergonomic improvements), reduce insurance premiums and avoid the cost of regulatory compliance administrative tasks (e.g., regulatory reviews, operating permits, and compliance training). Lastly, customer and employee satisfaction and retention are highly persuasive aspects of making a business case, if you can do it in credible, concrete terms.
- Reinforce the value of your involvement by measuring and reporting results: This is often forgotten in the swirl of the work day and the pressure to move on to new challenges. Once the change has been made and you are operating at steady state, do the analysis and demonstrate that the change has delivered what was promised. It will make people more receptive to your input the next time a change is contemplated.
What advice do you have for ensuring EHS is included in the management of change process? What lessons and success stories can you share?
Stephen Evanoff is Vice President of Environment, Health and Safety for Danaher Corp., a Fortune 250 global science and technology company. To learn more about the habits of effective change agents, tune in for NAEM’s Emerging Leaders webinar on “Strategic Influencing: How to Drive and Manage Change” on Sept. 20.
Employee Engagement Advice from ThyssenKrupp’s “Green Girl”
Sasha Bailey
Over the course of the last few years, I have acquired quite a few pseudonyms: the Green Girl, the Recycling Lady, Green Team Leader, Head of the Glee Club, the-hateful-woman-who-took-my-desktop-printer …you get the point. (By far my favorite is ‘head of the Glee Club’) But at the end of the day, when all the number crunching and reporting and return on investment talk is over, if your employees do not get on the bandwagon, all the corporate mandates in the world will not help you meet your sustainability targets.
As the official head of the Glee Club, I have come to recognize several truths regarding employee engagement:
- One: You have to meet people where they are. Basically it does no good to talk to an office manager like an engineer and an engineer like an office manager. Their priorities are different; thus, they hear messages differently.
- Two: Everyone likes contests. Everyone. No matter how much you are may think, “People at my company would never get involved”, I’m here to tell you they would. Amazingly, people (and by people, I mean full-grown adults) love pizza parties. (You – shaking your head – trust me. They do.)
- Three: People want to hear positive things and think happy thoughts. Skip the polar bears and water shortages. I don’t mean to sound callous, but you are going to help the bears much more by getting people involved in up-cycling candy wrappers as part of their office sustainability initiatives than not doing anything at all.
- Four: Lip service looks exactly like lip service. It is amazing how keen people are on detecting nonsense. If your managers and executives are not committed to employee engagement, why would the employees commit to it? A CEO in a T-shirt and jeans planting trees will take you further than 1,000 witty emails or polar bear pictures.
- Five: Put the “glee” in glee club. Don’t put someone in charge of your employee engagement initiatives unless they have personality! Information has to be engaging enough for someone to click the link or open the email.
To some, the above may sound like I am advocating silly contests with butterflies and wood nymphs, while ignoring the real issues. The fact is, I am capable of talking life cycle analysis and carbon footprints with the best of them. But in the last five years, I have learned that to get people to participate, you first have to get them interested. And to get their interest, you have to be someone they want to hear. You have to have a voice that does not judge or preach or tell them what to do, but rather a voice they start to trust* and actually enjoy hearing from.
*Little disclaimer: On average, I receive 7-10 emails a month from random employees tattling on coworkers for wasting paper, making green suggestions or just asking me advice on which brand of laundry detergent to use or where to take used batteries. The upside is that I also get dried mushrooms from an employee in Maine, photos of people’s gardens and every chain email out there about grandmothers remembering ‘before it was green’. I LIKE being trusted!
Sasha Bailey is the Strategic Communications Manager for ThyssenKrupp Elevator-Americans Operating Unit, where she is responsible for creating and implementing high level communications strategies for all business units within the Americas as well as acting as the press and media liaison.
The Most Important Weapon in the Sustainability Toolbox
Bruce Klafter
Pop Quiz: What is the most important skill sustainability professionals need to do their job?
An understanding of lifecycle analysis? The ability to calculate a greenhouse gas inventory? A command of climate science? Experience with kaizen, poke yoke and genchi genbetsu (all Japanese supply chain management concepts)?
In my humble opinion, the most important and oft-used tool is an optimistic outlook. The reason for this somewhat surprising conclusion is that sustainability managers are typically working to exert influence across an organization, which may mean working without authority or as I like to say “working without a net”.
In the job descriptions I’ve written for the sustainability family at my company, this trait is referred as “a positive attitude and passion for sustainability.” A number of organizations that have taken a more exhaustive and scholarly approach to identifying job skills have also singled out “passion”, “enthusiasm” and a “positive attitude” as a key skills or attributes for people working in this emerging field. For more information, you may refer to studies from the International Society of Sustainability Professionals, the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship and the Corporate Responsibility Officers Association.
When confronted with our colleagues’ protests that they lack the time, the resources, the bandwidth, or simply the interest to support a sustainability initiative, what is the best response?
My thesis is that a negative response (e.g. expressing disappointment, anger, exasperation) is never the right response. After all, if the sustainability team cannot maintain a belief that the initiative will happen eventually, then it is hard to expect your colleagues to form that belief. My experience has been that persistence and patience usually pay dividends at some point. Some of the projects I am currently working on took nearly three years to take hold, with a change in management and current events helping drive a greater sense of urgency. To my counterparts in NAEM and elsewhere – keep a smile and keep on plugging away!
Bruce Klafter is head of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability at Applied Materials, Inc. and leads the effort to fulfill the Company’s commitment to sustainability in the design and implementation of business strategies and worldwide operations. He serves as the champion for Applied Materials’ green programs and manages a variety of reporting, employee engagement and other strategic projects aimed at enhancing the company’s global citizenship programs. Mr. Klafter additionally directed the Company’s Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) programs for several years and began his career at Applied Materials as its first EHS legal counsel.
Aligning Sustainability Goals, Vocabulary
Sandy Nessing
When it comes to sustainability, defining it depends on who you talk to. That was eminently clear recently when the Electric Utility Industry Sustainable Supply Chain Alliance (“Alliance”) held a stakeholder roundtable with about 30 suppliers to the industry. The objectives were to identify and share best practices, hear about challenges and to network.
Not surprising, there were two familiar themes that came from the discussions. The first was that suppliers and utilities are in agreement that sustainability is a bottom line business issue. Suppliers and utilities said that if making changes to business practices improves their return on investment, they wouldn’t hesitate to do it. The second theme was the need for more consistency around the definition of sustainability. There was unanimous agreement that the overall inconsistency in defining sustainability within a company or an industry makes it challenging to understand the vision or to justify investments without certain payback. (On the flip side, some suppliers said they never would have undertaken changes to reduce water use or improve energy efficiency, for example, if the Alliance hadn’t asked about it.)
The suppliers have a good point about the need for clarity. I’ve heard these same types of complaints with regard to safety performance expectations for contractors. Every utility has different safety standards and requirements for contractors and the lack of a single set of industry expectations is confusing, putting contractors and company employees at risk of harm.
Without clear direction and a business case, how can we set expectations? I believe the Alliance is on the right track with its vision for a sustainable supply chain and much progress has already been made. But based on the feedback from suppliers, there’s still a lot of work yet to be done. Not the least of which is to more clearly define what a sustainable supply chain looks like for the electric utility industry.
What are you doing to offer clarity around ‘sustainability’ for your customers and suppliers? What definition of sustainability do you use?
Sandy Nessing is the Director of Sustainability & ESH Strategy & Design for American Electric Power Co. Inc.. She wrote and published AEP’s first Corporate Sustainability Report in 2007 and in 2010 published AEP’s first integrated Corporate Accountability Report, a combination of the annual sustainability report and Annual Report to Shareholders. Follow her on Twitter at @Watts4U.
Between Silos, Beyond Walls: The Product Stewardship Puzzle
Carol Singer Neuvelt
Last week I traveled to Boston for NAEM’s Product Stewardship conference, where we discussed best practices for complying with new product-focused regulations, internal collaboration, managing supply chain data, and engaging customers and suppliers.
Like many sustainability initiatives, “product stewardship” is an exciting concept, with the potential to spur innovation and transform the structures on which our current industrial ecosystem is built. Whether your company defines product stewardship broadly as “green product development” or in terms of compliance with product regulations, it involves re-thinking the fundamentals of how the product was designed, produced and labeled.
This is easier said than done.
From the outside, finding out what goes into your products might seem pretty straightforward: First, you ask your product development or research and development folks to tell you what materials go into your products. Then, you find out where those materials came from and document that information. Simply talking to your first-tier suppliers, however, will not likely yield the full answers you seek. For diversified manufacturers with global supply chains, product stewardship is an exercise akin pulling a loose thread on a sweater and seeing how long it takes to stop unraveling. Where does it end? And how far back “beyond the gates” is your company accountable?
In the overall history of manufacturing, the era of transparency is in its infancy. Our globalized manufacturing platforms operate on systems which were designed to be predictable, reliable and cost-effective. Introducing a new variable may be the next step in the evolution of proactive environmental management, but meeting the challenge of this paradigm shift will take time to accomplish. Companies are not yet accustomed to disclosing the information their customers and the regulations are now requiring; companies might not have data management systems adequate to meet the challenge; suppliers might not have the data their customers are seeking; that data may require third-party validation before it can confidently relied on; and, the transparency of that data may be associated with unintended business risks.
In other words, it’s a process. A process that has yet to be mastered.
Our recent benchmarking survey on the topic revealed that among the leadership companies who belong to NAEM, there is not a consistent approach to defining, managing or leading product stewardship efforts. Given the systemic nature of this challenge, many companies have responded by creating a cross-functional team composed of representatives from environment health and safety (EHS), procurement, legal, research and development, operations and marketing. The outstanding management question companies are struggling with, however, is who should be ultimately responsible for the outcome of the collaboration?
It’s likely that each industry, each company and each business team will answer that question for itself. But the issue of accountability is yet another thread on the sweater, a reminder that like many sustainability initiatives, the product stewardship challenge involves as many questions as answers.
EHS MIS Selection: People, Process…and then Technology
Joanne Schroeder
So you know you need an EHS MIS, but the question you’re probably asking yourself is, “Where do I start”?
Whether you need a system to collect and report sustainability metrics, capture incidents, or facilitate compliance, the process of identifying the right tools is complex yet similar in nature. What we’ve noticed time and time again is that many EHS professionals often begin the process by focusing on the technology. This means perusing vendor websites, attending webinars etc. and, before long, find themselves receiving calls from software sales representatives. The momentum this process creates continues to sales demonstrations and ultimately a vendor selection.
Unfortunately, this scenario often occurs without EHS professionals ever having documented exactly how their team operates and what they want this software to do.
What I’d like to emphasize in this conversation is that many of our top recommendations on where to start, ultimately relate back to the “people, process, technology” triangle. The people, process, technology triangle underscores the importance of looking beyond technology as the sole (or even primary) factor in facilitating change. Software is an enabling tool. Sometimes we select software to embrace embedded best practices. But often we don’t. Sometimes we select software based on a prioritized “best-fit” with defined requirements. But sometimes we don’t. Clearly developing a prioritized list of defined requirements with stated and measurable objectives are critical first steps to selecting the “best” technology for your company. However, beyond technology, the people and process considerations are of equal importance.
Unless your company culture is “command and control” (which is usually not the case in today’s world) it is essential that company staff are emotionally bought in and invested in the technology solution. Opposed staff can quickly derail even the best of technology solutions. Including a wide array of staff in specifying requirements, listening to and documenting wants and needs, polling and gathering general input, is absolutely critical to a successful rollout.
From a process standpoint, technology can enable EHS workflow if, and only if, these work flows have been established, understood and at least minimallydocumented. If not, you will find yourself with no other choices than to embrace the workflow enabled by the software. While this solution may work some of the time, it won’t work if you have not consciously made this choice and are just being dragged along.
For those of you who have been through the EHS MIS selection process, what is your advice for how to begin this internal dialogue? How much time did you set aside for the planning process?
Joanne Schroeder is a founding partner of E2 ManageTech, where she is responsible for project management, system solution design, systems implementation, quality control and business development. She will be sharing her advice on the “Top 10 Things to Consider when Selecting an EHS MIS” during NAEM’s webinar on the topic April 18. E2Manage Tech is a member of NAEM’s Affiliates Council.
From Strong Relationships Comes Healthy EHS Culture
Stephen Evanoff
At a February meeting of my company’s environment, health and safety (EHS) leaders, a guest speaker reminded the group how important relationships are in effective EHS management. The following day, I picked up the Feb. 20, 2012, issue of Time magazine that featured a cover article on the science of animal friendships.
I’m certainly not suggesting that animal friendships can teach us how to develop effective workplace EHS relationships, but these two incidents did remind me how the relationships we build as EHS managers directly impact the organization’s EHS culture. Here are a few of my observations on relationship-building principles that have worked to strengthen EHS culture in organizations:
- Emphasizing the team over the individual: This applies to EHS programs, projects involving cross-functional teams, safety committees, awards, and just about everything else within an EHS context except, perhaps,filling out regulatory agency required reports. The fact is that the EHS function can accomplish almost nothing on its own. Without interdepartmental relationships founded on trust, the EHS role can be lonely and frustrating.
- Acting as an enabler: Before approaching a person or team of people with an EHS issue, answer the questions: “What’s in it for each of them? And how can I help?” This exercise will start you down the path toward a consensus-based solution and help you develop an enabler’s mindset.
- Validating the other person’s perspective: When business leaders and core business process owners feel that the EHS people are cognizant of the demands of their jobs, understand the pressures they face and are aligned with the overall goals of the enterprise, they will be more receptive to EHS initiated projects, and more likely to include the EHS function in decision-making.
- Standing for what’s right: EHS managers who consistently act in the best, long-term interest of the organization (rather than doing what’s expedient, politically advantageous, or in the near-term interest of the EHS function) will, over time, build credibility and respect. These are characteristics of healthy EHS working relationships.
I am sure there are other important principles to relationship-building. What other principles or relationship-building experiences have had a significant impact on EHS culture in your organization?
