Businesses can benefit from investigating their waste management practices. Audits allow companies to see firsthand how they generate and dispose of garbage and how these methods affect their operations. Whether you’re looking to cut costs or reduce your environmental impact, dissecting your facility’s waste practices is helpful and necessary. Here are some useful tips for performing a waste audit to help improve your business.
Establish Clear Objectives
Before your start your investigation, take some time to establish clear objectives. What goals would you like to meet by the end of this process? You might decide that you want to identify places where you can save money or wish to find areas where you can improve your current recycling techniques. Whatever your goals are, it’s critical to define them early on to help guide you through every stage of the audit.
Assemble a Qualified Team
Depending on your business’s size, waste audits can take lots of time and energy to complete. You’ll need to assemble a qualified team to help you organize, collect, and analyze your data. Gather professionals from various departments, such as finance, safety, and HR, to weigh in with their particular expertise. You might even think about hiring a third party to perform your audit if you want an honest, unbiased opinion.
Prioritize Safety Measures
Waste audits involve more than observing collection and disposal methods; they’re about getting your hands dirty and sorting through all of your trash. Be sure to prioritize safety during this stage, as some garbage might be dangerous. Invest in personal protective gear like gloves, safety goggles, and masks to safeguard your team’s health. This useful tip for performing a waste audit will help you avoid sustaining any life-threatening injuries.
Carefully Analyze Data
Once you’ve done the work and collected information, you need to analyze your data carefully. This is the time for you to interpret your facts and figures and apply them to the goals you set earlier in the process. For example, there are many benefits of lab packing hazardous waste that could help improve your safety standards. What did you learn about your current methods that could enhance your lab packing practices, and what should you keep the same?
Conducting a waste audit will provide you with valuable information to develop your business. Use these tips when you’re ready to upgrade your operations and watch how much better your practices become.