The Tapestry of Sustainability in an Organization
Watch a brief video with highlights from the interview.
Study after study shows younger generations are looking for jobs in organizations that manifest values of sustainability and purpose. College students often ask how to get a job in sustainability. My advice to them is get any job in a company with good culture and then take initiative, like starting a green team, to show how your values add value!
If you want to attract and keep the best talent, yet you do not have the budget or team size to justify a specific role for sustainability, weave the principles and opportunities into existing positions such that the eventual tapestry of the organization has threads of positive impact throughout.
What would it look like to truly integrate sustainability into every department, or even every job?
This is actually a pretty straightforward ripple effect process. START A GREEN TEAM!! I had the pleasure of connecting with a fellow hotel green team advocate recently. Raquel Noboa founded Fifty Shades Greener, based on her personal experience successfully starting and running a green team. Not only is her green team launch story inspiring, she is a credit to the concept of a green team when we consider the fact that even after she is no longer at the property, it has gone on to be the first carbon neutral hotel in Ireland!
Astrapto and Fifty Shades Greener both offer courses and support for founding and running green teams. I enjoyed speaking with a kindred spirit! We both strongly agree that a green team:
Should be cross-functional.
Should NOT just be the executive management.
Should include Human Resources and Marketing/Sales - two departments often left out of sustainability initiatives.
Raquel provides an excellent example of why a green team is a great start but ultimately, job integration is vital. She describes a breakfast chef who turned on every piece of equipment in the kitchen when he came in each morning, even though some were not needed until later in the day. She asked him why and he replied, “That’s just what I do. That’s my job.” As Raquel stated, “He had never been told any different.” Furthermore, she described the importance in explaining the why to him (climate change, lowered energy bills/usage) to bring about behavior change.
Read more here about how to avoid the “because I said so” approach to sustainability.
(Be sure to watch the full interview with Raquel below. I promise you will be inspired by her examples and impressed with her accomplishments.)
So what are the integration steps?
Once HR has bought in and inspired to weave sustainability throughout, they might follow a process that starts with a job description. What flows from a job description? Screening and interview questions, job tasks, training, and performance reviews are all part of the job ecosystem. Incorporate sustainability into these steps, starting with one and then eventually all departments.
Let’s be realistic. You’re not likely to go thru and add sustainability to every single job description within that first department. We recommend you start with the next supervisor or above position you are filling. This enables you to slowly integrate sustainability across the organization.
And avoid doing this in a vacuum. Bring it up at a staff or management meeting and get input. The more people feel a sense of ownership, the more likely they will support the spread of the idea until it becomes an ingrained part of organizational design.
Let’s look at a hotel example. A housekeeping supervisor position needs to be filled. Ask the housekeeping department what sustainability initiatives they would like to see implemented or improved upon. Ask other departments, especially the directors of rooms, operations, engineering, and similar departments what they would like to see from a sustainability standpoint in the housekeeping department.
It’s okay to start small, like searching for someone who has experience selecting green cleaning products, or you can aim high, like requiring expertise in air quality management. It will depend on the level of sophistication you are starting with. A large hotel with well established sustainability programs would benefit from the addition of someone who has deeper knowledge of chemicals and who can contribute at a strategic level to take the property’s health and wellness offering to the next level. On the other hand, a smaller hotel just starting on its sustainability journey will benefit from a housekeeper who previously worked at a property that achieved Green Seal certification or a similar green cleaning endeavor. This person would have more of the practical, day-to-day knowledge needed to successfully switch supplies and techniques.
Other benefits of this approach:
Think outside the box. Job descriptions may have been a copy and paste for years and this is an opportunity to redefine the essence of what this role brings to the organization. Remember the principle that sustainability often brings about holistic operational improvements.
Attract a different type of or better candidates. Those who are seeking sustainability in their roles tend to have greater overall concern and care for their community, their team, and the guest.
Engage the department in a new way. We often find the lower levels of the organization feel left out of conversations about sustainability. They have definite opinions on the matter and want to be heard and included.
Once you have a job description written, use this to develop or edit a few interview questions. Continuing on the example from above, you could ask:
How have you overcome resistance to environmental initiatives / green cleaning?
Explain how you have convinced Managers or owners to adopt new products or programs?
How do you explain to or support staff who come from other properties and bring outdated or unsustainable practices with them?
What is your ideal opportunity to use sustainability programs to improve staff or guest health and wellness?
After hiring the candidate, be sure onboarding includes any existing sustainability initiatives, both for that location and, if applicable, the brand/corporate program. It’s important the new person have their own vision but also that she or he reinforces and enhances existing plans and efforts.
At some point in that first year, this new team member will likely set (and/or be assigned) performance goals and standards. Be sure to include sustainability in this. Initially, while everyone is learning how to best assess performance in this area, these goals may be more qualitative or yes/no. For example, a professional development goal might be to attend a minimum of 2 webinars about green cleaning practices. And as the organization matures in its adoption and measurement of sustainability, these goals can be more metrics-based. For example, is an organizational goal to raise guests' perceptions of the property's wellness factor is measured thru surveys, the housekeeping director/department could be accountable to a minimum 5% improvement in guests' ratings.
Ultimately, your plan should also include rewards and incentives tied to sustainability. For many, the chance to make a difference is reward enough but for others, they may not even be aware how they have impacted the company. Rewards demonstrate that sustainability is not just lip service but a core value of the culture. When people feel valued and cared for, they tend to stick around longer and give more of their energy and effort to the success of the business.
Following the tips and steps presented here will help you avoid the "it's not my job" copout, which is #4 (in no particular order) of the Top 10 excuses commonly we encounter when trying introduce sustainability into an organization. To learn more about the excuses and steps you can take to overcome them, follow the link below and sign up for the IGNITE the (Sustainability) Change Agent Within course.
Please watch the full interview below and go to Fifty Shades Greener website to learn more about Raquel’s amazing work.
Read and watch more from the IGNITE series here.
Watch the full interview with Raquel Noboa.
