Bonn Memorandum 2009

Sustainable Lifestyles

Sustainable Development in the Workplace

Sustainability is becoming an increasingly important competitiveness and success factor for companies. The various stakeholder groups of relevance to companies – financial market actors, customers, NGOs, politicians, the media etc. – are increasingly demanding a greater commitment to sustainability and therefore more corporate social responsibility. This means that companies must integrate sustainability into their corporate strategies and include sustainable management practices successfully in their operations.

First of all, companies must take a pro-active role in raising awareness of the concept of sustainability and its direct relevance to themselves, in order to create incentives for a stronger commitment to sustainability in the workplace. The “MIMONA – Motivation for Sustainability” (www.mimona.de) online database offers examples of how companies can involve and motivate their workforce and encourage them to think about and move towards sustainable action. On this website, the German Environmental Management Association (B.A.U.M.) lists hundreds of examples of schemes already being implemented by companies.

At a time of high and rising energy and resource prices in particular, energy saving and energy efficiency must be given higher priority. This reduces costs, which in turn improves companies’ economic viability and ultimately helps to safeguard jobs. This is a win-win situation which can be achieved, for example, by effective awareness-raising aimed at encouraging employees to take a greater interest in sustainability and explaining the benefits in terms of their own job security. Managers should also ensure that their own conduct sets a good example in the workplace. Positive incentives can be created, e.g.
 

• by establishing in-company proposal schemes,
• by holding competitions,
• by setting up working groups, committees or other bodies composed of representatives of various departments and levels of seniority, who work together on sustainability issues,
• by providing human and financial resources to support sustainability projects that actively involve the workforce.

More sustainability in the workplace cannot be achieved without the active participation and commitment of the workforce. The working environment can also generate synergies for more sustainability in employees’ homes and at work. Energy costs are a good example of how positive linkage can be created between these two settings: if a company provides information and/or meters that help employees save energy in the home, for example, they are more likely to adopt energy-saving measures at work as well, thus benefiting both sides.