Hello Everyone
March 21, 2008 by Gabor Harangozo , Mason Baziw , amathew and LAUREN KERWAWYCZ | Filed under: Collaboratory,What Should Be Measured and Why? [1,3]
Welcome all to the topic „What should be measured and why?” Let me introduce myself very briefly. My name is Gabor Harangozo, working at the Dept. of Environmental Economics at the Corvinus University of Budapest in Hungary. I was honoured by Professor Morelli to be able to co-think with you all on the mysteries of corporate environmental performance measurement.
The question „What should be measured and why?” is a key issue for an environmental manager.
First of all, one has to address the question: “What to measure?”, “What do I regard as (good) environmental performance?” What we need is to cover the main characteristics of good environmental performance to be able to have a description on what do we talking about. It does not have to be a scientific definition, rather a brainstorming on the main characteristics of (good) corporate environmental performance (production vs. products, environmental load vs. efforts of the management etc.)
Secondly, we should try to consider as many aspects as possible why environmental performance measurement can be beneficial for the company (or the environmental management).
Thirdly, we should consider ways how good environmental performance can contribute to the improvement of corporate performance. Actually that is a key issue, as otherwise how to convince company management to support “greening”? To get started, it might be useful to collect some short practical examples, and then try to systemize them somehow.
I am looking forward to your ideas and comments. In the meantime I wish you all happy Easter!
Gabor
Hello Gabor and fellow researchers,
I look forward to working with you on this important topic. I too feel that we need to define what exactly good or bad environmental performance is. I have researched some on this topic and taken a class specifically on corporate environmental management. We reviewed the benefits to good environmental performance and I actually wrote a paper on how companies integrate environmental management into business strategy. This would tie along with your questions on how good environmental performance could improve corporate performance and how to convince a company to support “greening.” I plan on doing some research and formulating some examples as you suggested.
I do have a few concerns that we can discuss. As you stated above we need to ask: “What do I regard as (good) environmental performance?” I find this interesting because environmental managers and companies may define good environmental performance differently. In other words, couldn’t environmental managers all have different characteristics for good environmental performance? If one manager feels that emitting 20 tons of a pollutant is good performance but another feels that good performance is emitting 10 tons then how do we truly determine who has good environmental performance? I find that it can be somewhat discretionary and not so much standardized as to what good environmental performance is. Another example would be someone who feels strictly being in compliance is good performance while some other individual feels that good environmental performance is going beyond compliance. I guess what my question is, how can we as environmental managers come to a common ground as to what good environmental performance is and do you believe this is possible? Can we come up with standardized measurements as to what good environmental performance is?
I’d really like to hear any suggestions on this and please feel free to comment.
Have a great week!!!!
Mason
Gabor, thank you the initial comments and for providing some direction. I look forward to working with both of you over the next couple months.
Mason, great insights!
What to measure is a great question. Do you think we need to narrow our discussions to a few industries to gather data on what is measured and what ‘can’ be measured? If we talk about industry in general I am afraid it will be challenging to capture the key metrics. What I characterize as good environmental performance would be a top down approach of environmental initiatives that start at the design phase. I will start to do some research to more clearly formulate what I see as good environmental performeance.
Environmental performance measurement is very important to many companies. At first glance, I know that the marketplace is putting the responsibility of environmental measurement in the hands of businesses. Not only does it provide good press, many organizations purchasing the products/services have initiatives to buy ‘greener’ products. We might be able to uncover some standardized metrics that companies are tied to. A grey area for me is what companies claim to be within their control. Is it a businesses position to assure all partners, both up and down the supply chain are acting in an evnrionmentally responsible manner and that their key metrics are viewed as ‘good?’
I think our next step is for Mason and I is to begin some literature review. Gabor, do you have any specific databases you recommend to use when searching for quality published literature on this topic?
I have a question as to what our final goal is going to be for the workshop. It is my understanding we will be workings to assist the moderator in the workshop – but what will our final product be? Handouts? A presentation?