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EERE » AMO eGuide » FOUNDATIONAL ENERGY MANAGEMENT

Step 5.1 Conduct management review of performance

Step 5 is when you conduct a strategic, high-level review of the results of your energy management program, looking for ways to continually improve your organization’s energy performance. This step is in contrast to Measure and Check Results (Step 4), when you measured and checked results of your energy management program at a more detailed and tactical level—monitoring project status and results, including any energy performance improvement. And so following completion of Step 4, you should have completed energy project activities and verified results. For projects involving changes in processes, procedures, or equipment, these project activities include things such as delegation of responsibilities, training, developing operating criteria, or initiation of new monitoring requirements.

During this step, you’ll be taking time to collectively assess your energy management program’s status, determining if any strategic changes are needed in the program or focus. You should ask questions such as the following:

  1. What is working well?
  2. Should anything be changed?
  3. Is our energy management program in alignment with other organizational efforts, our strategic planning, and our forecast?

The first and most important thing to do when reviewing for continual improvement is to conduct a management review of performance, including project progress, results, and the overall impact on your organization’s energy performance. Management needs to be involved in this review so that they can make decisions about allocating resources and planning for future projects to further improve your organization’s energy performance.

Advancing from Foundational Level 1 to ISO 50001 Level 2 for Step 5.1

In ISO 50001, management review of performance is a formal process. Management review involves top management evaluating your organization’s energy performance and energy management system (EnMS) and making decisions based on that evaluation. Management reviews are conducted at planned intervals and involve compiling and analyzing much more data and information than for foundational energy management (Level 1). Additional information includes the organization’s energy policy, EnPIs, projected energy performance, energy objectives and targets, results of internal audits, corrective and preventive actions, and recommendations for improvement. To ensure this data and information is available for management review, specific roles and responsibilities for data collection and analysis are established.

Top management is directly responsible for ensuring the EnMS is suitable, adequate and effective, particularly in achieving continual energy performance improvement. Specific outcomes are expected from ISO 50001 management reviews. These outcomes include decisions and actions related to changes in energy performance, as well as potential changes to the energy policy, energy objectives and targets, EnPIs and resource allocations. Management review records need to be maintained.

Advance to Next Level

How to do it

There are two associated tasks you will need to complete this step:

5.1.1 Plan and prepare for the management review

To prepare for the management review meeting, you will first want to set the agenda. You can use the Management Review Agenda Example and the Management Review Presentation Template to help you plan for your presentation.

As you prepare for the meeting, you will need to determine what information and supporting material will be needed and assign responsibilities for collecting that information. Include a review and update to energy sources, uses, and equipment.

It’s also important to invite the right people to the meeting. At a minimum, top management and the energy management representative should be included. Often, it is a good opportunity to include all of top management’s direct reports so that key managers and supervisors are included in the discussion. The entire energy team can be present or just the energy coordinator or some subset of the team.

Lastly, in preparing for the first review meeting, decide on a logical frequency for future management review meetings. Typically they should be at least annually. Some organizations choose to have a review meeting monthly or quarterly. Often this review meeting is part of another regularly scheduled meeting such as a manager’s meeting, strategic planning, or a business retreat.

5.1.2 Conduct the management review

The management review is the opportunity to check on the overall progress of the project(s) by examining the project action plan(s), energy performance, and related support systems. It’s important to take action on the results; based on the review, the energy team should make recommendations to management on how to move forward and what actions to take. Each action item should include an assigned responsible person along with a projected completion date.

While conducting the management review, be prepared to deal with the following issues:

  • Review meetings aren’t regularly scheduled: One of the key benefits of management review is a regular review time, be it monthly or annually. Sometimes it is difficult to add another meeting to everyone’s busy schedule. Look for meetings that the management review can be added to. Consider breaking the management review into several parts that can added to other meetings or more easily scheduled.
  • The review meetings become detailed instead of strategic: Often it is difficult to break away from the details and look at the big picture. Having some guiding questions to ask top management can help to keep the review at the strategic level. Questions can include:
    • Are there projects that can leverage off of current projects?
    • Is this program achieving our overall goals? If not, how can we realign it with original intentions?
    • Are there any changes we should make?
  • Actions from the last review weren’t completed: Incomplete actions items can hamper your energy management program, especially if it becomes the norm rather than the exception. In every organization, there are competing priorities. Sometimes an action item needs to be put on the back burner or legitimately needs more time to complete. However, if incomplete actions items become routine, it is time to take a closer look at staff and monetary resources that are dedicated to the energy effort. Top management needs to get involved to reallocated resources.
  • Projects not on track, little progress made: When this has occurred, the review meeting can develop into a negative experience where employees blame one another and get defensive. If this is the case, communicating with top management prior to the review will avoid blind-siding them and allow you to ask for their help in facilitating the meeting

Resources & Examples