Businesses can make a difference – by doing their bit
By Kevin Smith, IW Chamber Chief Executive
New Year is always a time for conversations about renewal and future growth and of course it is a time of optimism. On a personal level you might be in the swing of a new health regime, which is great. Many businesses will be thinking about growing and expanding whilst at the same time perhaps doing their bit for the environment.
I believe this is where Island businesses can make a difference – by encouraging a culture and attitude of looking after the health and wellbeing of your staff and your own business environment.
Over the past nine months the Chamber, working with the Local Sustainable Transport Fund, has been proactively engaged, encouraging companies and employers to work on a range of initiatives that can protect the beautiful environment that is the Isle of Wight as well as encourage the health and wellbeing of their employees.
Now don’t get me wrong – I am not one of these evangelists who, just because I might have started to get into cycling or walking, now wants everyone else to do the same! I don’t know about you but that type of evangelism just turns me off every time. But what I have seen by working in this area is that by developing a culture within your business that improves the health and wellbeing of your staff and that helps to protect the environment, it can also improve the productivity of your business. This can be achieved simply and without major drama by adopting a ‘nudge effect’ of getting a lot of people to do a number of small things.
This does not have to be a lot, as long as it is something. It can be as much as walking to work if your employment is within walking distance, or catching a bus, or car sharing on occasions. All of this helps the health and wellbeing of yourself, your employees and the environment. For the more adventurous this could also include getting back on a bike to cycle to work, which can be fun nowadays, especially if you try one of these wonderful creations the electric bicycle.
As a part of this gentle nudge to encourage us all to do our bit for ourselves and our environment in February we are running what we call a ‘Green Travel Month’ where we are asking employers and employees to have a go at getting to work in an environmentally friendly way. We are not saying ‘do this every day’, but you can if you want to. We are encouraging everyone to try something during the month however small it may be and don’t forget that if you love your car why not car share? It all helps.
This will be followed in March by a Green Island conference where we will be sharing plans and ideas for the future health and wellbeing of the Isle of Wight and its residents, to discuss how we can develop these ideas that will take us into the future. We will be also be launching a new ‘green island’ brand that will support a number of other initiatives associated with this which will continue the aspirations for a healthy workforce and healthy environment. I hope that you will join me in making this happen.
