Using digital tools to provide structure and success to complex regulatory programs is no longer a luxury. They are a necessity. In fact, digital tools ensure businesses can responsibly manage their resources. Luke Jacobs, co-founder and CEO of Encamp, can share the five essential steps to digital transformation for organizations struggling to meet regulatory requirements.
Even for the most seasoned Environment, Health, and Safety (EHS) teams, environmental compliance reporting can be time-consuming, complex, error-prone, and frustrating without the right tools and support. EHS teams responsible for compliance reports can spend hours searching for scattered data in unorganized and disconnected systems such as emails and excel sheets. This is further complicated by an endless cycle of:
- Ever-changing state and county-level regulations
- Complex reporting procedures and requirements
- Decentralized facility data
- Mountains of paperwork
EHS professionals need a modern solution to manual, tedious work like copy-pasting information from spreadsheets. If organizations overlook verifying collected data, they risk non-compliance, resulting in financial penalties or reputational damage.
Digital technologies offer a method to the madness. When businesses integrate technology into their compliance programs, they can streamline processes without the risk of human error, which accounts for more than 70%Opens a new window of non-compliance incidents.
Digital transformation technologies provide critical assistance to companies with dispersed facilities that don’t have a roadmap for how environmental compliance should work and seemingly never receive enough support. These five steps can help organizations begin their journey to environmental digital transformation.Â
Create a strong foundation for compliance data
Transforming environmental compliance operations requires a foundation of reliable, trustworthy data. The lack of a good data foundation is a real problem for many organizations. In fact, relatively few (only 35%Opens a new window ) executives have a high level of trust in their organization’s data.Â
To improve the management and accessibility of compliance data, facility, corporate, and personnel information must be visible across all sites. Organizing all data across environmental compliance operations via cloud-based software decreases the risk of costly non-compliance violations, like missed deadlines and inaccuracies. This single source of truth also enables all stakeholders to:
- Ensure control throughout the compliance process
- Understand reporting nuances at all regulatory levels
- Build out facility profiles at scale
- Track and update facility contacts
Organizations can also push centralized information to all relevant regulatory databases for compliance reporting at the local, state, or federal levels. Teams no longer need to access or update data in individual portals manually.
Adding to the efficiency, technology helps teams properly assign all facilities for a given program area with the correct corporate information and regulatory personnel. And should an organization change its corporate mailing address or one of its facilities change an emergency contact, the system automatically updates the entire system.
Set up continuous data collectionÂ
Once an organization has a single source of truth, EHS professionals must establish a continuous data monitoring and collection process for each program area. These data pipelines include direct data uploads, available integrations to existing data systems, and digital questionnaires for compliance stakeholders.Â
The result of automating data collection functions? Data control and visibility, with less effort and fewer errors. Over 65%Opens a new window of operations professionals cited automation as key to reducing data mistakes.Â
EHS teams can also improve compliance programs by tracking and managing data across all reporting lifecycle stages: collection, validation, input, and submission. Organizations should set up daily, weekly or monthly cadences to relieve some pressure on EHS teams during reporting season.Â
See More: Best Way Forward: Choosing the Right Data Collection Route
Automate notifications and updates
Keeping track of compliance notifications and updates specific to a facility on an ongoing basis can seem impossible for large organizations with distributed facilities. After all, facility information constantly changes, whether from a regulatory, corporate, or personnel perspective.
Software offers a solution by allowing EHS professionals to gather and file any necessary changes or updates continuously, keeping businesses in compliance across all program areas. Outdated and incorrect facility contact information are among the most common mistakes in environmental compliance reporting.
Automation frees employees from taking multiple steps to update information and removes another chance for human error. For example, if an emergency contact for a regulatory facility leaves an organization, an automated process would trigger an alert for a needed update. Technology catches necessary updates and notifications and submits them correctly and with audit-ready documentation.
Another example is generator status for hazardous waste facilities. If an organization operates as a small quantity generator (SQG) but then produces more than 1,000 kilograms of hazardous waste per month, it becomes a large quantity generator (LQG). That change means EHS teams must file a notification to the EPA and, most likely, state regulators. If a facility does not have continuous data collection, professionals have difficulty knowing if their facility has crossed the threshold. On the other hand, a software solution flags the change and pushes teams to take the necessary action.
Automate reportingÂ
The next and perhaps most critical step toward environmental digital transformation is filing compliance reports. Organizations track several deadlines for report compilation tasks and submission as they reach the end of their reporting cycle. Automated reporting through a cloud-based platform allows EHS and compliance professionals to send accurate compliance information to the right agencies, in the right format and at the right time.Â
By step four, an organization has all program data and reporting information centralized in one software system, giving EHS teams a complete and audit-ready record within reach. Automation reduces the time to complete and file compliance reports by more than 90%Opens a new window , freeing employees to focus on other pertinent tasks that drive operational efficiency.
Merge compliance programs
Digital transformation aims to unify all processes and operations in an organization. Once an organization transforms a particular compliance program area, it can then expand into another program area and lay the foundations there.Â
This approach allows enterprises to adjust their environmental compliance programs across different areas — like EPCRA and RCRA — into a continuous and auditable process. This method mitigates non-compliance risk throughout the data management process. This process consistency improves the quality and accuracy of an organization’s data, along with leaders’ trust in it.
Implementing a robust digital structure connects compliance operations, expands to meet program area needs, and scales with growing organizations. By making environmental compliance simpler, faster, and more accurate, organizations reduce compliance costs and risks and become better environmental stewards. Most importantly, regulators receive accurate data critical to achieving public policy goals and advancing sustainability efforts.Â
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