Global Action Plan

[Tristan_Parker]

Global Action Plan is an independent environmental charity that has been operating for 16 years. It aims to introduce attitude and behavioural change by working with businesses, local authorities, communities and schools in a variety of ways. The approach at the charity is to do “more than just workshops or events”, says Emma Bangar, PR and Marketing Manager for Global Action Plan. “We develop programmes in the workplace and with communities to measure environmental progress.”

CEO of the charity is Trewin Restorick, who also chairs the Environmental IT Leadership Team, is a trustee for sustainability charity Sustainability and Environmental Education, and co-chaired Defra’s Compact Group.

Global Action Plan offers to help businesses improve their environmental performance and lower carbon emissions in a number of ways, tailoring the help it provides to the size and structure of the organisation. For larger businesses, Global Action Plan works on employee engagement programmes and awareness campaigns. Nothing out of the ordinary there, but the charity uses some innovative methods of getting the message across, as Emma explains when talking about some of the environmental priorities for businesses to focus on:

“Reducing waste is a big area and we try to get people to do this in every way, such as replacing glossy paper with normal paper when printing. For one project, we collected all the photocopy paper boxes used in a month and hung them up from floor to ceiling in the staff canteen. There were a huge amount, and it really made people take notice. It’s about simple solutions like this and making changes so that people can see the results.”

The charity won a coveted Ashden Award – which recognises sustainable energy solutions – for its employee engagement programmes, which again featured innovative methods of engaging staff with the renewable energy message.

“Part of the reason we won the Ashden Award was our communications campaign which can include our interactive displays”, says Emma. “This included an energy efficiency bike, where people powered old-style lightbulbs and energy-saving lightbulbs to see the difference needed in power.” Measures like this are part of Global Action Plan’s 12-month employee engagement programmes which measures engagement with environmental and low carbon issues at the beginning and end of the programme. A key focus of these schemes is to involve staff from all levels of the business, rather than focusing on just one department. “We involve people by getting them to say what they want to achieve”, explains Emma. “Then, we make achievable goals and come up with relevant ideas. People, and businesses, don’t like to be told what to do – it’s much more important to raise awareness by keeping people enthusiastic. There are a lot of different ways to communicate the message.”

Emma goes on to say that one of the crucial elements of employee engagement is tackling the often-encountered attitude amongst staff of ‘why should we care about lowering costs for our boss?’ Therefore, much of the charity’s work concentrates on showing people the environmental benefits (and costs) of their actions in the workplace.

Another unusual technique used in a Global Action Plan engagement programme was a light-hearted version of the ‘name and shame’ method which involved, for example, placing a chocolate by an employee’s computer if they had taken action to successfully reduce environmental impact, and tying a balloon to their computer – to alert other people in the office – if they had wasted energy.

But for those doubting the effectiveness of such unusual measures, examining the resulting figures clearly shows what can achieved. Global Action Plan worked with insurance company Allianz on a series of environmental projects, including the company’s head office in Guildford, where waste was reduced by 30%, and another branch in Glasgow where the charity helped to address the fact that around 50% of the building’s lights were being left on overnight. All lights in the building are now turned off overnight. These and other measures implemented through the projects have saved Allianz around £65,000 annually.

Other large businesses that Global Action Plan has worked with include Investec and Sky. Investec realised its environmental impact and had been considering sustainability measures for some time when it began working with Global Action Plan, who addressed waste and energy inefficiencies in the company’s offices. Within a year, the following had been achieved: A 28% reduction in annual waste per employee; recycling rates of up to 70%; a 6% reduction in paper use; and 97% of photocopiers switched off – a huge increase from the previous rate of just 5%.

The charity has an ongoing three-year partnership with Sky involves many wide-scale environmental schemes. These include the Sky Leadership programme, which focuses on employee engagement by working with 50 leaders from across the company to develop a range of initiatives, such as Sky Eco-Champions, which will trial a new workplace programme structure which links directly into the company’s environmental policy.

Global Action Plan also provides help for smaller businesses, including advice on renewable energy technologies and assisting in the development of sustainable construction and low carbon buildings. This includes offering BREEAM (the Building and Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method) assessments and certifying Energy Performance Certificates for buildings.

“We are also a registered trainer for EMS [the Environmental Management Standard] toolkit” says Emma. “This can help smaller businesses to achieve ISO 14001 [an environmental management standard] and give them environmental credentials, which means that they will be able to compete more easily.”