ISO 14001 Certification: A Quick Guide to Achieve Compliance



Organizations today are seeking to have a definite Environmental Management System (EMS) accredited with the ISO 14001 certification to prove their environmental efforts and compliance with key environmental obligations. ISO 14001 is the benchmark standard when it comes to the management of environmental impacts. Designed by the ISO (International Organization of Standardization) it lays down the ground rules and structure of the EMS, implementing which helps organizations to efficiently reduce their harmful impacts and boost sustainability.

If you are reading this, it probably means you are interested in achieving the ISO 14001 certification for your business and achieving your environmental goals. This blog provides you helpful guidiance on the process of achieving the certification. It points out the key steps that you need to follow to make your EMS compliant with the requirements of ISO 14001.

Step-by-Step Procedure to Achieve ISO 14001 Compliance

Assessing the Gaps

The process starts with evaluating the existing framework or system of environmental management in your organization. Every organization is aware of the immediate impacts of their activities, products, or services on the environment and hence has some minimal measures to reduce them. By doing a formal gap assessment, you can determine where the measures stand true to the context of the ISO 14001 standard and where they do not. In short, you can identify all the gaps in your present environmental approach against the standard’s requirements and subsequently, decide what you should include in the new and improved EMS.

Designing and Documenting the EMS

After the gap assessment, you can decide the components and functions that your EMS will comprise. Hence, you are able to design the EMS appropriately. You should also document all the EMS procedures that will help to achieve your environmental objectives. Documenting the EMS procedures is a key requirement of the ISO certification. It helps in proving that your business has a proper EMS manual that is uniformly followed by everyone in the organization during the external certification audit.

Training Staff

To ensure the EMS is successfully established in your organization, train and educate all your employees. They need to understand the importance of ISO 14001 compliance for your business and how operating the EMS in a precise manner will help to reduce their carbon footprints and other detrimental environmental impacts. You should prepare presentations with training materials and conduct periodic meetings to make them fully aware of the EMS procedures and the requirements for complying with the ISO 14001 standard.

Implementing the EMS

Once the documentation is complete and employees get adequate training, you can start with the implementation procedure. It can take 1-3 months or even more, depending on the size of your organization, complexities, or environmental challenges. It is essential to have the EMS handbook readily available to the employees so that they can carry out each step carefully. You also need a monitoring system to prevent any errors or negligence and also to keep records of all the steps to trace back any implementation issues later.

Auditing the EMS

The last but most significant step needed to ensure conformance of your EMS to the ISO 14001 standard is auditing. The audit should be performed by experienced ISO auditors or some experts from your own organization who have an absolute understanding of the standard. They will thoroughly check your documents as well as the implemented EMS to ensure that they conform to every ISO 14001 requirement. If they find any nonconformity issues, they will highlight them and suggest corrective measures.

Bottom Line

Following these few critical steps is mandatory if you are looking to achieve the ISO 14001 certification for your business.  Once you are done with the above steps, certification is assured. However, you need a registrar or certification body to physically visit your organization to perform an external audit of your EMS.  After ensuring that it is ISO compliant, they issue the certification.

Contact Details:

Business Name: Compliancehelp Consulting, LLC
Email Id: info@quality-assurance.com
Phone No: 877 238 5855

Also Read: All About QMS Processes: Their Sequence and Interactions in the Business

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