A Sustainability Policy is a statement outlining your business’ commitment and strategy towards all areas of sustainability. Find out what to include in yours.
Companies and agencies are under more pressure than ever to meet environmental responsibilities. A sustainability policy defines your commitment towards ethical and environmentally-friendly practices within your organisation, but where do you start?
Why Develop a Sustainability Policy?
It has become very important for organisations and companies looking to contend for public sector contracts to demonstrate a sustainability policy. All government departments are now targeted on reducing their carbon footprint, decreasing waste and improving sustainability. So, it is vital that any service they purchase offers assurances of contributing towards their set performance indicators.
This trend is not limited to the public sector either, with sustainability often featuring heavily in corporate responsibility initiatives. Some private companies are also looking to only work with suppliers that boast a sustainable approach to meet their required mandates.
A sustainability policy should outline an organisation’s commitment to environmentally responsible operations, including alignment with recognised standards and sustainable business practices.
How a Sustainability Policy Can Help Your Business
While creating, developing and implementing a sustainability policy may require initial investment, some of the advantages from which your business could benefit include the following:
- Adherence to current environmental legislation
- Streamlining business processes, creating less waste and using less energy
- Creating a better reputation with environmentally conscious customers
- Improving your standing with stakeholders in the business
Initial Considerations
When creating an environmental sustainability policy there is no standard layout. This is where gaining ISO 14001 certification can help your business. This gives you a structured set of requirements for creating environmentally aware systems within your business, and once you have achieved full certification, it allows you to officially demonstrate competence in this area to prospective clients.
For more information about ISO 14001 certification, read our ISO 14001 Guide for Beginners.
Should you decide to complete your own sustainability policy, the key questions you might need to consider are:
- How do you plan to prevent and reduce your environmental impact?
- How are you going to ensure compliance with all relevant green legislation?
- How will you continually improve your sustainability performance?
- What steps will you put in place to manage and communicate the policy?
The above should take the context of the company into account. For example, it might be appropriate for a haulage company to review how they can start to use green fuels and energy efficient vehicles to cut down on emissions, more so than saving waste paper in the office. Although both activities can contribute towards stainable business policy. Businesses commonly look at the maximum area of impact and assess how they can make reductions.
It may be worth reviewing Cancer Research’s policy, which can be downloaded online, to get an idea of how a professional organisation in the public sector is constructing their sustainability policy and procedures.
How a Sustainability Policy Could Help You Commercially
Many organisations now have sustainable procurement policies. Defra is one example, publishing its policy statement online. While any ultimate buying decision will require a business to demonstrate reliability, cost efficiency and competence within their chosen industry sector, there are definite advantages to having a watertight sustainability policy.
An environmental policy is often closely aligned with a sustainability policy, as both support an organisation’s efforts to reduce its environmental impact. The environmental policy sets out the organisations environmental objectives and commitments, and forms part of the broader management system required to achieve continual improvement and legal compliance.
The Importance of Community Investment
Sustainability doesn’t have to be solely based around production and consumption. It can also consider a businesses wider impact on the populations around the business locations and the well-being of its employees.
For instance, if your company is a major employer in a local area, setting up green charity drives or allowing your workers time to support local green issues could help both your reputation and improve employee morale. This is a good example of how evaluating the wider context of a businesses environmental impact can lead to better efficiency – as we know that happier employees are more efficient.
Reviewing Your Employment Practices
Securing employee buy-in to green initiatives is vital, and taking care of employees’ wellbeing should be a consideration in a sustainability policy. Some more forward-thinking businesses are already implementing six-hour days and finding that productivity is on the up and seeing less sick days.
A good place to start is employee suggestions. Rather than simply using an intuitive approach, featuring what is believed to best for a business, a business could focus on allowing its employees to take an active role in decision making. Once the sustainability process is completed, it is important that employees are made aware of the policy and understand its goals.
A final note – retaining relevancy and updates:
A sustainability policy is best expressed as a living document that is updated continually in line with the demands of both legislation and the best academic understanding regarding environmental impact and employee wellbeing.
Businesses can consider posting their policy on their website, and discussing it with suppliers to encourage them to follow suit, with you leading by example. And of course, be sure to integrate your sustainability message into your marketing for the maximum results.
Get ISO 14001 Certified
With more public organisations requiring a standardised demonstration of adherence to environmental considerations, this is where ISO 14001 certification as part of your sustainability can really pay dividends. With prequalification becoming increasingly necessary to even bid on certain public sector contracts, ISO 14001 gives you a fast and simple way to prove your competence in this area.
Additionally, if your company can help contribute to the buyer’s own environmental targets then this can place you in better standing to win the business. Organisations are now looking to make cuts in all kinds of areas. Offering to help reduce their carbon footprint or remove toxic or harmful chemicals from its global production process, for example, could be extremely attractive from a purchasing perspective. To show your business’ commitment to sustainable business practices, begin your journey to ISO 14001 certification today.
