The way for SMEs to approach Green Strategic Management in their own firms is prepare a Green Strategic Plan document. This document will lay out the following elements from an environmental impact perspective: vision and objectives, life-cycle plan for present products, new products that will be introduced, new markets to be accessed, technologies that will be employed and organizational focus and commitment that it will generate. The generic strategic planning process is illustrated in Figure 4.
Step 1: Setting Mission and Goals. The environmental mission talks about two things – why you exist and the major goal you have set for the firm. The vision shows the direction to be taken and the goal to be reached. Precise and measurable objectives are also set. When setting the mission and objectives the Green Impact Map (Figure 1) should be considered. For guidance, the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies (CERES) publication of “The Ceres Principles” (Ceres Principles) can be used. This is a ten-point code of corporate environmental conduct. Similarly, the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) has prepared the ‘Business Charter for Sustainable Development' which sets out 16 principles for environmental management. The Charter covers environmentally relevant aspects of health, safety and product stewardship. Its objective is 'that the widest range of enterprises commit themselves to improving their environmental performance in accordance with the principles, to having in place management practices to effect such improvement, to measuring their progress, and to reporting this progress as appropriate, internally and externally. This too can be used as guiding principles. The mission, goals and objectives should be communicated to the organization.