The Role of Environmental Management Performance in Higher Education Institutions

Higher education institutions (HEIs) are influential social institutions which educate future decision-makers and shape society as a whole. Motivated by new public management, the proliferation of business tools, and a rising awareness for responsible acting, environmental management has also become a matter for HEIs. Focusing on performance outcomes and improvement based mechanisms leads to a professionalization through the active management of environmental issues. Therefore, the support of management structures is an essential prerequisite when implementing environmental efforts. Thus far, little attention has been dedicated to environmental management performance and steering processes of environmental issues in HEIs, which marks the research gap of this study. This article presents results of a survey on the concept of environmental management performance (EMP) based on Trumpp et al. (2015) aiming to answer the research question of how HEIs conduct environmental management along the dimensions of EMP, which includes environmental policy, environmental objectives, environmental processes, organizational structures, and monitoring. The results show that, as of now, HEIs pursue no common practice when approaching EMP. Nevertheless, two thirds of the respondents show an orientation towards sustainability with particularly high values regarding issues of environmental policy.