Make them Green

Shweta Puthran has never really lost any sleep over the environment. While
governments and scientists across the globe are predicting a gloomy
futurethanks the hole in the ozone to the melting Arctic shelfPuthran is
content to complete her call targets (she is employed as a senior customer
executive at a BPO outfit).

One day, Puthran got an email from the company detailing a new eco-initiative
the management was launching, and as part of the same, she was asked to attend a
workshop, where she came face-to-face with reality for the first time. Through
examples and illustrations like the July 26 Mumbai rains and Hurricane Katrina
in the US, Puthran came to know that every individual can be a change agent in
this battle for climate change by adopting and promoting eco-friendly practices.

Environment is very much my problem is what she realized and almost
overnight there was a change in the way she functioned. The computers were
switched off when she logged out, she reduced the use of tissues and Dixie cups,
started using public transportation extensively, etc. The BPO outfit had
transformed an eco-ignoramus into an eco-activist merely by reaching out to
them.

Reaching out to the employees is indeed the crux behind the success and
failure of eco-practices within organizations. For far too long, companies that
have treaded down the green path have done so in a very ad-hoc manner. There are
basically two ways in which the companies in India are going green, either from
the top or at the bottom. In quite a few cases, due to regulatory, compliance
and business issues, companies had to adopt green practices, thus rules and
regulations were formulated at the top and then passed on to the lower rung. In
this, much focus was paid to things like procurement of green products,
architecture, etcthings that the top management can directly influence.
Meanwhile, on the other hand, in quite a few companies, green practices are
driven by a single or a few passionate environmentalist employees, who will try
and coax everyone not to use a plastic cup or stop wearing fancy jackets to
office.

Our Civil Council also helps employees engage in environmental causes, either individually or in conjunction with or external organizations Varghese M Thomas, head, PR, Cisco India & SAARC	Green is not limited to procurement of hardware. It also requires behavioral changes in the employees Sudip Banerjee, CEO, L&T Infotech

In both these mechanisms, the crucial missing factor is the employee
participation. Quite often, the employees are not really inspired to go green;
there are not many partners in the drive and thus companies while they may
achieve the targets in the short run, are not able to sustain green practices
for a long time.

And yet, quite a few companies in India have realized the importance of
reaching out to employees and making them partners in the eco-journeys.
Organizations like Wipro, Infosys, Sun Microsystems, Cognizant, Global Logic,
Hexaware, Cisco, L&T Infotech, and others are indeed reaching out to employees,
talking and sharing information with them and even asking them to come up with
new ideas on what could be done on the eco-front.

Partners not Participants

One of the key challenges that companies face when reaching out to employees
is that of mindset. It takes a lot of effort to unshackle and liberate the mind
of individual employees and make them realise basically two things: first, that
the environment is everybodys problem and second, that it is not inconvenient
to be eco-friendly.

In fact Sudip Banerjee, CEO, L&T Infotech underlines the very same point when
he says, Green is not limited to procurement of hardware or equipments alone.
It also requires behavioural changes in the employees. The first step is to be
sensitive and then adapt to the changes. Such changes are possible only through
employee involvement. At L&T Infotech we offer green IT solutions to our
clients. We also see it becoming a major compliance requirement for large
contracts. An active participation from employees at all levels is critical to
ensure we are green-compliant. 

Wipro has also made genuine efforts to reach out to employees and sensitize
them to the impact of even seemingly harmless actions the environment. Brij
Sethi, VP, Ecoeye, Wipro, emphasises the need to enlist the help of employees
when it comes to going green. The absolute key is to go beyond personal
awareness and personal action plans and leverage the common intent as a team
rather than a collection of individuals only. The role of the community manager
is the key here, he states.

Yet one of the key challenges in going green is to convince the top echelon
of the need to go green. Premkumar Pandurangam, head of Go Green Initiative,
Cognizant, touches upon the issue when he says, Management buy-in is a key
challenge in realizing the full potential of green initiatives. Whether it is
facilities management, energy management, business travel or green IT, it takes
a lot of management commitment to push the green agenda within the organization.
It is important to drive home the point that going green saves money. At
Cognizant, a major thrust for green initiatives has come from the management
itself.

The 3-R Mantra

But getting the employees onboard the green wagon is not an easy task. While
convincing them to go green is easy, getting them to get involved is much
tougher. Hence, the whole process needs to be carried out in a very methodical
and scientific manner.

Usually, when it comes to employees, it is the HR function that often leads
the initiatives, but in companies like Wipro, Infosys, Cisco, and the rest,
there is a cross functional team that looks at these issues. In fact, cross
functional teams are best suited for these initiatives as they are more
adaptable and flexible when it comes to tackling issues. The idea of forming a
cross functional team is basically to empower the employee into taking
ownership. This has been done quite successfully at Sun Microsystems, wherein
every employee is encouraged to take ownership.

Eco-responsibility isnt one persons or one teams responsibility, every
job is an eco-job. Our commitment to eco-responsibility is realized by our
employees around the world. Sun employees are eager to take part in greening our
company, and we need their involvement to achieve our eco-responsibility goals.
We encourage employees to take responsibility and take action, states Karthik
Ramarao, director, technology, systems practice, Sun Microsystems India.

The important step after forming a specific team is to create a green mission
statement within the company, a goal that every employee must aspire to achieve.
The goal must be built around the 3-R principles, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.
This mission statement must be shared with the employees through multiple means,
posters, mailers, batches, mementoes, etc. Special effort must be taken so that
the mission statement becomes a part of the employee psyche and he or she
becomes conscious about the need and ways to go green.

Hexaware Technologies has in fact gone a step aheadit asked its employees to
come out with suggestions for a corporate green policy and the results were
fairly encouraging. We recently celebrated Green Day at Hexaware where we took
feedback from employees on what could constitute our green policy. We got a
resounding response from the employees and some of the suggestions that cropped
up were: mission deplasticize, print on both sides of the page, recycling of
paper, reduce power consumption, waste management, etc. In fact, we will be
using these suggestions to formulate the green policy, states Deependra L
Chumble, chief people officer, Hexaware Technologies.

Innovation Helps

There are multitude of ways to spread the green message among employees,
posters, mailers, etc. But of late, thanks to Web 2.0, Internet is becoming the
chosen medium. Quite a few companies like Cisco and Cognizant have set up
dedicated portals and blogs that talk about green. Most of these blogs are run
by employees, wherein they are encouraged to share their thoughts and views.
Cognizant has put up a Go Green blog that allows for exchange of thoughts,
ideas and updates and encourages associates to participate in green initiatives.
Meanwhile, networking major Cisco too is leveraging the power of the Web in a
major way. It has set up an online community, Lets Talk Cisco Green, where
employees share best practices and their recommendations for how to help Cisco
meet environmental goals. Employees also share their perspectives via short
video clips, downloadable from a new green-focused website.

Cisco also has Civic Councils across the world, including India, which help
employees engage in volunteer activities. The Civil Council comprises employees
passionate about giving back to society and plan volunteer projects, develop
nonprofit partnerships, roll out product donation programs, and other
initiatives to address the needs of the local community. It also helps employees
engage in environmental causes, either individually or in conjunction with the
Councils or external organization, says Varghese M Thomas, head, PR, Cisco
India & SAARC.

Companies can also build on creating awareness around events like Earth Day
(April 22); encourage car pooling, reducing travel, etc.  Infosys too has
formulated an innovative strategy of forming various clubs that look into
different aspects of green.

Not just Economics

In the end, it is very important to remember that while green is about cost
savings, it has a bigger role in society. A lot of companies facing the heat due
to the global meltdown are cutting costs by trimming expenses and presenting
them as green initiatives. This can be counter-productive. By associating green
with exigency measures can put off employees rather than inspire them. Thus, if
a company is cutting down on home-drops for employees, it is better to be honest
and present it as a business case rather than package it as a green initiative.

For green to be successful, it is important that the employee is enlisted in
the efforts and that requires honesty and transparency as well. Thus, today if
Shweta Puthran has become conscious of her carbon footprint and is adopting a
greener lifestyle, it is not merely to save money but to be a better citizen.
And this is what the companies need to doreach out and touch the heart, rather
than make rules and strictures.

Shashwat DC

shashwatc@cybermedia.co.in