Ways Our Office is Going Green

Please Welcome Guest Bloggers from the InterCall Toronto Office: Cristina Lucas & Jennifer Cramb

Since the start of our company’s recent green initiative there has been increasing awareness in our office when it comes to being green.  There are many ways that people can decide to reduce, reuse and recycle, but here are some of the steps we’ve found to be successful in all three areas.

Reduce
As our office is in a very urban part of the city, we are fortunate to have access to several forms of public transportation.  We all try to participate and have some options available such as the commuter train, subway, streetcars, buses and carpooling.  Each of these options reduces carbon emissions and, as an added bonus, we feel that it improves our quality of life.  With what would normally be a lot of time spent in the car in traffic, we can now prepare for meetings, read, socialize, and be stress free.

Our office has quite a bit of natural light available.  Because of this, it’s common for us to work without having to turn the lights on.  Each room has its own light switch and thermostat that allows us to control and maintain our energy consumption.  Our building has even installed sensors in the bathrooms so that the lights only turn on when it is occupied.

The main culprit in our “reduce” area is paper consumption.  There’s always someone you know in your office that “accidentally” prints off the entire sales database / inbox, or puts in paper the wrong way.  The best policy we’ve implemented to help reduce our paper use is having a duplex printer.  Our network team has assisted in updating everyone’s computers so their default settings include the duplex feature.  If your office doesn’t have a duplex printer, you can always reuse sheets by putting them back into the printer to reprint on the other side.  This is really good for those documents that you have to work off of but don’t need to keep forever.

Reuse
The reuse philosophy is one that commonly gets overlooked by people in the office place.  It’s easy to get your take-out food, use plastic forks and disposable cups.  With our office kitchenette, we are able bring in our own lunches and reuse dishware instead of paper and plastic alternatives, thereby allowing us to wash and reuse plates, cutlery, and mugs.

There are also more creative ways to be “friendlier” in the food court than you may think.  For instance, when getting coffee for the team, we keep the cardboard trays and take them back on our next coffee run. Some places will double-package your food, frst in its container, and then again in a bag. We skip the double-bag / plate, or bring our own substitute that we use on a daily basis.  We also use reusable bags when going to and from the office.

Recycle
Having someone on site that is diligent in educating and reminding others of our green responsibility is essential.  We affectionately refer to this person as the “office garbage picker”.  This person is our constant reminder that “Yes, that can be recycled” or “No, you don’t need to print that email”.  Creating signs can also help people understand the role they play in office recycling.

In order to be more efficient in recycling, we are approaching our building management to discuss options for composting or “green boxing”.  This is one thing that we are currently unable to facilitate on our own and need additional support for.

Being more aware and having good communication with your teammates is important to achieving the three Rs of reduce, reuse, recycle.  These are the things that have worked for us, but there are tons of ways to go green in your office. What challenges or successes has your office faced in going green?

Comments

[Ky]

Great to hear about your greening efforts! Our company, The Green Office, has the luxury of living in one of the greenest cities in the country so we don't have a problem with most of the large-scale things like public transportation and composting. It's the smaller things that are most important but most frequently neglected, such as avoiding plastic bags and disposable silverware when doing take out. We are fortunate to have very eco-minded colleagues who diligently remind us when we forget or fall behind. Office greening can be thought of as a fun and never-ending game as long as everyone is light-hearted about it!

http://www.thegreenoffice.com

[Taryn Stinson]

It's really interesting to me to read about how all of the offices are really working on increasing the awareness of being green. It's fun to see all of the different ways that people can accomplish the same task.

I work at home so it allows me to do my own thing...Most of the time, I don't need to work with the light on. And when I do - I'm using the special energy bulbs. I consistently try to do different things each day...I guess that's all it takes!

[Ricky Price]

Nice! I'm considering it now that i read your article. In our own simple way, we can lessen the pollution and help conserve mother earth! Thanks for your post!

[Texas Shredding]

Offices are among the institutions that use paper and other disposable cups and plates. It is good to know that some offices are now going green. Aside from using a duplex printers, you can use the back part of the page where the front has been printed on for scrap paper for notes and reminders. For the confidential documents, these can be shredded- http://www.texas-shredding.com. The shredded paper can be sent off to recycling centers. Going green comes with an effort from the management and cooperation from the employees themselves. This good office is fortunate to have employees who do their part.