Today the ISO 14001 system is used within a rather wide spectrum of firms and industries, even if the early adopters of the standard mainly where organizations in the heavy industry and manufacturing sectors.
Many of those early adopters have now been certified for over 10 years, and during the years several surveys and case studies have been conducted to pinpoint the motives, benefits and challenges for why organizations chose to implement and maintain the system.
However, one issue with research about ISO 14001 up until now is that most studies have focused upon a managerial perspective where the managers´ attitudes have been in focus rather than the employees. Therefore, this case study set out to explore how the employees, the production operators, inside one certified organization are involved in ISO 14001 through a Grounded Theory approach.
The results of the study showed that the production operators relied upon different strategies in order to legitimize their involvement in ISO 14001. Further on, the study shows that the production operators where involved in ISO 14001 at a level which was required in order to keep the certification. However, they could not obtain enough legitimacy to motivate an involvement in ISO 14001 which extended what was required in order to keep the certification.
Grounded in the discovery of the different strategies used by the employees, this study argues that environmental awareness could be seen as an internal barrier and as a source for unsatisfied employees. Something which risks emphasizes a feeling of being involved in a rational myth.
Source: Uppsala University
Author: Bomark, Niklas