Built-in compliance assurance breaks silos for smart buildings leader.

Facing increasing EHS compliance requirements, a wide umbrella of standards, and varying ways of assessing risk across its business, one multi-national smart building leader wanted to further support its teams with compliance assurance they could count on. The company turned to Enhesa to stay at the forefront of the evolving EHS and sustainability (EHS) landscape with a more comprehensive – and consistent – way to manage it all.

Why the company wanted a solution:

• As the regulatory landscape expands, EHS functions need more support to achieve extreme knowledge for every issue.
• The quickening pace of regulatory developments demanded a way for EHS personnel to see them coming sooner.
• Jurisdictional nuances and different assessment approaches made it difficult to achieve a consistent, complete view of global EHS compliance.
• Its ISO-based global compliance management required that all locations know and understand what their obligations are.

What it achieved with Enhesa:

• Support for local teams with in-depth expert, actionable insights into today’s widening range of EHS compliance issues.
• Reduce regulatory surprises for local EHS functions with updates on fast-changing and frequent regulatory developments.
• See and solve issues more effectively with standard scorecards for comparable, measurable EHS compliance metrics.
• Align global efforts with a consistent, comprehensive regulatory outlook that’s covers its ISO-based compliance management system’s needs.

Building on 100s of years of continuously aiming for excellence, the company demanded clear and accurate regulatory intelligence that its entire organization could trust and leverage. This meant a solution that not only anticipate new requirements across its 2,000 locations in 71 different jurisdictions but also provides a standardized way to monitor compliance with all of them on a corporate level.

“One of the key standouts from the Enhesa offering is the dynamic view of legislation – it is not just a snapshot of the text of the law, there is an analytical element – and this is coupled with continuing education and updates.”

The business leveraged Enhesa Compliance Intelligence and Regulatory Forecaster for timelier, more efficient access to regulatory insights across its multi-national business. The wide-reaching coverage across 300+ jurisdictions keeps EHS professionals across all locations up to date on what changes are coming for their facilities – while the actionable insights provide additional support in knowing exactly how to prepare for them.

An extensive knowledgebase to back up plant managers

Today, EHS requirements cover much more than they used to. There’s a new awareness of risks that were once hidden – or simply misunderstood – such as psychosocial factors endangering employees’ mental well-being. On top of that, the processes behind managing compliance involve more effort and expertise – monitoring, analyzing, and reporting to stay in line with the law.

The company found that the Enhesa solutions fortified its local teams with a more efficient way to keep track of their requirements, what’s changing, and what needs to happen in each facility as a result.

“The EHS function has much wider responsibilities now than in the past,” explained the company’s Executive Director of EHS, “There is so much more to cover, that being an expert in all areas is much more challenging, and there is a need to prioritize as a result. We can’t have extreme knowledge everywhere – one plant manager cannot manage, for example, everything regarding EHS laws in France.

“One of the key standouts from the Enhesa offering is the dynamic view of legislation – it is not just a snapshot of the text of the law, there is an analytical element – and this is coupled with continuing education and updates.”

A solution to spot trends in every location, at every level

To keep on top of the never-ending flow of new regulations and changing requirements, this industry leader uses Enhesa Regulatory Forecaster to ensure that everyone involved in EHS compliance management can stay ahead. Specifically, they leverage the customizable alert feature as a first line of information on what matters most to each team.

EHS personnel at plant, regional, and corporate levels employ the automated alerts from Enhesa Regulatory Forecaster. These notifications give the company a jump start ahead of what could change in their EHS requirements and plan to adapt their processes before they come into place.

Different levels of the business use these alerts according to their own needs. As its Executive Director of EHS explains, “At the corporate level we look for major trends and issues that could impact the business more widely, whereas site personnel will look more at the specific regulatory changes that may impact them.”

One of the company’s regional EHS directors adds, “Enhesa is a valuable tool for field leaders. Offering regular updates, it acts as a resource and reservoir of information for our EHS leads. It’s also a big enabler of our corporate program and allows me to put my ‘enterprise’ hat on.”

This look into the future of regulatory developments empowers the company “We can spot trends and highlights in new regulatory developments around the world. When one region has a concern about new legislation… we can look at what other regions are requiring this, and thereby manage our response much better.”

Scorecards to assess EHS compliance the same way

The company also wanted a comparable, more consistent way to assess compliance across its facilities. With the company’s devolved approach to multi-national compliance management, it needed a solution that could effectively consolidate each differing assessment approach into higher level view.

As its EHS Director explained, “There are nuances beyond the segmentation taken in the annual report, and each country takes a different approach to [assessing] health and safety. Centrally, the organization wants to use an American coded system, whereas on a country-level, many will use a risk-based approach.”

To establish a common ground for more standardized reporting, the company uses Enhesa Scorecards, a feature in Compliance Intelligence that enables individual sites to self-assess the same way. These scores are then captured in the company’s EHS compliance management software.

“We see compliance assurance very much as an ongoing process – where sites are required to self-assess through Enhesa scorecards. We then follow that up with audits to validate those assessments.”

As a result, the company says that the integration process “allows us to capture the audit findings from the Enhesa Scorecards – and thereby provides us with a closed-loop corrective action process. We also have a view on findings globally.”

This ability to prove to authorities that illustrates their compliance can also pay off, literally. “There is now an inducement to have conversations with regulators to prove that we’ve met obligations,” said one senior executive, “In some jurisdictions, we’re able to get rebates or claim backs for providing evidence that we have complied with legislation.”

Standardized compliance assurance to keep teams on the same page

This global leader in the buildings industry uses a management system based on ISO 14001 (Environmental Management) and ISO 45001 (Occupational Health & Safety). To be clear on these exact requirements – and sure of its compliance with them – the business leverages Enhesa Compliance Intelligence and Regulatory Forecaster for a comprehensive, global view.

All of the company’s sites are part of the management system, and they’re awarded levels of maturity that correspond with where they’re at within it. When a site reaches Level 3 maturity, the company encourages the site to certify its management system.

As one executive explained, “Enhesa fits within this process because we have specific requirements regarding compliance assurance, and all sites need to know and understand what their legal obligations are. We use Enhesa’s regulatory intelligence as part of a compliance calendar where we can track and manage repeat regulatory obligations.”

On top of a streamlined way to track compliance requirements, the company has found an advantage in how Enhesa’s standardized view enables teams to collaborate on compliance across its business. The company’s Executive Director of EHS shares, “One of the biggest benefits has been the ability to talk about a similar compliance assurance process with all our EHS personnel around the world. Everyone on a call will understand what is being talked about as we are all using the same information and database.”

Comprehensive EHS compliance intelligence teams can count on

Staying true to its mission to always operate within best practices, the smart buildings leader has established a clear and consistent foundation of compliance assurance for its teams, stakeholders, and customers. Saving time and reducing regulatory surprises along the way.

Today, its EHS personnel are more informed about the latest regulatory developments and have a strong knowledge base to support them in acting upon those changes. Employees at every level can stay up to date, spot new trends, and share input for how to deal with new issues – all in a standardized way that means the same thing to everyone. And the company can more effectively align efforts across all locations and its ability to demonstrate compliance for external certification.

What will be your compliance success story?

At Enhesa, we’re proud to work closely with leading companies like this one, empowering them with regulatory intelligence to create a more sustainable future.

Let’s talk about how to establish EHS compliance assurance in your company with our trusted solutions. Contact our talented team to learn more!