New Paradigm Consulting specialises in streamlining management systems and here is a tip for you to reduce some of the administration associated with meeting the requirements of ISO 14001 : 2015.

Many organisations are under the impression that if they identify 20 individual environmental impacts during a review, then all 20 must be addressed immediately or they will fail an audit.

Most organisations do not have the financial and personnel resources to appoint a full time member of staff to focus on improving the environmental performance of the organisation. With that in mind, creating 20 individual improvement plans to address each of the 20 impacts, is likely to be an unrealistic target and will most likely not be completed.

The standard simply requires that you identify your significant environmental impacts and show evidence that you are trying to improve your environmental performance. Consider identifying the top 5 detrimental impacts and focus on reducing their impact on the environment.

5 environmental objectives, accompanied by 5 improvement plans and evidence of improvement will be better received by your auditor than 20 improvement plans that were not completed. Not to mention you are likely to get more value from the process and actually improve your company’s environmental performance. In addition, that leaves another 15 areas that could be improved next year!

Please contact New Paradigm Consulting if this situation is familiar to you and we can discuss other opportunities for streamlining your environmental management system with the emphasis on reducing the effort required to manage it.