One of the biggest differences between you, the EHS manager, and your CEO, is your scope of the company's issues. Generally, the CEO oversees the strategic mission of the company, while you manage individual people, practices, and issues. The speakers at a recent BLR audio conference on the return on investment (ROI) of workplace safety offered some best practices for building a better relationship with your CEO to get more resources for your EHS department.

When preparing for a meeting with your company's CEO, remember to:

• Make the most of your time. Never walk into a meeting with your CEO without at least three issues to solve.
• Present things that have a direct association to company scope. Talk about trends and competitive advantages, and show how a company investment in EHS can affect these things.
• Remind your CEO of the successful past projects that he or she has approved. Knowing that an investment in EHS has worked, he or she is more likely to approve more projects.
• Never present issues to your CEO that you should be solving yourself.

Sometimes the best path to the CEO's office is not a direct one. If you can align your goals with those of other departments and develop relationships with the managers, you can let those managers bring the issues to the CEO. Some good examples of possible strategic alliances with the EHS department are Human Resources, Finance, Manufacturing Operations, and Production.

What if your CEO is a micromanager? The key to working for a micromanager is to always be mindful of the details. Bring your risk assessments and metrics to the meetings and always present things that you have accomplished so that you are not always bringing bad news. For help with developing EHS metrics, see Safety.BLR.com's section on EHS Strategy.

For more information about BLR audio conferences or to a purchase CD copy of this audio conference, click here.