Environmental Management: Auditing is part of our DNA
Customer audits, internal audits, aviation security audits, quality audits etc. – the list of regular internal and external inspections at our LSG Sky Chefs facilities around the globe has been already very long. And, when putting myself in our operations managers’ position, I am sure it is not always easy to handle all these individual audits, while taking care of the day-to-day business at the same time – namely keeping our customers happy. Now, the list was expanded by an environmental audit, which meant even extra workload for our facilities. But it was an important step, since acting in an eco-friendly manner is part of our company’s philosophy.
Share the learnings
So the biggest task was to limit the extra burden for our operations to a minimum while generating the maximum outcome for our organization. Easier said than done. First, our corporate environmental managers came up with a questionnaire of some 60 questions, covering all aspects of environmental topics. In a second step, they thought of ways how to improve our environmental performance at all of our facilities, while only auditing a few at a time. The solution was to inspect every year some selected Customer Service Centers (CSCs) from an environmental point of view, covering not just areas identified in our worldwide environmental initiative, but others such as resource restrictions, water quality, kind of atmospheric emissions produced by the CSCs and noise pollution. The observations and findings of these inspections should then be shared on our global e-platform and serve as best practice and a source of learning for all our other locations around the world.
External auditors guarantee compliance with local regulations
When finally entering the implementation phase, we figured that it would be very important to take account of the local legal regulations. As our company is present in more than 50 countries, we really needed a partner with international experience to ensure that all requested measures are fulfilled. We have therefore decided to conduct our environmental audits with the support of Environmental Resources Management (ERM) the world’s leading sustainability consultancy. ERM is tasked with auditing our facilities in regards to compliance with local regulations. The inspections will be initiated by the Corporate Environmental Manager together with the General Manager of the selected facility and the Regional Environmental Manager. I am looking forward to watching our best practice platform filling up with great examples!
Kind regards,
Walter