Corporate environmental strategies and performance: A longitudinal study

Paper in proceeding, 2013

This paper focus on four environmental strategy aspects: 1) stakeholder relations, 2) management systems, 3) environmental staff, roles and responsibilities and 4) integration of environmental work. The paper aims to identify trends related to these four aspects and explores the relationship between them and environmental and business performance. The paper is based on a longitudinal and cross-sectional empirical study covering all Swedish construction companies with at least 50 employees (for architects 20 employees). Questionnaire surveys covering environmental attitudes, management practices and performance was carried out in 2002, 2006 and 2010. Respondents were environmental manager/officers in each company. Response rates for the three surveys were between 41-45%. The results show that the environmental work is on its way to be institutionalized as a strategic part of the companies. Environmental staff is increasing and environmental managers are part of top management and often also members of the management board. We can also see that communication and cooperation with stakeholders is getting more intensified and more diverse. So is the use of EMS as driver for a more active environmental work. It is concluded that a key to successful environmental and business performance is that environmental work is integrated with a variety of other corporate business areas/issues.