Offices and the environment: Corporate responsibility

Corporate responsibility has become a huge buzzword in the world of business in the past two decades. It reflects the fact that organisations have recognised their broader role in society. Customers increasingly expect the companies that they buy from to be ethical, sustainable and responsible in their business practices, from using overseas factories that ban child labour to recycling and minimising their carbon footprints. Whilst customers expect that kind of broader responsibility and commitment to ethical business practices, governmental regulators increasingly mandate it.

A business of any size, whether they own their property or have used a company such as http://www.matrix-house.co.uk/ who have Offices to let Basingstoke, can make small changes that they can then incorporate into their corporate responsibility statements.

How businesses approach environmental strategy

Examples of corporate environmental decisions

Firms will pursue a variety of strategies in order to become more environmentally friendly. They will typically will bring in expert environmental consultancy in order to ascertain their best course of strategic improvement action, to re-engineer the business at all levels, strip out waste, and ensure that high levels of sustainability and environmentally friendly practices are being pursued. Of course, this work is not entirely altruistic; businesses usually save a great deal of money in the process!

Pest management as a focus area

Focus areas

Different businesses will have different focus areas. Those with warehousing premises might find that they have pest problems and regularly have to call out specialist pest experts to deal with mouse or bird control services in London.

By choosing those with integrated pest management practices, the firm can be reassured that the pest problem will be constantly monitored and managed, with chemicals being a last resort. Even then, the least toxic varieties are used.

Fleet, waste and renewable energy

Fleet and logistics

Company cars and delivery vehicles can be assessed for carbon emissions, and firms may decide to only invest in models that have excellent green credentials. This will typically reduce running costs as well as carbon emissions.

Waste management

This is one of the main focus areas for all businesses because they deal with different kinds of waste and are able to recycle much of it. Some firms will even go a step further and install their own biomass or energy-from-waste installation onsite – for example, to heat or power a commercial installation or local buildings by burning waste that would otherwise go to landfill.

Renewable Energy

Firms will also buy environmentally friendly energy tariffs or even install their own wind or solar PV systems to generate their own power, following in the footsteps of Google and IKEA.

Summary

This article looks at how businesses build corporate environmental responsibility into their operations. It covers bringing in environmental consultancy to guide strategy, using integrated pest management with chemicals as a last resort, choosing lower-emission company vehicles, recycling waste or generating energy from it on site, and buying green energy tariffs or installing wind or solar power.

Questions this article raises

• How much do these environmental measures typically save businesses on running costs?
• How common is on-site energy-from-waste among smaller UK businesses?
• What proof do customers expect to see behind a corporate responsibility statement?