Considerable evidence exists that supportive managerial and supervisor behaviours in environment initiatives are important in developing employee engagement in environmental management (EM). For example, Ramus and Steger’s (2000) study of European employee ‘Eco initiatives’ (defined as any action taken by an employee that they thought would improve the environmental performance of the company), found a strong relationship between managerial behaviours such as competence building, communication, rewarding and recognizing employees and their engagement with innovative environmental activities. Additionally, the UK Institute of Environmental Management (IEM) has established and delivered training workshops for environmental managers, including raising awareness and skills in EM (Bird, 1996), and managerial attitudes and norms are seen in the US wine industry to act as strong drivers for undertaking active EM behaviours in organizations there (Marshall et al., 2005). Further, a self-report study of managers in China reveals that they have a ‘strong disposition’
towards taking environmental action, and that environmental knowledge and values are predictors of personal environmental behaviours there (Fryxell and Lo, 2003: 57) (See Renwick et al., 2013 for details).

Question

1 What evidence can you see of managers enacting green HRM practices in organizations today?
2 What factors do you think could help managers to enact ‘eco-initiatives’?
3 Do you think that LMs are ready to embrace green HRM? What arguments would you make in support of them doing so, and what ones against?