The Management Development Group: Teaching High Quality interpersonal and people management skills to managers and supervisors.

In today's business world it seems as though environment is always in the spotlight. Government, customers, shareholders, and the community all keep an eye on an organization's environmental performance. Environmental practices also play a vital role in ensuring employee health and safety. Our environmental record can enhance or negate our relations with our community. The way in which we manage environment is becoming more and more important in reducing corporate risk, ensuring due diligence, and maintaining a good corporate image. The key to successful environmental management lies in your approach to communications and training.

The best starting point for managing environment is to have a firm grasp on the technical realities of compliance in your organization, but there is more to success than having all the data in place. Even the best technical solutions fail when their impact on people is overlooked. Technical compliance manuals need to be translated into day-to-day work actions for staff to follow. After all, compliance is possible only when all employees, including managers, doe their part every day. To be successful in preventing or responding to environmental incidents, each person needs to know what to do, who needs to do it, and exactly how and when it should be done. Add another dimension to your training, the "why do it" aspect, and employee buy-in will increase. This will help avoid a common obstacle faced by environmental managers - the resistance that occurs when environmental protection is viewed as an 'add-on' to work.

When you plan your communications and training, keep in mind that environment is a personal issue for many people. Be sure to highlight how on-the-job actions can protect people and the community, as well as the environment. For example, show what happens when toxic substances end up in a storm sewer, and you'll be amazed at how quickly prevention and response actions move from an "extra job" to a personal benefit. People often are simply unaware of the potential effects their actions can have on the environment. In communications and training, be sure to help employees see the links between their environmental protection actions and personal health.

Here are a few things to keep in mind when planning your environmental training and communications programs.

Offer information that will help every person on staff become more aware of the overall issues related to environment. Awareness is the first step toward change.
Show senior management's commitment to environmental excellence. Lead by example.
Communicate with all of your publics, community, stakeholders and employees.
In training, use hands-on practise where possible and give people an opportunity to learn more about the "why" behind environmental protection.You will help promote their "right actions" for protection, prevention and emergency response.
Communicate the specific goals of the organization, such as reducing waste by 10% this year or having zero reportable spills by the year 2000. Offer frequent feedback on progress. A bulletin board showing progress toward the goal acts as a reminder for everyone, and is a terrific way to promote participation.
Encourage participation and involvement for everyone, both inside and outside the organization.
Foster employee initiatives for environmental actions outside the work place, such as a tree planting day, a stream clean-up, or car pooling. These actions are positive for the community, as well as the organization.

Lucy Keating is a managing Partner at Commexus Inc. specializing in environmental training, communications and community relations programs.