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We humans ponder others’ impressions of us, especially while in the throes of complicated performance. And that concern can be incentive enough to improve. However, at extreme it becomes a pathological obsession with the impossibility of being perfect.

So to start with, some comfort for all. An audit does not define yours, mine, or anyone else’s overall value as a human. Rather, it is merely a snapshot of the tasks one has accomplished toward multiple objectives in pursuit of a management system’s conformity, compliance, and continual improvement. Also, you may have your own definition of an audit superior to the one just given. And if so, that is just as well and perhaps even better, because it is in your working memory for ready use.

Just as important a realization is that ISO is voluntary, in that there are no fines or jail cells awaiting those who cannot pass muster. In short, don’t panic during any ISO audit – just keep your proverbial calm and carry on.

And while in full composure during audit, you do well to keep in mind that you are undergoing an evaluation of a system and NOT a person or people. Meaning that EMS evaluation is not a judgment of virtues, peccadilloes, and vulnerabilities. No, nor is the ISO 14001:2015 Standard a bible by any stretch. Sure, one can assert the analogy of an EMS as a kind of being and the Standard a sort of guide for the being’s behavior. But that’s as far as it goes.

Therefore, this analogy aside, an audit is just a temporal check of a management system, including actions taken by those who keep it running. But again, it is NOT an inquisition into one’s moral code, character, or anything else apart from the management system as a whole, being both its overall effectiveness and its indicators of continual improvement from one Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle to the next.

So, a bad EMS does not mean that there is a bad person behind it. Nor necessarily is there a virtuous person behind a stellar EMS. And auditors should not be treated as gods and goddesses, nor auditees as worthy of worship if they excel in system management.

For example, a person who passes an ISO 14001:2015 EMS audit with flying colors can still be very easy to work with, as in having such positive qualities as compassion, longsuffering, and optimism. Or that same successful person can be very difficult to work with: lacking sympathy, impatient, and cynical. So, from the evaluation of behaviors of thousands of people across some 200 external and internal audits, along with the development of several environmental management systems (EMS) “from scratch”, my view is there’s no direct correlation between performance and personality. In short, the virtues or vices of a person are not necessarily what drives the actual EMS performance.

However, the variant personalities of the people who perform and audit a management system are the very real story behind the difficulties of system improvement. And it is when a distorted perception becomes a personal reality – such as when the one responsible for an EMS feels he or she is being personally attacked for what should simply be an assessment of performance and not individual character – now that is when problems crop.

And what complicates the picture is that auditors can be so adamant about the relatively minute details of a system – for example, an overemphasis on documentation rather than whether actual performance is dampened by not dotting all i’s and crossing all t’s – that an auditee can feel pressured into having to overperform during audit. And this tends to result in personality clashes.

So there really is a great deal to be said for having the right players involved in the EMS. And this INCLUDES identifying reasonable internal and external auditors to assess system performance. After all, it is a voluntary program, and an auditee has the right to shop auditors and certification bodies until they find the right mix for long-term effectiveness and improvement. Which to my view is the most important element of a maturing EMS.

Here’s a safe guess: you make things or serve others and their contract demands an environmental management system (EMS) certified against International Standard ISO 14001.

So you may have to keep spill kits handy where chemicals are stored, separate incompatible ones, and permit equipment to protect air, water, or land. Different from but somewhat like an insured person who foregoes cigarettes, alcohol, and skydiving to pay less for premiums.

Either way is risk control. Run your plant without environmental concern, and you pay lower insurance premiums and no fines. But this also means that you must perform well, going against the grains of entropy and apathy.

Inanimate opponents include wear and tear, collisions between pieces of equipment, fires, and even wind, water, and soil erosion. Living opponents include absence of respect among staff, overemphasis on a single subject to exclusion of others, and even just plain fear which can immobilize people who ought be self-directed or receive direction to act.

Your plant may not face such extreme opposition. But the point is, systematic environmental management forces a company to eliminate any such opponents to good performance. That is because ISO 14001 requires a company know its context, that is, the commercial setting in which it remains a going concern. Likewise, the standard stipulates that the system have a policy as a statement of ideal performance and that leadership model it to employees. Without detailing them, other EMS elements include planning, support, operational controls, monitoring, and management review.

In short, building an EMS forces a self-examination which beats regulators to the punch. By virtue of ISO 14001 certification, companies not only find themselves complying with existing regulations but also integrating the business element of environmental risk into their daily practices. For more on how to make an EMS and ISO 14001 certification a reality for your company, please contact Don Dickerson, P.E. and Exemplar Global EMS Auditor 111772 at ddickersonjunior@gmail.com or (470) 539-0208.