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Greening Your Office: Sustainable Practices for a Better Workplace
With even the private sector now experiencing pressure to adopt sustainable practices, it’s clear that ESG credentials have become a highly valuable currency in the world of modern business.
As the ongoing battle against climate emergency develops, the pressure is on for businesses – global enterprise and SMB alike - to implement sustainable practices into their operations. Not only do they have to continually demonstrate compliance with emerging policies and regulations, but added pressure is also coming from another surprising source.
Recent research suggests that sustainability is a rapidly growing concern among employees – and nowadays, catering to these concerns is key to recruitment and retention. Out of a poll of 1,000 UK employees in mid-size businesses, 73% considered sustainability to be important – with as many as one-fifth (20%) reporting that they have turned down jobs based on a business having poor ESG commitments.
So, the big question is: how can you demonstrate your commitment to sustainability? As it turns out, there’s more than one way to ‘green your office’…
Challenges & Solutions
While implementing sustainable business practices isn’t necessarily a straightforward path from A to B, every obstacle has a solution. For instance:
- Tight budgets can be a significant roadblock to adopting sustainable tech solutions. However, sustainability is such a priority for many governments and organisations that many will offer tax breaks, subsidies, and grants to help you offset the upfront costs.
- Employee resistance is another factor to consider when planning a companywide implementation. For this reason, it’s vital to clearly communicate to your teams how these changes will generate sustainable benefits, to ensure everyone is on the same page and ready to adopt new practices by the time it is active.
- Installation & Implementation presents a considerable challenge by itself – which is why careful planning is essential. Of course, coordinating the installation process through a trusted Managed Workplace Services provider will ensure you are making the right steps the first time; with ongoing testing organised to ensure that everything is working optimally.
The Many Roads to a Sustainable Workplace
Below are some examples of how to start ‘greening your office’ – and while this list is by no means exhaustive; engaging with one, or a mixture of these examples can contribute significant benefits to any sustainability strategy.
Sustainable Print
Many companies are finding sustainability benefits with HP-based Managed Print solutions –which, as well as offsetting 100% of your print-related greenhouse gas emissions, reduces your paper waste by 25%, improves your resource efficiency by 13%, and decreases your impact on ecosystems by 12%.
For added peace of mind when your employees are printing, be assured that this service is certified as CarbonNeutral® in accordance with the CarbonNeutral Protocol, which covers the HP devices’ lifecycle, supplies, paper, manufacturing, transportation, use, and end-of-service disposal.
Reduced Forest Impact
With your print infrastructure operating with increased sustainability measures, why not add another to the mix?
Further reduce your forest impact by adding PrintReleaf to your Managed Print Service, a software that records your paper output and replants the equivalent number of trees into reforestation projects around the world.
Refurbished Tech
Apogee’s research indicated that 92% of respondents believe refurbished equipment is beneficial to the environment, with only a very small minority (less than 1%) saying that they would only accept brand-new workplace devices. This indicates that the vast majority of employees would be willing to accept refurbished technology, so long as it matches the performance of a brand new device.
Refurbished devices available through The ACE Line each undergo a rigorous 30-step inspection process to ensure peak performance – but are available for lower costs and shortened leases, giving you the benefit of high-performing machines, for less financial commitment.
Sustainable IT
Accessing top-quality IT devices through a service provider is both easy and cost-effective, thanks to a Device-as-a-Service (DaaS) solution. To date, HP have sourced over 60 million ocean-bound and recycled plastic bottles to produce HP laptops, with over 1 billion pounds of recycled materials used in its products and packaging.
Furthermore, between 2022 and 2023, 100% of HP’s released PCs and displays contained recycled materials – so by aligning with HP, you are not only greening your own office, but also contributing toward a growing market interest in green, renewably-sourced IT.
Digital Processes
Digitisation will lay the foundation for the future of work for more reasons than one. Not only does digitised data unlock all kinds of utility whilst feeding into automation, but it can also be stored, shared, backed-up, located, and secured far more effectively than physical documentation.
By making use of digital data processes to enable more effective collaboration between your teams, you decrease the need for your employees to commute onsite – allowing you to utilise your floor space more effectively, rent it out for extra income, or remove it completely. This means you can minimise your company footprint whilst actually boosting productivity, as well as minimising emissions from employees travelling to the office.
As mentioned previously, this is not a checklist – but merely represents possible avenues to explore when it comes to introducing sustainable practices into your workplace. For more information on greening your office, contact us by using the form below.
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