encouraging green behavior.pdf

7/28/2019 encouraging green behavior.pdf

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Encouraging innovative environmental actions:what companies and managers must do

Catherine A. Ramus*

Donald Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106-5131, USA

Abstract

Increasingly environmentally proactive rms are interested in nding ways to encourage employees to take environmentalactions that will improve the environmental performance of company operations, products and services. Results of an employee

survey show that both environmental policies and supportive supervisory behaviors can increase the probability that employees

will try environmental initiatives. We describe environmental policies and supervisory behaviors that exist in rms that are

committed to sustainable development and employee environmental initiatives. From the survey results, we draw some lessons

for managers and organizations that would like to support employee participation in sustainable development activities.

# 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

Many corporations have embraced the mantra of sustain-

able development, committing to policies of environmentalprotection in an attempt to move their organizations toward

the ill-dened goal of sustainability.1 Managers believe that

environmental innovations are necessary to transform busi-

nesses into sustainable enterprises (Davis, 1991; Fussler,

1996), but it is not always apparent to managers how to

encourage creative environmental ideas to help the business

move toward this goal.

Employee creativity is an important environmental pro-

blem-solving resource for companies (Beard & Hartmann,

1997). Since innovations, by denition, are creative ideas

from individuals or teams that have been implemented

(Amabile, Conti, Coon, Lazenby, & Herron, 1996), it

follows that companies that want innovative solutions to

improve their environmental performance need to develop

effective systems to support employee actions. But which

types of support from the organization are effective and

which are not? This is a difcult question. Especially sinceorganizations are not always supportive of employees' ideas

and innovation in general (Peters, 1990, 1991; Van de Ven,

1986; Wagner, 1991; Zaltman, Duncan, & Holbek, 1973).

Part of the difculty with developing organizational

support is that environmental management is not the focus

of many line managers attention. Even in rms with a stated

commitment to environmental sustainability, and with sus-

tainability policies in place, managers still do not give the

same level of support and attention to employee environ-

mental activities as general management related tasks

(Ramus & Steger, 2000). Having the sustainability policies

is a rst and important step for rms. These policies show

line management and employees that the rm expects anddesires environmental ideas and actions. Supervisors' beha-

viors that demonstrate support for environmental actions

also provide an important message to employees. In general,

higher levels of employee creativity and innovation result

from managerial behaviors that support employee actions

(Bowen & Lawler, 1992; Kanter, 1989; Redmond, Mumford,

& Teach, 1993; Spreitzer, 1995). The results of our survey

show that employees need a clear signal of organizational

support (environmental policies) and supervisory support

(daily behaviors aimed at encouraging environmental

actions) in order to focus their creative energy on environ-

mental problem-solving.

Journal of World Business 37 (2002) 151164

* Tel: 1-805-893-5057; Fax: 1-805-893-7612.

E-mail address: [email protected] (C.A. Ramus).1 Sustainable development is dened as ensuring that we meet

the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future

generations to meet their own needs (World Commission on

Environment and Development, 1987). No rm is yet sustainable,

but environmentally proactive rms have attempted to prevent

pollution, to minimize resource use, and to redesign products and

services so they have less impact on the natural environment, in

order to move toward sustainable operations. Currently the

movement toward sustainability is a process rather than a discrete

end.

1090-9516/02/$ see front matter # 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.

PII: S 1 0 9 0 - 9 5 1 6 ( 0 2 ) 0 0 0 7 4 - 3


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The purpose of this paper is to provide managers in

business organizations with a detailed description of the

environmental policies and supervisory behaviors that exist

in environmentally proactive, European headquartered

rms. And to show which of these factors have the most

important (signicant) impact on employee willingness to

try environmental initiatives. The descriptions of policies

and of behaviors, as well as lessons draw from the survey

results, provide practical information, which companies that

want to strengthen their environmental management pro-

grams can use to transform their current operations.

The unique contribution of this paper to the current

literature is that it provides a blueprint for businesses that

want to encourage employees to try environmental initiatives.

First we provide a brief description of employee eco-initia-

tives in rms and possible inuences on employee environ-

mental actions. And then we describe the environmental

policies and supervisory behaviors that employees perceive

to have a direct or indirect impact on their willingness topromote environmental initiatives. This rst part of the paper

provides lists and descriptions so that managers can visualize

the types of organizational factors they could put in place to

encourage employee environmental actions. Then we

describe the purpose, methodology and results of an employee

survey that consisted of the policies and supervisory beha-

viors.2 In this second-half of the paper, we use the results of

the survey to determine possible priorities for companies

interested in engaging employees and line managers in efforts

to improve the environmental sustainability of the rm.

1.1. What are employee eco-initiatives?

Employee environmental innovations (eco-innovations)

exist in companies today. They are actions (or initiatives)

taken by individuals and teams that improve the environ-

mental performance of companies.3 For example, an

employee who implemented a new recycling program

may have borrowed the approach from another company,

but the program was innovative in the new setting. Eco-

initiatives occur at all levels within companies, resulting

from creative ideas from managers, ofce personnel, blue-

collar workers, or other types of employees. In practice, we

observed three types of environmental initiatives: those that

decreased the environmental impacts of the company, thosethat solved an environmental problem for the company, and

those that developed a more eco-efcient product/service.

Examples of employee-lead environmental initiatives

abound. Employees at GE Plastics Europe's Bergen Op Zoom

facilities in The Netherlands took responsibility for devel-

oping innovative waste reduction and recycling programs as

part of company-wide efforts to decrease environmental

impacts (Ramus, 1997). At the Allentown, Pennsylvania

Lucent Technologies manufacturing facility, a team of

employees developed a microchip cleaning process which

replaced a hazardous volatile organic compound with water,

thus eliminating an environmental problem for the company

(Ramus, Steger, & Winter, 1996). A team at Neste's research

laboratory in Porvoo, Finland developed a cleaner diesel fuel,

which was marketed with great success, adding to the

company's protability while resulting in cleaner air in

Helsinki where it rst was sold in fuel stations (Neste, 1997).4

1.2. What inuences employees to try eco-initiatives?

Both organizational and individual factors can affectemployee willingness to eco-innovate (Hostager, Neil,

Decker, & Lorentz, 1998). The rm can signal desirability

for and provide organizational incentives for employees to

take environmental actions. For example, environmental

policies and supportive behaviors from supervisors can

signal organizational support. In addition, individual

employees may have skills and competences that enhance

their abilities to participate in environmental initiatives.

Employees can bring these skills when they accept employ-

ment, and/or they can develop environmental skills on the

job. And as importantly, employees may come to companies

with intrinsic motivation and values that motivate them totake actions to protect the natural environment. These pre-

existing skills and values are not tested in our study. Rather

we focus on measuring the set of organizational factors,

which could inuence employee actions, since these are the

factors that managers can inuence. For example, we mea-

sure employee perceptions of supervisory behaviors that

encourage environmental competence building, but we do

not try to measure the existing environmental competencies

of employees at the time of employment.

2. Environmental policies and supervisory behaviors:

best practices

Amabile et al. (1996) found that organizational and

supervisory factors encourage employee creativity. We

wanted to discover which forms these two categories of

factors might take in rms that were committed to support-

ing employees' environmental creativity. From structured

interviews with managers and employees, we discovered

2 Note that the author has published the empirical data and

results of the survey in a separate article where the measures,

results, and validity of the survey are explored in detail (Ramus &

Steger, 2000).3 Many companies today measure the environmental impacts of

their businesses against a set of goals, much like they measure their

nancial performance against a set of nancial goals. Thus, we call

measurement of this progress against environmental goals,

environmental performance.

4 This example was presented by Juha Kiljonen, Business

Development Manager, Fortum Oil, at IMD International's MIBE

Forum, in November 1999. The oil and gas divisions of Neste Oy

became Fortum Oil just prior to his presentation.

152 C.A. Ramus / Journal of World Business 37 (2002) 151164


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that 13 environmental policies and six categories of super-

visory behaviors existed in companies who were trying to

support employee eco-initiatives. The companies were

selected because they stated they were committed to envir-

onmental sustainability, demonstrated this through having

environmental policies, and had had some success in sup-

porting employee environmental actions. We describe the

sustainability policies and supportive supervisory behaviors

found in these companies. These two sets of factors form the

basis for the survey discussed later on.

2.1. Corporate environmental policies

Since the United Nations Conference on Environment and

Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1992 many com-

panies have gone beyond the publishing of an environmental

policy stating their intent to reduce environmental impacts.

Many global corporations have adopted a set of environ-

mental policies aimed at integrating environmental consid-erations throughout the company. Many of these policies go

beyond compliance and environmental impact reduction and

stretch the company toward sustainability goals.

Which policies are some proactive companies adopting to

move their businesses toward sustainability? Managers from

12 international companies in the MIBE project at IMD

created a list of 13 sustainability policies they had in their

companies.5 These policies ranged from having a written

environmental policy to having use-reduction policies in the

areas of fossil fuels, toxic chemicals, etc. (Table 1 contains a

list of the 13 environmental policies.)

2.1.1. Written environmental policy

In a company, a written environmental policy forms the

backbone and skeletal framework from which all other

environmental components are hung, including the environ-

mental management system (EMS), audits, assessments, and

reports (Brophy, 1998). It indicates to internal and external

stakeholders that the company intends to take environmental

protection seriously. And, it tells employees that the com-

pany will take a responsible approach to environmental

issues. The written environmental policy often acts as a

guide for employee actions when it provides environmental

targets and objectives. Having a written policy in itself does

not make a company proactive or sustainable. Rather, it is anecessary prerequisite for sustainable development.

2.1.2. Specic targets for improving environmentalperformance

At a minimum environmental targets set goals for improv-

ing company environmental performance. But companies

can take the target setting exercise further by developing a

system to measure environmental impacts across the life

cycle of the company's products and services. Once the

impacts have been quantied, an environmental index can be

created to lay out targets for facilities, business units, and

overall corporate performance (Epstein, 1996). Without

targets, environmental progress is seldom made. By taking

a comprehensive, life cycle approach to setting targets across

all activities and for all products and services, the companycan move itself toward sustainability.

2.1.3. Publication of an environmental (sustainability)

report

Since 1992 there has been a strong increase in the number

of companies that have been publishing their environmental

performance for stakeholder review (Sustainability & Uni-

ted Nations Environmental Program, 1997). In 1997 a survey

of 596 companies from Fortune 500 and Standard & Poor

500 showed that 108 produced environmental reports. Com-

panies produce environmental reports in order to present the

environmental objectives of the organization and its perfor-

mance against explicit targets. Environmental reports arewritten for both internal and external audiences, with many

companies stating that external stakeholders are of second-

ary concern when they publish their environmental report.

Many companies use the report primarily as a tool for

increasing employee involvement in environmental manage-

ment, increasing employee morale, and winning top man-

agement support (Lober, Bynum, Campbell, & Jacques,

1997). A new trend for proactive companies is to move

toward ``sustainability'' reporting, incorporating aspects of

social, economic and environmental performance in a single

report. For example, the Body Shop and British Telecom

produce sustainability reports.

Table 1

List of environmental policies which exist in environmentally

proactive rms

1. Written environmental policy

2. Specific targets for improving environmental performance

3. Publication of an environmental (sustainability) report

4. Environmental management system

5. Environmental purchasing policy

6. Environmental training and education

7. Employee responsibility for environmental performance

8. Life cycle analysis (assessment) policy

9. Management understands sustainable development

10. Fossil fuel use reduction policy

11. Toxic chemical use reduction policy

12. Policy of reducing use of unsustainable products

13. Same environmental standards at home and abroad

5 MIBE is the environmental management research project at the

International Institute for Management Development (IMD)

sponsored by companies who see environmental management as

a source of competitive advantage. In 1996, a group of 12

environmental officers sat together and developed a list of

environmental policies that existed in their companies. Not all of

the policies existed in all of the companies, but the managers

agreed that the trend was to develop such a set of sustainability

policies that cut across departments and managerial responsibil-

ities.

C.A. Ramus / Journal of World Business 37 (2002) 151164 153


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2.1.4. Environmental management system

Environmental management systems are in vogue. Since

the mid-1990s, a signicant number of companies have

applied these systems. Broadly dened, an EMS is a trans-

parent, systematic process for implementing environmental

goals, policies and responsibilities, and auditing these ele-

ments (Steger, 2000). Thus, EMS's provide a tool for

employees and managers to take environmental impacts into

consideration when performing daily job functions. The

implementation of an environmental management system,

like International Standards Organization's (ISO) 14001 or

the European Union's Environmental Management and

Auditing Scheme (EMAS), is a necessary but not a sufcient

condition for reaching ecological sustainability for business

activities (Roome, 1992; Welford, 1993). (Note: The adop-

tion rate of the ISO 14001 certied EMS is far lower in the

United States than in Europe where there are institutional

incentives for implementing environmental management

systems (Delmas, in press).)

2.1.5. Environmental purchasing policy

Many companies include in their environmental policy a

statement that they intend to work with suppliers to mini-

mize impacts on the environment. Proactive companies often

partner with and/or apply pressure on their suppliers to this

end. One mechanism companies use is the requirement that

suppliers have a certied environmental management sys-

tem. Another is using a comprehensive questionnaire asking

about the supplier's environmental practices and perfor-

mance. Scott Ltd. in the United Kingdom dropped the worst

10% of their suppliers after such an environmental perfor-mance assessment (Hutchinson, 1998). Beyond looking up

their value chain to their suppliers, some companies, which

care about the sustainability of their activities, now look

down the value chain too. They work to reduce the environ-

mental impacts of their distribution networks and to improve

the useful life and recyclability of their products and

services.

2.1.6. Environmental training and education

Environmental training, education and skill development

improve employees' abilities to give high quality contribu-

tions to environmental activities. The capacity of employees

to participate in environmental problem-solving as well asthe motivation to do so can both be improved if a company

has a strong environmental training program in place (Wehr-

meyer, 1996; Welford, 1998). Some corporations try to

integrate environmental considerations into most or all of

their training programs for different levels of employees and

managers; others offer programs that are focused on envir-

onmental, health and safety subjects alone; other companies

use external education opportunities such as job rotations,

outside courses, and site visits. The success of environmental

training is not solely dependent upon the quality of the

programs or the stated corporate intent to train employees.

Supervisory encouragement for employee participation in

environmental capacity building activities is important, and

often missing.6

2.1.7. Employee responsibility for environmental

performance

The successful implementation of corporate environmen-

tal policies and management systems depend on environ-

mental responsibility being shared with employees and

managers at all levels of the company (Hutchinson, 1996).

While there may not be an explicit written policy stating that

employees are responsible for environmental performance, it

is clear to employees whether or not the company expects

them to help reach the company's environmental goals.

2.1.8. Life cycle analysis (assessment) policy

Originally, companies used life cycle analysis (LCA)

(sometimes called ` life cycle assessment'') as a tool for

designing products and services with reduced environmental

impacts, but now it is also used for assessing and minimizingenvironmental impacts of company business processes. LCA

can be an effective tool for aiding companies who want to

achieve sustainable development (Welford, 1998). For

example, a company who tries to minimize environment

impacts across the life cycle of all its processes including

purchasing, manufacturing, distribution, product/service use

and disposal can truly improve its environmental perfor-

mance. This is especially true since the largest environmen-

tal impact for many products comes during the use of the

products and at the end of their life (i.e., at disposal).

2.1.9. Management understands sustainable developmentThere is an active movement within many companies

today to take responsibility for the sustainable development

of their enterprises. But how effective are companies with

sustainable development goals at sharing responsibility for

these with managers? Do managers in companies with

proactive environmental policies really understand the wider

issues of sustainable development? Are managers taking

steps to address sustainable development in these enter-

prises? It is clear that managers have an important role to

play in bridging the gap between traditional business pro-

cesses and those necessary for the transformation into a

sustainable enterprise. Some companies make line managers

explicitly responsible by incorporating environmental tar-gets into performance evaluations and linking bonuses to

fulllment of these environmental targets.

In addition to thesegeneral environmentalpolicy questions,

there are a number of specic sustainability policies that some

companies are embracing. The Natural Step, an international

organization, begun by Karl H. Robert in Sweden, delineated

a number of systems conditions necessary for enterprises to

attain sustainability. Reduced use of unsustainable sources of

6 We found that even in our sample of environmental proactive

companies, managers were often weak at supporting employee

environmental competence building (see Ramus & Steger, 2000).



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energy, persistent chemicals, and natural resources, as well as

environmental equity are the four system conditions outlined

by The Natural Step (Robert, 1989). Some proactive com-

panies have adopted these four policies.

2.1.10. Fossil fuel use reduction policy

Companies, which truly want to move toward sustainable

development, must focus on using renewable energy sources.

2.1.11. Toxic chemical use reduction policy

Persistent toxic chemicals, because of their negative and

long-term impacts on the natural environment, must be

replaced by more benign substitutes if an enterprise wants

to become sustainable.

2.1.12. Policy of reducing use of unsustainable products

Products, whose harvesting and use do irreparable

damage to eco-systems and the natural environment, must

be replaced with sustainably harvested substitutes. Forexample, unsustainably harvested sh can threaten species

diversity, which is seen as causing irreparable damage to

eco-systems on which humans and animals depend.

2.1.13. Same environmental standards at home and abroad

A central tenant of sustainable development is that a

company should use the same high standards to protect

human health and the environment in all places that a

company operates. Thus, the higher standards that are

enforced by law in developed countries in North America

and Europe would be automatically applied in sustainable

enterprises that operate globally.In conclusion, there is evidence that environmentally

proactive companies are increasingly adopting environmen-

tal policies that go beyond pollution reduction. Many rms

are beginning to endorse policies that focus on pollution

prevention and environmentally sustainable actions.

2.2. Supervisory behaviors that support employees

eco-initiatives

Supervisory behaviors can also have an effect on

employee willingness to try eco-initiatives. Learning orga-

nizations, or organizations that support the continuous learn-

ing and knowledge creation of all their employees, so theorganizations can grow, change and innovate (Cavaleri &

Fearon, 1996), often have managers who aregood at empow-

ering employees (Bowen & Lawler, 1992; Garvin, 1993;

Kimberley & Evanisko, 1981; Pearn, Roderick, & Mulroo-

ney, 1995; Redmond, Mumford, & Teach, 1993; Senge,

1990). We looked at those supervisory behaviors that exist

in learning organizations, as well as those that existed in

companies who had successfully supported employee eco-

initiatives and found them to be similar.

What types of supervisory behaviors exist in rms that are

good at supporting eco-initiatives? This was a question we

asked ourselves when developing our employee survey. We

interviewed 50 employees at ve companies with reputa-

tions of supporting employee environmental creativity, andasked them which of their supervisors' behaviors support or

failed to support their environmental actions. From this

starting point we developed an empirical tool measuring

six categories of behaviors. (Table 2 contains a list and brief

description of the six categories.) The characteristics of

managers who used learning organization behaviors to sup-

port environmental innovation are detailed as follows.

2.3. Behaviors that support eco-initiatives

2.3.1. Innovation

What are some of the things that managers do to encou-rage environmental innovations on the part of employees?

They make it acceptable to take risks. They implement

employees' suggestions. They see mistakes as learning

opportunities. They encourage experimentation to develop

new processes. They learn from both inside and outside of

their own organization. They use assignment rotations as

learning tools. They quickly implement changes. They

partner with other departments to implement new ideas.

In essence, managers who want to support employee

innovation have a set of skills that encourage new ideas,

experimentation, and learning from a myriad of people,

departments, business units, and other organizations. These

managers signal through their behaviors that they are open tonew environmental ideas. For example, these managers are

good at asking employees regularly for creative environmen-

tal ideas, designing teams to work on environmental problem-

solving or product/process development, and providing

resources and other support for environmental projects.

2.3.2. Competence building

What do managers who want to support employee envir-

onmental competence building do? They use training and

education to foster innovation. They look for learning

situations for employees, like courses, mentors, site visits,

etc. They ensure that employees get training on new skills

Table 2

List of categories of managerial behaviors found in rms that

support environmental initiatives by employees

1. Innovation: Encouraging new ideas, experimentation, and

learning

2. Competence building: Supportive of training and education

activities

3. Communication: Encouraging employees to communicate their

suggestions, thoughts, and critiques

4. Information dissemination: Sharing important company

information with employees

5. Rewards and recognition: Using formal rewards and informal

praise to recognize and reinforce desired employee behaviors

6. Management of goals and responsibilities: Using quantitative

and qualitative measures to share goals and responsibility for

performance with employees



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that will help the employees engage in environmental activ-

ities. They realign employee responsibilities to allow the

employee time for training, site visits, and exploring new

techniques for doing his/her job. They spend time with each

employee developing and implementing an environmental

learning plan.

These managers nd ways to focus time and resources on

employee development in the environmental area. In doing

so, they signal clearly that they, and the organization, care

about giving the employee the necessary knowledge and

competences to engage in environmental problem-solving.

For example, these managers use regular performance eva-

luation meetings to discuss the employees' environmental

training needs.

2.3.3. Communication

What do managers who want to create an open environ-

ment for employee communication on environmental man-

agement issues do? They discourage organizationalhierarchies and ``we'' vs. ``they'' thinking in the organiza-

tion. They encourage individuals and groups to communi-

cate on problems and to propose solutions. They develop

open and direct styles of communication. They are good

listeners. They encourage employees to express concerns

about company decisions and policies. And, they openly

discuss employees' concerns. They answer questions hon-

estly even if the answer is not what the employee wants to

hear. They value the inputs of managers and employees from

all parts of the company. They accept criticism of ideas (and

even of themselves) and dissent.

In general, we found that managers who have democraticand participative styles (Lawler, 1986) of communication

are very good at supporting employee environmental inno-

vation. They foster employee trust through open commu-

nication, and by doing so they create a work environment

where employees contribute their creative environmental

solutions. For example, these managers are not threatened

or defensive about employee criticisms or comments, but

rather listen with an open mind to environmental commu-

nication, and encourage employees to share their ideas with

other managers and business units within the company.

2.3.4. Information dissemination

What do managers do to encourage the ow of informationin order to help environmental problem-solving? They pro-

vide clear, accurate, easily accessible information to internal

and external audiences, like environmental reports, environ-

mental targets, chemical release data, site expansion plans,

etc. They use information systems like email, electronic

bulletin boards, etc. to share information amongst employees.

They inform employees about changes in company vision,

policies, and progress toward goals. They forewarn employ-

ees about signicant changes. They inform employees of what

they need to know and where to get information they want.

In learning organizations, managers give information

that affects employees' decision-making. This top-down,

manager to employee dissemination of information is sup-

posed to help employee to nd environmental solutions as it

keeps the employees informed of the company environmen-

tal vision and goals.

2.3.5. Rewards and recognition

What do managers do to reward and recognize employee

environmental problem-solving? They look for opportu-

nities to publicly praise good ideas. They never publicly

reprimand an employee for a failure or a mistake, but rather,

in private, use it as a learning opportunity. They reward their

team for good efforts and for progress toward goals. They

use company bonus systems and other monetary awards to

reward employees who achieve and surpass their environ-

mental goals.

These managers use formal award systems, but also look

for daily opportunities to give feedback and praise in order to

help motivate employees to nd solutions to environmental

problems and to develop less polluting products and ser-vices. They always recognize environmental ideas by

employees, even if they aren't implemented. For example,

these managers feature environmental successes during

regular staff meetings.

2.3.6. Management of goals and responsibilities

How do managers use goal setting and responsibility

sharing as tools to motivate employee environmental parti-

cipation? They seldom delegate tasks, but rather look for

ways to share ownership for overarching goals. They talk

regularly with employees to assess progress toward goals

and to offer help. They use both qualitative and quantitativemeasures to assure individual contributions to company

environmental targets.

These managers are good at using the performance

evaluation process and regular review meetings to share

responsibility for environmental goals with employees. They

instill ownership while at the same time providing guidance

to facilitate employee success in environmental activities.

In conclusion, we learned from our interviews with

employees which managerial behaviors the employees felt

encouraged their environmental activities. Our empirical

study tested which of these categories of behaviors had a

signicant impact on a large number of employees in

different rms. Note that these six categories correspondto those dened in the learning organization literature

(Campbell & Cairns, 1994).

3. Employee eco-initiatives survey7

Research on employee creativity and innovation in rms,

as well as the literature on learning organizations, indicate

7 For a complete discussion of the measures, data analysis,

validity, and limitations of the study, see the article in the Academy

of Management Journal by Ramus and Steger (2000).



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that organizational and supervisory support will increase

employee willingness to take actions. The environmental

management literature assumes that the factors that effect

creativity and innovation in general will also be the factors

that will affect environmental creativity and innovation.

Prior to our survey research there was no empirical test

of which factors were effective in supporting employee

environmental initiatives. We tested two hypotheses. The

hypothesis that environmental policies signal organizational

priorities and, if effectively communicated, could focus

employees on environmental problem-solving. And, the

hypothesis that supportive supervisory behaviors were of

paramount importance in enticing employees to try eco-

initiatives (Milliman & Clair, 1995; Shrivastava, 1996;

Stern, 1992; Storen, 1997).

Our research shows that companies with a commitment to

environmentally sensitive business development have a

number of environmental policies to communicate these

sustainability goals. In fact, many leading-edge rms hadup to 13 environmental policies, directed at different envir-

onmental improvements, as discussed above and shown in

Table 1). Using data from an employee survey, we identied

which of the 13 environmental policies, when perceived by

employees, resulted in a greater probability that the

employee would take an environmental initiative. We found

that if the employee believed the company was committed to

a written environmental policy it more than doubled the

probability (from 19 to 50%) that the employee would have

tried an environmental initiative. Other policies had no direct

positive effect on employee eco-initiatives.

Environmental management researchers have assumedthat supportive supervisory behaviors, which are found in

so-called ` learning organizations'', encourage employee

environmental initiatives. We made an empirical test of

which behaviors resulted in increased probability of

employee environmental initiatives and which had no sig-

nicant impact. Of the six categories of supervisory beha-

viors that we found could signal to employees the

desirability of environmental actions (described above and

listed in Table 2), we found that ve of the six categories of

behaviors had a signicant impact on employee willingness

to try eco-initiatives. The sixth category, sharing of envir-

onmental information, which was assumed to effect

employee eco-innovation, had no signicant impact.Some of our ndings conrm the assumptions that those

factors that support innovations in general also improve the

likelihood that employees will eco-innovate, and some of

our ndings run counter to these assumptions. Thus, we offer

a revision of the theories we tested. In addition, we offer

lessons for managers who want to support employee envir-

onmental participation.

3.1. Method

As described above, we developed an understanding

of policies and behavioral factors that could impact

employee environmental actions through interviews with

employees in environmentally proactive rms. Then we

developed a questionnaire to test which of these two types

of factors had an important positive relationship to employee

eco-initiatives. The respondents answered 13 policy ques-

tions (like ``my company publishes an environmental pol-

icy'', and ``my company makes employees responsible for

company environmental performance'') using a 5-point

scale (Strongly Agree, Partially Agree, Don't Know, Par-

tially Disagree and Strongly Disagree).8 When answering

questions related to their direct supervisor, respondents

selected the most typical daily behavior from a list of

710 rank-ordered behaviors in the six categories (innova-

tion, competence building, communication, information

dissemination, rewards and recognition, and management

of goals and responsibilities). For example, in the category

of competence building, the behaviors ranged from the

least positive ``refuses to commit resources and employee

time for training and education activities'' to the mostsupportive ` spends time discussing and implementing

a learning plan with each employee.'' They selected

one behavior to describe the supervisor's most typical

behavior related to general management, then from the same

list, they selected one behavior to describe the supervisor's

most typical behavior when managing environmental

issues.

3.2. Data sources

Middle and low-level employees from 12 countries

(Austria, Belgium, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Italy,The Netherlands, Norway, Spain, the United Kingdom, and

the United States) who were employed by six companies

with proactive environmental policies were the focus of

our empirical investigation into these questions. In order

to obtain a diverse sample of employees, we sent our

survey questionnaire out in four languages. We received

responses from 353 employees in 1996 and 1997. (This was

a 24% response rate; 1,465 surveys were distributed). The

respondents all worked for large European headquartered

companies with all or most of the 13 environmental

policies.9 To ensure respondents of condentiality, all ques-

tionnaires were returned directly to the author for process-

ing and only aggregate results were reported back to thecompanies.

8 Here we are measuring employee perceptions of company

commitment to environmental policies, not whether the company

says it is committed to such policies. What is of interest for our study

is the effect that perceived commitment to environmental policies has

on employee willingness to try environmental initiatives.9 Each of the six companies was listed in the top 200 in terms of

sales in the countries where they were headquartered. They

employed between 1,500 to 41,000 people, and represented a

number of industries including: chemical, entertainment, manu-

facturing, medical devices, oil and retail.



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3.3. Data analysis

The objective of our analysis was to examine the relation-

ship between environmental policies and employee environ-

mental initiatives, and the relationship between supervisory

behaviors and employee environmental initiatives.

Employee willingness to try an environmental initiative is

the dependent variable. To examine these relationships weused logit analyses and likelihood ratio tests. We also wanted

to nd out if employees perceived that their supervisors

were as supportive of environmental activities as other

general management activities. We used Chi-square tests

of differences for this comparison. The results of the

statistical tests can be found in Tables 37. (These tables

are reprinted from Academy of Management Journal by

Ramus & Steger (2000).)

A complete discussion of the research methodology,

statistical tests and results of the data analysis can be found

in an article by Ramus and Steger (2000). We have summar-

ized these empirical results below to demonstrate thosefactors that have the greatest impact on employee environ-

mental initiatives. We believe that these results can be

helpful to managers who are thinking of making changes

to their environmental management programs.

Table 3

Descriptive statistics and correlation table for environmental policies

Independent variables Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

1. Pu blish ed environ mental policy 1 .61 0 .73

2. Specific targets for

environmental performance

1.46 0.71 0.48***

3. Publishes annual environmental report 1.08 1.01 .41*** 0.47***

4. Uses environmental management system 1.22 0.91 0.37*** 0.51*** 0.45***

5. Environmental considerations in

purchasing decisions

0.75 1.05 .36*** 0.45*** 0.33*** 0.38***

6. Emplo yee environm en tal train in g 0 .58 1 .22 0 .25*** 0.36*** 0.35*** 0.32*** 0.35***

7. Employees responsible for company

environmental performance

0.86 1.20 0.25*** 0.34*** 0.33*** 0.37*** 0.37*** 0.53***

8. Life cycle analysis 0.21 0.99 0.18*** 0.23*** 0.29*** 0.21*** 0.37*** 0.28*** 0.31***

9. Management understands/addresses issue

of sustainable development

0.66 1.01 0.32*** 0.30*** 0.35*** 0.34*** 0.39*** 0.31*** 0.41*** 0.39***

10. Syste mat ic al ly re duce s fossil fuel use 0.14 1.27 0.08 0.23*** 0.14** 0.31*** 0.27*** 0.15*** 0.28*** 0.25*** 0.30***

11. Systematically reduces toxic chemicals use 0.73 1.15 0.17*** 0.29*** 0.18*** 0.22*** 0.31*** 0.05 0.13** 0.21*** 0.35*** 0.34***

12. Systematically reduces consumption of

unsustainable products

0.40 1.12 0.19*** 0.23*** 0.21*** 0.20*** 0.40*** 0.16** 0.25*** 0.37*** 0.36*** 0.51*** 0.59***

13. Applies same environmental

standards at home and abroad

0.64 1.09 0.19*** 0.24*** 0.17*** 0.19*** 0.26*** 0.31*** 0.25*** 0.18*** 0.27*** 0.03 0.14** 0.13*

Scale: Strongly Agree (2), Partially Agree (1), Don't Know (0), Partially Disagree (1), Strongly Disagree (2).*

p 0:05; ** p 0:01; *** p 0:001.

Table 4

Logit analyses of dependent variable on environmental policy independent variables

Constants p-values for

constants

Independent

variables

Coefficients p-values

1 0.74 0.01* Published environmental policy 0.37 0.02*

2 0.31 0.21 Specific targets for environmental performance 0.13 0.403 0.33 0.04* Publishes annual environmental report 0.19 0.08

4 0.13 0.46 Uses environmental management system 0 1.00

5 0.14 0.29 Environmental considerations in purchasing decisions 0.02 0.81

6 0.20 0.10 Employee environmental training 0.13 0.15

7 0.14 0.30 Employees responsible for company environmental performance 0.02 0.78

8 0.14 0.20 Life cycle analysis 0.08 0.47

9 0.19 0.14 Management understands/addresses issue of sustainable development 0.09 0.38

10 0.15 0.16 Systematically reduces fossil fuel use 0.18 0.04*

11 0 1.00 Systematically reduces toxic chemicals use 0.17 0.07

12 0.07 0.54 Systematically reduces consumption of unsustainable products 0.16 0.11

13 0.23 0.07 Applies same environmental standards at home and abroad 0.15 0.12

Dependent variable: employee environmental initiatives.*

p 0:

05.



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Table 5

Descriptive statistics and correlation table for supervisory behaviors

Independent variables Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

1. Environmental innovation 6.02 2.30

2. Environmental competence building 5.70 1.79 0.31***

3. Environmental communication 6.26 2.08 0.41*** 0.41***

4. Environmental information

dissemination

6.95 2.13 0.33*** 0.43*** 0.51***

5. Environmental rewards/recognition 5.93 2.25 0.30*** 0.40*** 0.47*** 0.45***

6. Environmental management

goals/responsibilities

5.85 2.60 0.35*** 0.38*** 0.54*** 0.50*** 0.54***

7. General innovation 6.49 2.21 0.51*** 0.25*** 0.38*** 0.27*** 0.27*** 0.38***

8. General competence building 5.84 1.79 0.22*** 0.50*** 0.32*** 0.31*** 0.37*** 0.29*** 0.23***

9. General communication 6.28 2.18 0.24*** 0.33*** 0.58*** 0.42*** 0.42*** 0.41*** 0.34*** 0.32***

10. General information dissemination 7.09 2.31 0.26*** 0.37*** 0.40*** 0.68*** 0.37*** 0.40*** 0.27*** 0.39*** 0.48***

11. General rewards/recognition 6.00 2.54 0.27*** 0.26*** 0.38*** 0.36*** 0.71*** 0.38*** 0.29*** 0.35*** 0.40*** 0.37***

12. General management

goals/responsibilities

6.21 2.67 0.28*** 0.29*** 0.43*** 0.43*** 0.39*** 0.65*** 0.38*** 0.34*** 0.41*** 0.47*** 0.42***

Scale: maximum 10; minimum 1.***p 0:001.

Table 6

Logit analysis of dependent variable on supervisory behaviors independent variables

Constants p-values of

constants

Independent variables Coefficients p-values

1 0.79 0.01** Environmental innovation 0.11 0.02*

2 0.98 0.01** Environmental competence building 0.15 0.01**

3 1.09 0** Environmental communication 0.16 0**

4 0.61 0.10 Environmental information dissemination 0.07 0.17

5 0.93 0** Environmental rewards/recognition 0.13 0.01**

6 0.81 0** Environmental management goals/responsibilities 0.12 0.01**

7 0.77 0.02* General innovation 0.10 0.05*

8 0.42 0.25 General competence building 0.05 0.39

9 0.67 0.05* General communication 0.08 0.09

10 0.70 0.05* General information dissemination 0.08 0.09

11 0.81 0** General rewards/recognition 0.11 0.01**

12 0.77 0.01** General management goals/responsibilities 0.10 0.01**

Dependent variable: employee environmental initiatives.* p 0:05; ** p 0:01.

Table 7

Chi-square test of the differences in answers to environmental and general management concerning supervisory behaviors

Environmental vs. general Chi-square value p-value

Empirical Theoretical

Innovation 23.02 16.92 0.006***

Competence building 24.58 12.59 0***

Communication 27.17 15.51 0.001***

Information dissemination 29.70 15.51 0***

Rewards/recognition 40.43 15.51 0***

Management goals/responsibilities 28.07 16.92 0.001***

***

p 0:

001.



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4. Results and discussion

Our study showed what many rms might have suspected,

that line managers, even in environmentally committed

companies, are less supportive when managing environmen-

tal activities than other activities. When employees are

aware that the company is committed to a written environ-

mental policy statement, they are more likely to try envir-

onmental initiatives. Other environmental policies (like

environmental purchasing, environmental reporting, having

an environmental management system, for example) had no

signicant direct impact on employee environmental

actions. Employees who felt their supervisors were suppor-

tive of environmental actions were more likely to try envir-

onmental initiatives than those who did not feel their

supervisors used supportive behaviors. Managerial beha-

viors that supported environmental innovation, environmen-

tal education, environmental communication from

employees, rewarding and recognizing environmentalactions, and managing environmental goals and responsi-

bilities have a positive effect. But, dissemination of company

environmental information had no signicant effect on

employee willingness to eco-innovate. (See Section 5.7

for an explanation of this counter-intuitive result.)

A summary of the employee survey results is shown in

Fig. 1. We looked at direct impacts of each environmental

policy and each supervisory behavior on the dependent

variable (employee eco-initiatives). One of the 13 policies

and ve of the categories of supervisory behaviors had

a direct positive effect on employee willingness to eco-

innovate.

Clearly, communicating company commitment to an

environmental policy statement more than doubled the

probability that an employee tried an eco-initiative, increas-

ing it from 19 to 50%. But, 11 of the other 12 environmental

policies had only an indirect impact on employee eco-

innovation. Indirect impacts, meaning that the respondents

who perceived the existence of policies were more sensitive

to supportive or unsupportive behaviors on the part of their

supervisors, existed in all cases except in the case of the

fossil fuel policy. When employees perceived these 12

environmental policies (including having a written environ-

mental policy), they were more likely to eco-innovate if their

supervisor used learning organization support behaviors

directed at environmental activities, and less likely to

eco-innovate if their supervisor used behaviors that wereperceived to be less supportive of environmental actions.

Policies like, having an environmental management system,

publishing an environmental report, etc. are important

because they sensitize employees to support from their

supervisors.

An interesting exception in our results exists for policy

10. Having a fossil fuel use reduction policy had a signicant

negative impact on employee eco-initiatives. We found that

Fig. 1. Environmental policies and supervisory behaviors which support employee environmental initiatives.



11/14

the majority of the rms in our survey did not have this

policy. (Only two of the six rms had a fossil fuel use

reduction policy.) The data showed that those employees

who perceived that the policy did not exist were those who

were more likely to eco-innovate. One possible interpreta-

tion of this result is that knowledge of which policies exist

has a direct affect on employee eco-innovation. Our study

seems to indicate that those employees who are more

knowledgeable about the policies are also those who are

more likely to try environmental initiatives, but other inter-

pretations of this result are possible since energy policy in

companies is not only motivated by environmental con-

cern.10 (Note that we did not observe an indirect effect

between fossil fuel policy and supervisory behaviors.)

In general, we found that having line managers who use

learning organization behaviors when managing environ-

mental activities increased the probability of employees

trying eco-initiatives. For example, when employees per-

ceived supportive environmental communication behaviorsfrom their supervisors it more than doubled the probability

that they would have tried environmental initiatives (from 28

to 62%). Companies, which have line managers who used

supportive behaviors, are also those that beneted from a

larger number of eco-initiatives. The following is a rank-

ordered list of the results, with the categories of supervisory

behaviors that had the strongest impact at the top of the list.

1. Environmental communication: Participative environ-

mental management style, including use of a demo-

cratic, non-hierarchical approach to encouraging

communication from employees.

2. Environmental competence building: Encourages envir-onmental competence building by employees, including

allocating time and resources.

3. Environmental rewards and recognition: Using daily

praise and company awards to reinforce environmental

successes and problem-solving.

4. Management of environmental goals and responsibil-

ities: Shares environmental goals and responsibilities

with employees.

5. Environmental innovation: Shows openness to new

environmental ideas and encourages employees to

experiment to nd solutions to environmental problems.

The companies selected for our survey all stated they hada commitment to sustainable development, yet we found that

line managers in these rms consistently used less suppor-

tive behaviors when managing environmental activities than

other general management activities. This demonstrates how

difcult it is for rms to make environmental management a

priority for managers.

5. Lessons for companies and for managers

5.1. Companies need an environmental vision and policies

Employees are more likely to engage in environmental

problem-solving in rms that clearly communicate their

environmental vision through policies. Our study shows that

having environmental policies on the books is not enough.

Most of the 13 policies of sustainability existed in the

companies for which the employees in our survey worked.

Yet, only where the company had communicated a clear

environmental vision using these policies did we see an

increased probability of employee eco-initiatives.

A written environmental policy has the most signicant

impact on employee actions, but the indirect impact of othersustainability policies is also important. Employee aware-

ness of these other policies makes them ripe for environ-

mental actions. But, if they sense that their supervisor does

not want them to engage in environmental problem-solving,

then they do not take actions. The implication is that

companies should prime their managers to be supportive

of environmental activities prior to communicating environ-

mental policies, or the communication of these policies can

back reresulting in a decrease in eco-innovation. (And

possibly an increase in employee dissatisfaction with the

company and its management.)

5.2. A participative communication style applied to

environmental management

Of the six categories of learning organization behaviors,

the most important was environmental communication. Line

managers in rms who embrace democratic approaches

when managing employees are more likely to reap the full

benets of employee environmental problem-solving. We all

know that managers should listen to their employees, but our

result indicates that it is important for managers to listen to

and elicit employees' environmental ideas. Employees are

more likely to be creative when their environmental ideas,

criticism, or suggestions are heard and acknowledged. Theenergy it takes for a manager to give an employee feedback

on environmental ideas is well spent, since it seems to lead to

increasing numbers of environmental initiatives.

Sometimes an employee from one area will have the

solution to an environmental problem in another area of the

company. A manager who takes a non-hierarchical approach

will encourage the employee to communicate directly with

the other business area. But, we nd that in an organization

where managers don't listen and don't care, these environ-

mental solutions are unspoken. Thus, just as every company

knows it should listen to its customers, companies can

benet from encouraging managers at all levels to listen

10 Energy policy can be motivated by non-environmental issues

like cost concerns (e.g., in the airline industry fuel consumption is

one of the biggest expenses) or the products/services being

produced (e.g., an oil production company may not be committed

to reducing the use of the major commodity that they produce).

Therefore, there may be a hidden factor that can explain these

results.



12/14

to the environmental ideas of their employees. Our research

shows that this change alone will lead to more environmental

problem-solving from employees.

5.3. Competence building provides the environmental

problem-solving tools

Environmental education supports employee eco-innova-

tion. All of the companies in our survey had environmental

training programs. But often line management do not make it

a priority to send employees on courses, site visits, assign-

ment rotations, and other opportunities for building envir-

onmental problem-solving know-how. The most frequent

response was ` my manager neither encourages nor dis-

courages environmental competence building.'' Thirty-eight

percent of the respondents selected this behavior to describe

their managers' most typical daily behavior.

From employee written comments on the questionnaires,

it is clear that companies have trouble nding time to trainemployees. Even when resources are available, employees

often fail to get management support for learning activities.

The emergency of the day and getting daily tasks accom-

plished is seen as more pressing than building competencies

that can be advantageous for the future. This appears to the

employees to be especially true of environmental skills and

knowledge development. Since many managers have dif-

culty seeing the advantage of managing environmental

activities, they seldom make it a priority to develop and

implement environmental learning plans with their employ-

ees.

How can companies encourage managers to allocate timeand resources to employee environmental education? The

rst step is to provide line management with environmental/

sustainability training. If managers see the value of this type

of training rst-hand they will be better able to envision its

value to their employees.

5.4. Reward and recognize environmental actions

From our results we can see that a word of praise directed

at an environmental effort can go a long way in encouraging

employee participation. It is not surprising that employees

who found their managers to be good at using rewards

and recognition in the environmental area were those whotried environmental innovations.

Making environmental awards, bonus pay, gift certi-

cates, etc. available for managers can be a rst step in

creating an awareness in line management of the need for

daily feedback on environmental actions. One example is a

company that gave line managers discretion over giving

dinner vouchers at local restaurants to reward environmental

initiatives. The managers could give the vouchers on the spot

whenever they observed a positive environmental action.

Systems like these can multiply environmental actionsnot

because of the value of the awardbut rather because of the

value of being praised! In this company line managers

learned to look for environmental initiatives, and employee

environmental creativity blossomed under the attention.

5.5. Share environmental responsibilities with everyone

Our research shows that employees eco-innovate when

they ``own'' part of the corporate environmental targets. The

success of line managers in sharing goals is directly corre-

lated to employee eco-innovation rates. Without environ-

mental goals, environmental problem-solving seldom

occurs. Thus, companies who have managers who are good

at instilling responsibility in employees for environmental

solutions are those managers who have a greater probability

of having employees who eco-innovate.

For example, in one company we studied, every line

manager was evaluated in their performance review against

specic environmental targets. The only way for these

managers to reach their targets was to share responsibility

with their subordinates. Most of the employees in thiscompany reported that they felt their managers were good

at sharing environmental performance goals, and were sup-

portive of environmental initiatives.

5.6. Developing managers who believe in environmental

value creation

Our research shows that supervisors who are open to new

environmental ideas, experimentation, and innovative

approaches to problem solving are good at encouraging

employee eco-innovation. These behaviors, like some of

the other learning organization behaviors discussed above,might be difcult to instill in line managers.

If your company wants to have employee eco-innovation,

but your managers are not using supportive behaviors, what

can you do? Start over? Maybe yes. One implication of our

results is that becoming an ` environmental'' learning orga-

nization requires line management to care about environmen-

tal values; otherwise the evidence shows that they will not

support environmental management (Rands, 1990). One pos-

sibility is to start screening potential hires for environmental

values. Another is to invest in instilling these values into

existing line management through training, coaching, 3608

feedback, performance evaluation targets, and other manage-

mentdevelopmenttools.Doing bothsimultaneously will showthat thecompany really cares about achievingits sustainability

vision, and cares about supporting employee participation in

eco-initiatives to move toward sustainable development.

For example, one company required its line managers to

take environmental leadership training. The result was a

greater commitment to progress toward the company's

sustainable development goals.

5.7. A counter-intuitive result: information dissemination

One interesting result was that environmental information

dissemination did not have a signicant effect on employee



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eco-innovation. (The category of information dissemination

included behaviors that supported/failed to support top-

down (manager to employee) information sharing like infor-

mation on policies, performance, and, changes within the

company. This is in contrast to the highly signicant com-

munication category that included behaviors that supported

bottom-up (employee to manager) dialogue and sharing of

ideas.) We asked ourselves if the lack of signicance was

because environmental information was an unnecessary

driver. We believe from our interviews in companies and

from evidence in the survey that environmental information

can be highly important. For example, employee perceptions

of company commitment to a written environmental policy

had an important impact on environmental actions.

So we looked for another explanation. One alternative is

that managers poorly disseminate environmental informa-

tion. Possibly, managers are not currently communicating

environmental information, like progress toward company

environmental goals, to employees in a way that the employ-ees can associate this information with their personal

actions. And managers may not be giving employees envir-

onmental information of any kind regularly. It is difcult to

know the correct explanation for this result, but it may be

important for companies to ask themselves: do our line

managers have pertinent environmental information to share

with employees (for example, qualitative and quantitative

information disaggregated to the business unit level)? And if

so, are they disseminating it effectively?

6. Conclusions

Prior to our research no empirical work had been done to

demonstrate which organizational and supervisory factors

have an important impact on employee environmental

actions. This paper denes the policies and supervisory

behaviors that employees in companies say could have a

positive effect on their willingness to try environmental

initiatives. Then it shows which of these factors have a

signicant impact on employee willingness to take environ-

mental actions. The learning organization literature tells us

that all six behavioral categories (innovation, competence

building, communication, information dissemination,

rewards and recognition, and management of goals andresponsibilities) should have a signicant impact. We dis-

cover that in the environmental management case one of

these six, information dissemination, does not to date have

an important impact on employee actions. We also nd that a

well-communicated written environmental policy is the

single most important policy driver. Furthermore, environ-

mental policies are important because they make employees

sensitive to the signal (supportive or unsupportive) that they

receive from their line manager.

For companies that want to improve the sustainability of

their operations, our research indicates a number of possible

lessons. Sustainable development of businesses requires

both corporate commitment to a written environmental

policy statement and line management support for employee

environmental initiatives. Sustainability policies that lead-

ing-edge companies have developed, when communicated

clearly, make employees more sensitive to managerial sup-

port for eco-initiatives. Thus, we argue that companies need

more than just a clearly communicated set of policies aimed

at sustainable development. They also need line managers

who use a set of behaviors that show they care about

environmental value creation. Managers can be trained to

be good at encouraging employee environmental idea gen-

eration, and it may be expedient for rms to start hiring

managers who already use learning organization behaviors

and value environmental protection.

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Documents

encouraging green behavior.pdf