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The Guidebook

7. Introducing sustainable purchasing to your organisation

Introducing and subsequently implementing a sustainable purchasing or a sustainability or environmental policy requires a change management strategy as would any other significant change in the way an organisation goes about its business.

The key elements in making changes are:

• Getting the commitment of senior managers, and if necessary board members, governing body members etc.
• Ensuring that there is a respected champion at senior level with responsibility
• Establish a process for the effective engagement of the wide range of individuals who will be contributing to the development and implementation of ideas- these will over time include purchasing officers, budget holders and project managers, users of products and services, facilities and estates managers, suppliers and contractors etc.
• Setting, and agreeing targets with timings, responsibilities and the necessary monitoring and reporting arrangements set out.

The wide potential scope of sustainability actions, which can involve virtually the whole business and numerous staff means that if any progress is to be made, priorities must be clearly identified and linked to targets.

The commitment to introduce sustainable procurement is perhaps best re-inforced by the development and wide dissemination of policies and objectives for sustainability. it is important to remember the damage to reputation that will result if a policy commitment is made without putting in place the means of implementing it.

• It is likely to be helpful for organisations that adopt sustainable procurement to do so as part of a more general sustainable development or environment strategy. There are at least three reasons why this is sensible.
• It will hardly be credible in negotiations with suppliers for a customer to demand sustainability to be built into the goods and services which it is procuring, if it does not demand the same of the management of its own manufacturing and operations;
• Much of the competitive advantage of being a sustainable procurer will be lost if the organisation does not have a reputation for managing itself sustainably;
• It will be very difficult to get the support and understanding of staff who have to implement a sustainable procurement strategy if it is not part of a wider sustainability initiative.

There are many examples of organisations that have successfully introduced sustainable procurement policies and sustainability policies. Click here to see some examples.