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ePaper created 2017-03-14, 10:25:37 | version 1.49.03
ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY 1 RECONCILING INTERESTS IN THE COMPANY USING STAKEHOLDER INTERACTION ANALYSIS Birgit Haller, Jan Iden, Ur sula Schließmann Assessment of sustainability Resource and energy eficiency are generally important objec- tives in the development and application of new products and technologies. However, the contribution made by companies to sustainable development also involves other factors. For example, the working conditions in production and the im- pact of a location on its surrounding environment play a part in this. Yet the evaluation of a product in the early phases of development is a laborious task, especially as the necessary data is often not yet available. Stakeholder Interaction Analysis identiies hot spots In order to identify and evaluate so-called hot spots – ields of action that urgently need to be addressed – at this early stage, Fraunhofer UMSICHT and Fraunhofer IGB have developed an instrument called Stakeholder Interaction Analysis (SHIA). The goal of SHIA is – by taking into account the interests of the relevant stakeholder groups – to market socially acceptable products and processes, which make a greater contribution to sustainable development. The aim is to enable the company to ind a transparent way of dealing with opportunities and risks through a change of perspective and dialog. To develop SHIA, the Fraunhofer Institutes IGB and UMSICHT made use of their experience with methods and standards of sustainability assessment and reporting. Existing instruments were compared over a period of three years, and new dialog- oriented, production-related approaches were developed and tested. Finally, these were translated into a tool that can be easily implemented in various branches of industry and areas of application. 9 4 Implementation and evaluation tools SHIA is intended mainly for small and medium-sized manu- facturing companies, and focuses on processes of change in production or in future location development. The Fraunhofer experts advise and support companies in the following steps: (a) self-assessment of relevant ields of impact in the product development process, (b) identifying the stakeholders concerned, (c) identifying the interests of the stakeholders, (d) assessment of the implementation status in the company. Fields of impact include in their scope the economic, eco- logical and social effects of production at the location, also aspects of the product lifecycle as well as the supply chain or disposal and recycling routes. The full service range comprises phases of dialog, investiga- tions and analysis, as well as expert advice, and makes use of a modular system with various tools: The key component is the systematic analysis of the ields of impact, stakeholders and their interests using an inter- view guideline and an evaluation matrix. A criticality tool to assess the inluence of a stakeholder group on the planned production process: the stakehold- ers are evaluated on the basis of the criteria ability to achieve aims and organizational capability. A knowledge database of stakeholder interests and exam- ples of good practice in the form of a wiki platform: typi- cal stakeholder interests serve to classify interview results.