Understanding the Standard

ISO 14001 is an international voluntary standard that specifies the minimum elements for an environmental management system. It was published in 1996 by the International Organization for Standardization and is being taken up by organizations throughout the world at varying speeds.

The above is accepted as true by most people who are aware of the standard. Beyond these simple facts, however, there are many misconceptions about ISO 14001. For instance:

ISO 14001 will be a requirement for all companies.
As with ISO 9000, conformance to ISO 14001 may become a condition of doing business in certain countries, regions or markets. This process already has begun in some industrial sectors, such as the automotive and electronics markets. However, there are still a tremendous number of companies in business today that do not conform to ISO 9000, even though that standard is now 13 years old. Thus it is too early to tell how widely ISO 14001 will be required in the future.

Implementing ISO 14001 means getting a registration.
Many suppliers choose to demonstrate conformance to ISO 14001 through third-party certification. Some customers may require this. However, the standard itself considers a company's self-declaration of conformance as an acceptable alternative. Further, some companies simply use the ISO 14001 model for internal purposes as a means to enhance their environmental performance.

ISO 14001 is just paperwork and won't really help my company.
ISO 14001 is like many things in life - you get out of it what you put into it. The way a company implements the standard determines what benefits it receives. Many companies that have implemented ISO 14001 report a variety of benefits, including improved environmental performance, greater operating efficiency, cost reduction, improved employee awareness and enhanced public image, among others.

Implementing ISO 14001 means throwing out our current environmental programs.
ISO 14001 criteria specify "what to do," not "how to do it." Implementation approaches vary widely. There is no reason to think that your existing approach to environmental management must be put aside to satisfy ISO 14001.

The standard requires companies to write an ISO 9000 quality manual that defines how each requirement of the rather broad ISO 9001:2008 standard is applied at the company. In a sense, the ISO 9000 quality manual is a company specific version of the standard.

While writing the quality manual represents a big hurdle for most companies, the ISO 9001:2008 standard requires further details in form of ISO 9000 quality procedures, a quality policy and quality objectives. Most companies make the mistake of creating various different documents to meet these requirements; however, this usually is the beginning of a cumbersome and bureaucratic ISO 9000 quality system.
Tip: Combine the different documentation requirements (i.e., quality manual, procedures, corporate policy and objectives) as much as possible into one comprehensive manual. This reduces repetition and bureaucracy, and it saves time implementing the quality system.ISO 9000 Quality Manual
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