The environmental outcome is an important part of the total result of the CMS business.
The monitoring and control of fluid systems together with everyday maintenance
are direct factors influencing the result. There are also several indirect factors
that will affect the environmental outcome (see also Section 11.4.4):
• Financial incentives for suppliers to start recycling products and investing in
development. The organisation of and the system for improvement work is
linked to the financial incentives and will strongly affect how fast the improvements
and implementations from process development will occur.
• Knowledge sharing and joint development of solutions in CMS are important for
business and environmental success and long-term relations (Toffel 2002). Loss
of knowledge and control over own processes is also named by many companies
as one of the main barriers to CMS partnerships (Mont et al. 2003). Information
sharing between suppliers and customers is vital for fluid monitoring and control
and especially for ensuring fluid function.
• Communication and mutual trust is regarded as the most important factor for
success of CMS (Oldham 2003). Strongly committed partners have a bigger
chance of being satisfied with the outcome of the business relation. Good communication
influences the level of satisfaction in partnerships and increases
chances of succeeding with environmental tasks.
The next section draws on experiences from a large organisation; the influence of some
factors and the environmental results of implementing CMS partnership are studied.