Working on the environment

Organizations increasingly recognize that environmental problems will reduce if their employees would act more pro-environmentally, but struggle with the question how to realise this. This PhD project shows that employees act more pro-environmentally at work when they care about the environment, and when the work context makes them focus on environmental consequences. Importantly, it appears that in the right context, people with relative weak environmental values will act as pro-environmentally as those with relative strong environmental values. Pro-environmental behaviour (at home or at work) generally implies a conflict between immediate gratification or financial gains and desirable long-term benefits for the environment. Yet, despite this, people are motivated to act pro-environmentally when they are focused on benefiting the environment. When people are focused on benefiting the environment, they are less focused and influenced by possible inconvenience and financial costs of pro-environmental behaviours. The extent to which employees are focused on the environment depends on how strongly they value nature and the environment, and on the context in which decisions are made. First, the context needs to facilitate pro-environmental actions. Second, the context can strengthen employees’ focus on benefiting the environment, for example by signs of corporate environmental responsibility. Strong environmental values and contextual factors that make people focus on the environment can even encourage pro-environmental actions after prolonged working on a strenuous task. See also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjQFDI8hcc

My company is green, so am I:the relationship between perceived environmental responsibility of organisations and government, environmental self-identity, and pro-environmental behaviours

To reduce environmental problems, citizens, governments, and organisations need to take action to reduce their environmental impact. In the current paper, we tested if and how perceived environmental responsibility of organisations and government is related to pro-environmental behaviour and acceptability of pro-environmental policies among employees, customers, and citizens. We hypothesised that the stronger perceived environmental responsibility of organisations and government, the stronger the environmental self-identity of employees, customers, and citizens because they are a part of that organisation. We hypothesised that a stronger environmental self-identity, in turn, is positively related to a range of pro-environmental actions as well as acceptability of pro-environmental policies. We tested our hypotheses in three studies. We found that a stronger perceived environmental responsibility of organisations is indeed related to a stronger environmental self-identity among employees and customers of the organisation. A stronger environmental self-identity was in turn related to a range of pro-environmental actions. An alternative explanation for our findings is that those with a stronger environmental self-identity are more likely to become a customer at an organisation with a strong perceived environmental responsibility. However, we found support for our hypotheses among those who chose and among those who did not freely choose to be a customer of the organisation, suggesting that the alternative explanation does not fully explain our findings. Furthermore, we found that citizens report a stronger environmental self-identity when perceived environmental responsibility of their government is stronger. A stronger environmental self-identity was in turn related to a higher acceptability of policies aiming to promote energy savings. Our findings are in line with social identity theory, which states that people partly infer how they see themselves based on the groups to which they belong. Furthermore, our findings have important practical implications for organisations and governments aiming to promote pro-environmental behaviour. Specifically, if organisations and government reduce their environmental impact and clearly communicate this, citizens, employees, and customers may also be more likely to do so

The relationship between Corporate Environmental Responsibility, employees’ biospheric values and pro-environmental behaviour at work

Many organizations strive for Corporate Environmental Responsibility (CER). This can make organizational processes and procedures more pro-environmental, but does it also promote employees’ pro-environmental behaviour? We reason that CER can encourage employees to act pro-environmentally at work by increasing the likelihood that they consider the environmental consequences of their behaviour. In two studies, we test to what extent CER affects pro-environmental behaviour at work, and whether this depends on the extent to which employees value nature and the environment (i.e., endorse biospheric values). Both studies show that stronger biospheric values and perceived CER are related to more self-reported pro-environmental behaviour at work. Interestingly, the relationship between perceived CER and self-reported pro-environmental behaviour was stronger among those with moderate to weak biospheric values. These results suggest that relative weak biospheric values are less likely to inhibit pro-environmental behaviour at work when employees believe that their organization aims to realize CER

Environmental considerations in the organizational context:A pathway to pro-environmental behaviour at work

AbstractEncouraging pro-environmental behaviour at work can result in a significant reduction in environmental problems. Research revealed that general environmental considerations such as biospheric values and environmental self-identity are important antecedents of private pro-environmental behaviour. Yet, the question remains whether such general environmental considerations also predict pro-environmental behaviour at work. We propose a parsimonious theoretical model (the VIP-model) in which biospheric values affect personal norms to behave pro-environmentally at work and pro-environmental actions via the environmental self-identity. A study involving a diverse sample of employees from different European organizations supported the VIP-model, showing that biospheric values and environmental self-identity influence personal norms, and that stronger personal norms encouraged various self-reported pro-environmental behaviours at work to some extent. The VIP-model yields promising, cost-efficient strategies to encourage pro-environmental behaviour at work

Environmental considerations as a basis for employee pro-environmental behaviour

Organisations are increasingly recognising that environmental problems will reduce if their employees act more pro-environmentally. However, pro-environmental behaviour (at home or at work) generally implies a conflict between immediate gratifications or financial gains and long-term benefits for the environment. Yet, despite this, people are motivated to act pro-environmentally when they are focused on benefiting the environment. In this chapter, we discuss a conceptual framework to understand, predict and promote pro-environmental behaviour at work. We identify two main factors affecting pro-environmental actions: the values people endorse and contextual factors. We propose that people are more likely to act pro-environmentally at work when they strongly endorse biospheric values. Biospheric values influence behaviour by strengthening the environmental self-identity and personal norms to act pro-environmentally at work. Yet, contextual factors can prevent (or promote) people acting upon their personal norms. Contextual factors may not only inhibit or enable pro-environmental behaviour at work, but they can also affect the extent to which people focus on benefiting the environment, which affects pro-environmental actions. People are more likely to act pro-environmentally when the context makes them focus on the environment, even more so when people have relatively weak biospheric values