Stakeholder Engagement is one of my top 5 trends in Chemicals Management for 2015.

Stakeholder Engagement is important in any industry. There is ample opportunity to work together to identify solutions to large complicated problems. A few years ago, leading companies worked independently to drive innovation in sustainability. Marks and Spencer’s with its Plan A and Interface with its Mission Zero drove home the importance of innovation in sustainability, both in products and supply chains. But now the trend is moving away from individual efforts and towards business-to-business platforms.

Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals, ZDHC a group of major apparel and footwear brands formed in 2011, and made a shared commitment to help lead their industry towards zero discharge of hazardous chemicals by 2020. Their philosophy is based on stakeholder engagement and they have published a roadmap and aligned on industry leading supply chain tools such as the MRSL.

On an even larger scale is the Interstate Chemicals Clearing House IC2. This is an association of state, local, and tribal governments that promotes a clean environment, healthy communities, and a vital economy through the development and use of safer chemicals and products. They are developing a consistent set of tools to assess chemicals that can be adopted by each of the nine member states.

The Green Chemistry and Commerce Council (GC3) is a cross sectoral, business-to-business network of companies and other organizations working collaboratively to advance green chemistry across sectors and supply chains. It provides an open forum for collaboration and stakeholder engagement to share information and experiences about the challenges to, and opportunities for safer chemicals and products.

The benefits of stakeholder engagement and business-to-business platforms are bountiful and include the following.

• Pool knowledge to identify and share best practices across industries.
• Share costs by working together on common goals and deliverables.
• Cross fertilize by bringing together expertise from different industries.
• Develop, align and harmonize industry-leading tools to reduce complexity.
• Create and be one big voice for change.
• Access current dialogue among experts to up-skill your teams and manage transformation in your supply chain.

What are the impacts to your business?

Questions to consider:

• Are you engaged in any stakeholder groups?
• Is there a benefit for someone from your organization to engage with key stakeholders in the business and NGO community?
• How will stakeholder engagement help your company?

For help with any issue associated with chemicals, contact Amanda Cattermole at (415) 412 8406 or Amanda@cattermoleconsulting.com. We can help you develop powerful solutions to protect your company and brand reputation and result in safer products manufactured in cleaner supply chains.

Tips and Insights is published bi-monthly and contains information to help you make informed chemicals management decisions. Each post highlights a particular topic and includes questions you may want to consider for your business.