Developing an ISO 14001:2015 / ISO 45001 Action Plan
Developing an ISO 14001:2015 / ISO 45001 Action Plan
Marek Bidwell, Director of Bidwell Management Systems, is a Chartered Environmentalist and visiting lecturer in environmental management at Newcastle University.
Marek has led the design, development and implementation of environmental management systems at a wealth of businesses across the UK. He is the author of a series of
articles in The Environmentalist on management systems, is the author of "Making the transition to ISO 14001:2015" and was facilitator for the practitioner‐led ISO
14001:2015 Road Test Group.
Bidwell Management Systems can assist you with the development of health, safety, environmental and quality management systems and provides internal auditor training
and an internal audit service for organisations throughout the UK.
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Developing an ISO 14001:2015 / ISO 45001 Action Plan
Topic
Brief Summary of Change
Structure of standard
and documented
information
Rank
Action Plan
The standards are structured in accordance with ISO’s High Level
Structure (Annex SL).
Each has 7 main sections: 4) Context of the organization, 5)
Leadership, 6) Planning, 7) Support, 8) Operation, 9) Performance
Evaluation, 10) Improvement.
There are no requirements for procedures but many requirements to
establish process and retain documented information.
Context of the
organization
A requirement to understand the context of your organization (4.1).
This means identifying internal and external issues that may affect the
intended HSE outcomes.
For ISO 14001:2015, you must also determine external environmental
conditions that affect, or be affected by, your organization.
Interested parties
A requirement to determine the needs and expectations of interested
parties (including managerial and non‐managerial workers, and
internal and external parties) from an HSE perspective (4.2).
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Developing an ISO 14001:2015 / ISO 45001 Action Plan
Topic
Brief Summary of Change
Leadership &
commitment
Increased focus on the role of top management. This includes
ensuring compatibility between HSE policy and the organization’s
strategic direction, and top management taking accountability for the
effectiveness of the management systems (5.1).
Worker participation
This is included in multpile clauses throughout ISO 45001 and goes
beyond the requirements of UK law. Top management must ensure
the active participation of workers and a process must be established
for this. Additional emphasis is given to non‐mangerial workers.
Risks and opportunities
Rank
Action Plan
Determine the risks and opportunities in order to ensure the HSE
management systems achieve their intended outcomes, prevent or
reduce undesired effects and achieve continual improvement.
A wide range of issues must be considered, including context (4.1),
interested parties (4.2), environmental aspects/OH&S hazards (6.1.2)
and compliance obligations (6.1.3).
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Developing an ISO 14001:2015 / ISO 45001 Action Plan
Topic
Brief Summary of Change
Achieving objectives
Rank
Action Plan
The plan to achieve objectives must be more detailed than previously
and include what will be done, resources required, who will be
responsible, when it will be completed, how results evaluated, and
how it will be integrated with business processes (6.2.2).
Competence
A requirement to determine and ensure the HSE competence of all
persons/workers doing work under the organizations control, and
evaluate the effectiveness of actions taken to acquire competence
(7.2).
Communication
A requirement to plan communications including what, when, with
whom and how (7.4).
For 14001:2015 you must ensure the ‘reliability’ of external
communications.
For ISO 45001 you must define communication objectives and
evaluate if they have been met.
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Developing an ISO 14001:2015 / ISO 45001 Action Plan
Topic
Life cycle Perspective
Brief Summary of Change
Rank
Action Plan
For ISO 14001:2015 you must determine environmental aspects
considering a life cycle perspective, determine environmental
requirements for procurement and intergrate environmental
considerations into the design and development of products and
services.
Both standards require that outsourced processes are controlled […
“or influenced” for ISO 14001].
Performance evaluation
An enhanced level of monitoring, measurement, analysis and
evaluation is prescribed: what, the methods for, and when; along with
a requirement to analyse, evaluate and communicate the results
(9.1.1).
Compliance obligations
Compliance obligations is new terminology for ISO 14001, but ISO
45001 still uses ‘legal and other requirements’.
It is a requirement to maintain knowledge of compliance status
(9.1.2). This is in addition to the existing requirement to evaluate
compliance.
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Key changes in the new ISO 14001:2015 and ISO 45001 standards
Annex SL common clause structure
The main sub‐clauses of ISO 14001 and 45001
Summary of the five key areas of concern
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