Integration of Environmental Initiatives in Operations - Evidence from at sustainability leader

Abstract: As a response to the increasing pressure from society, governments and consumers, a growing number of companies disclose an environmental engagement in order to improve their reputation and maintain legitimacy. However, critics of such disclosure blame companies for greenwashing and point to the tendency of companies to decouple their environmental initiatives from the work practice. Few studies have thoroughly investigated the operative activities in manufacturing companies in order to explore how environmental performance is integrated. This is surprising, firstly because manufacturing companies have large environmental impact, and secondly because much of their impact origins specifically from the manufacturing processes. Thus, the main purpose of this case study is to describe how a manufacturing company’s environmental initiatives are integrated in the work practice of its technical personnel. The findings indicate that the environmental initiatives are decoupled from the operative activities. However, due to a win-win relationship between an enhanced manufacturing process and improved environmental performance, the outcome is generally positive, implying that the company cannot be accused of greenwashing. Therefore, this study suggests that there are differences between decoupling and greenwashing, and that these concepts should not be used for describing the same phenomena.