Gaining from green management: Environmental management systems inside andoutside the factory

Environmental Management Systems (EMSs) are relatively new and rather innov ative management practices that provide firms with additional sources of in formation and leverage over their environmental and business processes and performance. This article reports the results of a survey of manufacturing plants that have adopted EMSs. It finds that EMSs are associated with facto ries that are larger, more committed to total quality management, and more innovative in general. EMSs are also a useful tool for managing community r elationships and dealing with key stakeholder groups on potentially controv ersial environmental issues. Furthermore, EMS plants appear to pose less en vironmental risk for communities and report that their adoption and use of an EMS is an important factor in achieving this result. In the end, EMSs ar e an effective tool for managing environmental costs and risks inside and o utside the factory in ways that add to, rather than detract from, the botto m-line.