Ethisphere Institute Recognizes Company for Dedication to Ethical Business Practices

POMPANO BEACH, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mar. 11, 2015-- Waste Management (NYSE:WM), has once again been recognized by the Ethisphere Institute, an independent center of research promoting best practices in corporate ethics and governance, as a 2015 World’s Most Ethical Company^®.

This is the eighth time Waste Management will be honored with this award, which recognizes organizations that continue to raise the bar on ethical leadership and corporate behavior. The World’s Most Ethical Companies designation recognizes those organizations that have had a material impact on the way business is conducted by fostering a culture of ethics and transparency at every level of the company.

“This is a great honor for us and is testament to the character and commitment of the entire Waste Management team to keeping safety, ethics and compliance front and center in all they do,” said David Steiner, president and chief executive officer of Waste Management. “As North America’s leading environmental solutions provider, we strive every day to provide excellent service to our customers, contribute to communities where we live and work, and minimize our environmental impact. We’re extremely proud of our strong grounding and firm commitment to doing the right things and making the right decisions, day in and day out.”

Waste Management is the only company in the Environmental Services industry being honored this year.

“This is one of our company’s proudest achievements,” said Dawn McCormick, Director of Communications for Waste Management Inc. of Florida. “We are committed to sharing an unwavering dedication to the highest ethical standards from employees at every level of our organization.”

“The World’s Most Ethical Companies embrace the correlation between ethical business practice and improved company performance. These companies use ethics as a means to further define their industry leadership and understand that creating an ethical culture and earning the World’s Most Ethical Companies recognition involves more than just an outward facing message or a handful of senior executives saying the right thing,” said Ethisphere’s Chief Executive Officer, Timothy Erblich. “Earning this recognition involves the collective action of a global workforce from the top down. We congratulate everyone at Waste Management for this extraordinary achievement.”

The World's Most Ethical Company assessment is based upon the Ethisphere Institute’s Ethics Quotient™ (EQ) framework developed over years of research to provide a means to assess an organization’s performance in an objective, consistent and standardized way. The information collected provides a comprehensive sampling of definitive criteria of core competencies, rather than all aspects of corporate governance, risk, sustainability, compliance and ethics. The EQ framework and methodology is determined, vetted and refined by the expert advice and insights gleaned from Ethisphere’s network of thought leaders and from the World’s Most Ethical CompanyMethodology Advisory Panel.

Scores are generated in five key categories: ethics and compliance program (35%), corporate citizenship and responsibility (20%), culture of ethics (20%), governance (15%) and leadership, innovation and reputation (10%).

The full list of the 2015 World's Most Ethical Companies can be found at http://ethisphere.com/worlds-most-ethical/wme-honorees/.

Senior executives of honorees contribute high-level insights and best practices to the well-regarded World’s Most Ethical Companies Executive Briefing (download Volume 2 here). Additional insights gleaned from the World’s Most Ethical Companies will be released in a series of whitepapers and infographics over the coming months (download the 2014 Insights). Organizations interested in how they compare to the World’s Most Ethical Companies are invited to learn more about Ethisphere’s services.

ABOUT WASTE MANAGEMENT

Waste Management, Inc., based in Houston, Texas, is the leading provider of comprehensive waste management services in North America. Through its subsidiaries, the company provides collection, transfer, recycling and resource recovery, and disposal services. It is also a leading developer, operator and owner of landfill gas-to-energy facilities in the United States. The company’s customers include residential, commercial, industrial, and municipal customers throughout North America. To learn more information about Waste Management visit www.wm.com or www.thinkgreen.com.

ABOUT THE ETHISPHERE INSTITUTE

The Ethisphere^® Institute is the global leader in defining and advancing the standards of ethical business practices that fuel corporate character, marketplace trust and business success. Ethisphere has deep expertise in measuring and defining core ethics standards using data-driven insights that help companies enhance corporate character. Ethisphere honors superior achievement through its World’s Most Ethical Companies^® recognition program, provides a community of industry experts with the Business Ethics Leadership Alliance (BELA) and showcases trends and best practices in ethics with the publication of Ethisphere Magazine and The World’s Most Ethical Companies Executive Briefing. Ethisphere is also the leading provider of independent verification of corporate ethics and compliance programs. More information about Ethisphere can be found at: http://ethisphere.com/.

Source: Waste Management

Waste Management
Dawn McCormick, 954-226-9894
dmccormick@wm.com
or
Ethisphere
Clea Nabozny, 480-397-2658
Clea.Nabozny@ethisphere.com