Help to Save Our Planet - One Meeting at a Time!
Have you ever taken the time to calculate your carbon footprint? It can be frightening! When you think you're doing your best for the environment and you're still way above the national average, you start to wonder where you're going wrong.
You may be re-cycling everything you can, turning things off when they're not in use, washing at 30 degrees and even investing in energy saving light bulbs! So, where on earth does the problem lie? And then you think back to all the business meetings you've attended over the past 12 months, all the flights, trains and trips around the country in your car.
Then it dawns on you, the real problem is at work rather than at home! So, you begin to think of ways you could improve things at work, like you've done at home.
You start by thinking how much valuable time you've wasted travelling to and from meetings and all the CO2 emissions! And then you think back to how unproductive many of the meetings were and what a further waste of your time they'd been.
A number of them didn't even require you to be there! Few of them had started on time, people had arrived half way through the meetings, there had been no agenda, no minutes taken, no actions set, no follow ups! And how much had they cost for everybody to attend? And what did the total CO2 emissions amount to? We should all be striving to make our meetings carbon footprint friendly.
Here are a few essential things you should consider: 1) The first step is to determine whether you really need a meeting.
What is the purpose of the meeting? What outcomes are you looking to achieve? At the same time, it's worth questioning whether any regular meetings you have are providing good value for money -- if not, scrap them! 2) Consider whether a face to face discussion is actually necessary as there are a number of more environmentally friendly alternatives available, such as teleconferencing, video conferencing or web conferencing.
Remember, a simple phone conversation or email can sometimes achieve the same results as a face to face meeting.
However, these are often overlooked or someone decides (wrongly!) that a meeting would be more productive.
3) When travel is unavoidable, try to choose a venue for your meeting that will require the least amount of travel for your attendees.
Obviously, this is far easier when arranging a meeting between offices from the same organization, but we should all try to think 'greener' when choosing meeting venues.
Unfortunately, some clients still take the view that, as they are paying, they want the world to revolve around them, but we need to help people wake up and eradicate this selfish attitude.
Try suggesting a mutually convenient venue next time.
If you just apply these simple steps, you'll start to significantly reduce your CO2 emissions -- and improve the planet at the same time!To discover how to make your meetings even more effective, please visit http://www.
mosaiquegroup.
com/Meeting_Minutes_Software.
html
You may be re-cycling everything you can, turning things off when they're not in use, washing at 30 degrees and even investing in energy saving light bulbs! So, where on earth does the problem lie? And then you think back to all the business meetings you've attended over the past 12 months, all the flights, trains and trips around the country in your car.
Then it dawns on you, the real problem is at work rather than at home! So, you begin to think of ways you could improve things at work, like you've done at home.
You start by thinking how much valuable time you've wasted travelling to and from meetings and all the CO2 emissions! And then you think back to how unproductive many of the meetings were and what a further waste of your time they'd been.
A number of them didn't even require you to be there! Few of them had started on time, people had arrived half way through the meetings, there had been no agenda, no minutes taken, no actions set, no follow ups! And how much had they cost for everybody to attend? And what did the total CO2 emissions amount to? We should all be striving to make our meetings carbon footprint friendly.
Here are a few essential things you should consider: 1) The first step is to determine whether you really need a meeting.
What is the purpose of the meeting? What outcomes are you looking to achieve? At the same time, it's worth questioning whether any regular meetings you have are providing good value for money -- if not, scrap them! 2) Consider whether a face to face discussion is actually necessary as there are a number of more environmentally friendly alternatives available, such as teleconferencing, video conferencing or web conferencing.
Remember, a simple phone conversation or email can sometimes achieve the same results as a face to face meeting.
However, these are often overlooked or someone decides (wrongly!) that a meeting would be more productive.
3) When travel is unavoidable, try to choose a venue for your meeting that will require the least amount of travel for your attendees.
Obviously, this is far easier when arranging a meeting between offices from the same organization, but we should all try to think 'greener' when choosing meeting venues.
Unfortunately, some clients still take the view that, as they are paying, they want the world to revolve around them, but we need to help people wake up and eradicate this selfish attitude.
Try suggesting a mutually convenient venue next time.
If you just apply these simple steps, you'll start to significantly reduce your CO2 emissions -- and improve the planet at the same time!To discover how to make your meetings even more effective, please visit http://www.
mosaiquegroup.
com/Meeting_Minutes_Software.
html
