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Irwin Mitchell is one of the UK’s most successful and respected law firms employing over 2,100 people in nine UK and two Spanish offices, with headquarters in Sheffield. The business has a long history of corporate social responsibility with a Social Responsibility programme and as an initiating member to provide carbon footprinting across the legal sector.

Irwin Mitchell made a decision to gain certification to ISO14001 Environmental Management System to formalise the existing practices and as a response to increasing customer pressure. The scope of the Standard covers all the UK offices and the services provided including the offices, support services and the professional legal practices. The challenge was to develop a robust system that did not impact upon the day to day working of the business whilst also managing to meet the high expectations to reduce resource and utility consumption.

Services Provided
DPP Sustainability was engaged to provide a review of the existing environmental system and training to the property management team, which included:

• Tailored training workshop to provide an overview of good practice and challenge the effective implementation of the system.
• Legal compliance review of business activities and gaps providing a revised Legal Register and associated Environmental Risk Register.
• Review of the Environmental Policy and management system to align with the business culture and operations.

Achievements
• Streamlined the environmental management system to focus upon key requirements and responsibilities. The system was modified to fit into day to day business activities and form part of the culture to gain ownership from across the business;
• Irwin Mitchell achieved certification with a system that can be self managed and operated with minimal additional resources.