Are you conscious of your business’ image? If so, you’re part of a growing number of business leaders who correctly realise that their companies’ green credentials are becoming increasingly important in 2021 and beyond.
No matter what it is that has motivated you to go on a quest for a greener business, whether you’ve taken inspiration from (or being made to feel guilty by) Greta Thundberg or whether the soothing speech of Sir David Attenborough has prompted you to take action, now is a fantastic time to transform your business for the greener.
Going green isn’t just for those businesses that carry out activities which obviously pollute, such as companies that run fleets of vehicles where it can be easy to find tweaks and changes that lower pollution. Going green applies to all businesses, even those which work in IT and have only remote employees, such as call centres and bingo sites. There are always adjustments that can be made and fine tuning that can be done to result in greener business.
Let’s kick things off by taking a look at five simple actions you can take to make your business activities more green.
Cut back on unnecessary energy usage
You should start by eradicating any obviously unnecessary wastage of energy, but assuming you’ve already done this, next you should be on the lookout for the more subtle wastage. Are your office lights being switched off at night? Do you shut down all your computers at the end of the day? Maybe you have unnecessary monitors running throughout the day which no one really pays attention to, or revolving doors that spin even when nobody is there?
All of the above are subtle changes, but over a year small adjustments such as these can result in savings for your business, but most importantly, they can amount to a huge collective impact if many businesses make the same adjustments.
Invest in low energy appliances
You may think that keeping your archaic appliances running is pound wise and represents a saving over switching for new.
For example, the blow dryer in the bathroom which makes such a mess on the floor and nearly scolds your hands after each wash – next time it breaks, consider putting the money you’d normally use to coax it back into life into purchasing a more eco-friendly replacement.
Incentivise staff to be greener
You can have fun with this goal. Why not operate a leaderboard for staff who take various actions. Those who cycle to work could be entered into a prize draw? Getting creative here is great and if you do it right, you could save energy but also gain more from your employees by way of increased motivation.
Work with greener suppliers
Again, take a really close look at your business. In just about every area that your business has suppliers, it will be possible to make switches for those that are greener. For example, web hosting. This probably isn’t an area of your business that you’ve examined closely in the past, but when you do, you’ll realise there are green minded web hosting companies.
Allow remote working
After a period of time where it’s become the norm for staff to work from home, you may have decided that you prefer to have your stuff present in the office. But why not go half way? Allowing your staff to work a couple of days from home could make them happier and it will also be helping reduce their footprint in terms of travelling.
As you can see, going green can be about the tiny changes and the best thing is, many of these changes are really very easy to implement. We hope this article serves as a starting point for making greener decisions for your company.