Life cycle management: Integrated approach towards corporate environmental issues

An integrated approach towards environmental management, the concept of life cycle management, is presented. Life cycle management consists of three parts: (i) integrating environmental issues into the decision‐making process of the company; (ii) optimizing the environmental impact caused by the product system during its life cycle; and (iii) creating a new organizational culture to support the decision‐making process. The concept was developed during the compilation of an environmental management handbook for Finnish industry. The model combines a market‐oriented environmental management approach, a circular value chains approach and an organizational culture approach.