How can I encourage my employees to be green?

23 Nov, 2017

So if as a business you have thought about or have decided to ‘go green’ what can you do to ensure that employees get on board with helping to make your business greener?  Here we provide our top tips for incentivising your employees to boost your business’ green credentials.

Include employees in the vision

When implementing any new policies in the workplace, it helps if employees understand why they are being implemented.  Make sure that employees understand that reducing environmental impact can have many positive effects on the business.  This does not just include reducing the business’ carbon footprint but also includes costs savings, increased sales and better reputation in the market place.   Ask for employees input in to how they think the business can be greener.

Create a Green Team

Many people these days are enthusiastic about being green in their personal lives and are making greener choices at home.  Why not create a team of green leaders in your business to be at the forefront of your green drive.  Get them to implement things such as recycling programmes, share ideas for rewarding employees and set examples for being environmentally conscious.

Staff Education

You may have some staff who are totally in the dark about environmental issues.  This is where staff education becomes crucial.   Make some time in your training programmes to educate staff about things such as energy efficiency, the impact of plastic on the environment, the importance of recycling.  Try to find outside speakers who can enthuse staff.  Don’t forget the impact of signage around the office/building to remind employees to turn lights off, put rubbish in the recycling or make sure taps are off.

Incentives

Incentivising employees can be a good way to encourage adherence to environmental policies.  Rewards could be financial, such as gift cards or a bonus.  However, they don’t have to be financial.  Sometimes, public recognition for doing a good job can be sufficient or perhaps a certificate.

Internal competition

To be effective, it’s crucial that being environmentally conscious does not become a laborious task for staff.   You could create an internal competition to make the process more fun for staff such as a prize for the person that recycles the most or takes on board the most environmentally friendly tasks personally.

Top down leadership 

Whenever any new policy or procedure is implemented within a business, it’s important that employers are seen to lead by example. Managers therefore must be seen to be following their own policies on environmental sustainability so that being green becomes the norm of the business.

The above are ideas for if you just want to improve your current environmental status.  If however, you want to go a step further and implement ISO 14001 Environmental Management System, then we can help.  Take a look at our website here to see what is involved or give our friendly team a call on 0330 058 5551.