A Potential Development Model of Environmental Management System Consultants in the Industrial Sector

Abstract

The purposes of the research were: 1) investigate desirable characteristics of consultant, 2) create a potential development model for environmental management system consultants in the industrial sector, and 3) construct a potential development handbook for environmental management system consultants in the industrial sector. A mixed methods approach combining qualitative and quantitative methods was employed. The population were three groups: 1) environmental management experts for deep interview, 2) questionnaire respondents who were from 318 companies acquiring the standard ISO14001 environmental management systems and 3) experts for focus group. The research instrument were an in-depth and semi-structure interview questionnaire and a group discussion. The findings revealed that all characteristics affecting the consultants’ service were at a high level in all items. Upon consideration on each item, the method of consultants’ knowledge providing which should be clear and easy to understand showed the highest mean, followed by consultants’ specific knowledge. The Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) on consultants’ potentiality: knowledge, skills, characteristics, ethics, and development techniques being required on an environmental management system displayed eigenvalue more than 1 in all elements. The main elements could be classified into five aspects and 100 factors: (1) knowledge with five elements, (2) skills with two elements, (3) characteristics with two elements, (4) ethics with one element, and (5) development techniques with two elements. After trying out the constructed handbook, it was found that the consultants gained their knowledge at a statistical significant level of 0.05.