Disengaged employees can be a real drain on businesses. They can negatively impact the people they work with, as well as the bottom line. Often the problem lies not so much with the employee, but rather in a lack of clarity given to the employee about his or her responsibilities. 

According to the Blessing White 2008 study “The State of Employee Engagement,” employees at the lowest level of contribution need greater clarity about their tasks and the reasons for doing them. This is a two-fold issue:  first is the issue of clarity and second is the issue of understanding the reasons for what is being asked.

Being clear about what is expected of an employee means communicating in a manner that leaves no ambiguity about their responsibilities. Writing down goals and expectations, meeting with employees and discussing the expectations, answering their questions, and asking for and giving regular feedback will help ensure there aren’t any misunderstandings or lack of clarity.

But what if an employee doesn’t really understand why he is doing what is asked of him? What if he doesn’t see how his efforts contribute to the company? Or that his work is of any value?

Perhaps even more important than clarity about expectations is clarity about an employee’s value within the organization. Everyone, from the mailroom on up, needs to feel that they perform a necessary and important function in the organization. Spelling this out for your employees upfront, when they are first hired, can clear the way for immediate higher engagement.  And, reminding employees of their value, by pointing it out on an ongoing basis, will continue to elicit higher contributions from them.  But this value should be real.  If someone is not performing some necessary and important function in the organization, maybe the position should be eliminated.    

So, elevate employee engagement.  Be clear about your expectations.  And be especially clear about the value you place on your employee’s work.

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Would you shy away from using a business tool that entices the best and brightest of the largest segment of the world’s population?

Many business owners and managers fear social media type applications, believing them to be time wasters and distractions. But social media applications have many business benefits.  Perhaps most importantly, internal social media applications are going to be a key aspect of recruiting and retaining the next generation of business leaders.

About 18 percent of the global workforce is comprised of Baby Boomers, born between 1946 and 1964. An additional 7 percent of the workforce is made up of Traditionalists, or the Silent Generation, born between 1900 and 1945. In some companies, the percentage of these older workers is even higher.  At Dow Chemical, approximately 40 percent of its workforce is likely to retire over the next five years, according to Social Media at Work: How Networking Tools Propel Organizational Performance (Jossey-Bass, Publishing) by authors Arthur L. Jue, Jackie Alcalde Marr and Mary Ellen Kassotakis.

As this large generation retires, we face a “global talent shortage.” The urgency for succession planning has never been greater for organizations looking to replace large segments of their workforce. And the next generation is dramatically different from those who came before.

Retiring Traditionalists, who value security and stability, and Baby Boomers, who value teamwork and human rights, are being replaced by Gen X, who values empowerment and demands corporate responsibility. Born between 1965 and 1976, they make up only 14 percent of the population. Gen Y, or the Millenials, born between 1977 and 2000, comprise the largest segment of the global population, at a whopping 24 percent.  As they mature, and the Traditionalists and Baby Boomers retire, they are going to dominate the workplace. This group values technology, personal growth and social activism.

By far the biggest portion of the population, Gen Y was born into a digital world, connected to video games, computer programs, the Internet, and to each other since they could hold a keyboard.  Technically savvy, they navigate the ether world and its ever changing tools instinctively. 

The Millenial perspective on work is that: they work to live; they want to contribute and make a difference; their work must matter; and they trust people, not institutions. They see that career lifespans can be short, and they want to be flexible and creative with their careers.  They are connected outside of work, and they expect to be connected inside the organization, as well.  Seventy-seven percent say that social aspects at work are very important to their satisfaction on the job. They see digital connectivity as essential to communication, collaboration and productivity.  If they don’t find it with one employer, they will leave and go to another that does provide it.

Many organizations fear social media applications.  Yet, studies have shown that business-oriented social media applications contribute to productivity, including speedier idea generation and product development.

Progressive organizations that have adopted internal social media applications are seeing the many benefits, not the least of which is attracting the best talent from the up and coming, technologically connected workforce.

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LED lights have come a long way over the last few years, with superior technology that allows them to last up to 100 times longer than incandescent lights, and they can be used in a much wider variety of settings and conditions than incandescent. LEDs use only about 20 percent of the energy that incandescent bulbs use and are gaining market share with governments and commercial and residential users.

Price has been the main barrier to widespread market penetration by LEDs.  At $25 for an LED bulb that works in a standard light socket, they cost more than many people are willing to spend, even though they are expected to last 25 years.

There are less expensive LEDs, but quality can be an issue.  Mike Rogers, EVP of Green Homes America, a green retrofitting company based in Irvine, Calif., says that while the big box store LED products are not really ready for prime time, he is willing to recommend some of the higher priced products for their unrivaled energy efficiency and quality of light.

Luckily, according to the New York Times, prices are dropping rapidly. The $25 bulb was about twice as expensive six months ago, and some analysts believe it will drop to around $10 within the year.

 “Lighting is going to completely change over the course of this decade,” said Alan E. Salzman, chief executive of VantagePoint Venture Partners, in the article.

What is the business case for LED lights? Read more about this energy efficient solution, here.

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With the gubernatorial election slated for November 2, 2010, things are starting to heat up in Florida…over paper clips.

As odd as it may sound, some of the debating has to do with counting paper clips and other office supplies and may add up to some serious — $20 million — cents.

Democratic candidacy aside, in her role as Chief Financial Officer (CFO) for the State of Florida and “paper-clip-saving-queen”, Alex Sink believes that her department can save tax payers $200,000 this year simply by putting a freeze on office supply spending for the remainder of the fiscal year. That’s a savings she calculates to be 30 percent for just one governmental department.

Sink’s opposition in the race does not think this idea will create jobs, but that is not what she has set out to do in her role as CFO.

Last year, Sink formed a task force to inventory office supplies in an effort to cut costs. Staff found surpluses of 37,601 individual binder clips and 17,425 individual pens along with 537 pounds of paper clips in the Department of Financial Services inventory. Sinks aides also calculated that the State of Florida as a whole spent almost $47 million on office supplies in the 2008-2009 fiscal year.

Another part of Sink’s initiative involves establishing the “CFO Depot,” an interoffice website where agency workers share and trade surplus supplies.  Further, Sink makes recommendations to other state departments so they can establish office supply reuse programs as well; Sink’s office reports that even NASA is interested.

And Florida is not the only state to be on board with office supply reuse.  Brian LaValle with the State of Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) Consumer Programs Division says, “MassDEP encourages (and practices reuse) of office supplies for the obvious reason that if you maximize the use of the materials you have then there is less need to buy more items.” He added, “This results in the consumption of fewer resources, which saves money and reduces the strain on the environment through the production and distribution of those resources.”

Throughout the country, businesses and institutions are also realizing savings, and your business can benefit as well.

Four Ways to Make Reuse Work in the Office

1. It’s Not all Pens and Paperclips

Your office supply reuse program need not be only paperclips, staplers and pens. Paper items provide opportunities for significant reduction of waste and reuse.

For instance, double-siding paper is a reuse idea that is frequently overlooked because this resource may already be used – once. Reusing the blank side of unused print jobs at your desk and in the copier or fax machine decreases the need for the purchase of paper, notepads and sticky notes and fully uses paper resources before they are recycled.

Defaulting copy machines to duplex mode can also reduce the consumption of paper. In 2008, offices generated over 27 million tons of paper, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Double-siding print documents could reduce this rate by 20 percent or 5 million tons.

Further significant savings can be found with shipping container reuse.

After receiving office supplies from New England Office Supply (NEOS) packaged in nearly 50,000 delivery boxes in 2008, the State of Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) Consumer Programs Division decided to run a pilot program for statewide package reuse in 2009.

“The beauty of the pilot was that you could point to both environmental and financial benefits,” said LaValle. Because NEOS collected its delivery boxes back from the state agencies for reuse, the state had less packaging to dispose, and there were fewer packaging costs for NEOS, which they could then pass on to the state.

The pilot revealed that if NEOS collected and reused the boxes it packaged office supplies in for delivery to the state agencies  just two additional times before recycling, the result would be 32,000 fewer boxes used overall.  At a cost of 55 cents per box, this adds up to approximately $18,000 annually in savings.

Further, the pilot found that the cost savings opportunities provided the incentive for both NEOS and state agencies to reuse and recycle. It was also evident that commitment from senior management for environmental initiatives is key. LaValle explained, “In the case of MassDEP’s package reuse pilot program the initial resistance of getting folks to change their habits was the most difficult. If there was support from senior management then that agency had success.“

2. Centralized Location(s) for Sharing

The idea of setting up a reuse cabinet for office supplies is not new, but with budgets tight nationwide, CFO Sink’s common-sense approach presents an ‘idea whose time has come again.’

LaValle uses MassDEP’s Boston headquarters as an example, “[It] has several reuse stations on each floor where folks can find used office supplies such as binders, folders, writing implements, scissors, books, envelopes, tape, staplers, you name it.” He adds further, “This greatly reduces the need for employees to have to buy new materials and it is much faster and easier to get a hold of something you need from the reuse station than it is to order something and wait for delivery.”

It may seem intuitive, but setting up a centralized location, keeping like items together (e.g., tape with tape dispensers) and labeling items goes a long way in keeping reuse items efficiently organized and easily accessed.

If you work for a large business or multiple facility operation, you can also consider using interoffice transport for your reuse program as well implementing an improved inventory system (e.g., an optical scanner) to provide a more precise control over supplies and aid in your re-ordering processes.

LaValle also recommends getting everyone on board from the start, “Send out an e-mail letting everyone know about the reuse stations, what’s in them, where they are and ask for donations.”  He adds that it’s even better if the information can come from management, “encouraging everyone to use the reuse station – it saves money, time, and resources.”

3. Let the Web Help Sort Things Out

In the first few months of operation, Sink’s “CFO Depot” has seen hundreds of items exchanged. According to Jayme O’Rourke, Press Correspondent with the Florida Department of Financial Services Office of CFO Alex Sink, the site is set up with two main sections, “’We Have It’ where divisions post notices of items they have to either swap of give; ‘You Want It’ where Divisions post items they need.” O’Rourke says, “It works like Craigslist.” 

The “CFO Depot” has even seen some surprises.  O’Rourke explains, “Some amazing exchanges have occurred – another aspect of the CFO Depot is that employees have been finding ‘out of stock items’ and other items they had long ago given up hope of finding – on the site, free!”

Similar to Sink’s “CFO Depot,” many states boast online material exchange opportunities that can prove useful with packaging and other office supply reuse. 

MassDEP developed the Mass Material Trader, a free on-line material exchange network for businesses and manufacturers in Massachusetts to assist with reuse of materials.

LaValle says he ”would encourage businesses in Massachusetts to use this resource if they are wondering what to do with surplus inventory, manufacturing by-products, or even office furniture.” He adds, “Businesses can post those items that would otherwise be disposed of. Businesses can also search for items that are in many cases free to avoid purchasing new items, saving money and the environment.”

The Mass Material Trader is linked to the Reuse Marketplace the nation’s first multi-state materials exchange, which enables businesses, government agencies and nonprofits that have unwanted materials to connect with markets beyond their local areas.

4. Order Consolidation

You need not have a moratorium on the purchase of office supplies like CFO Sink has instituted for her department, but don’t overlook purchasing practices as part of your overall office supply reuse plan. How you order supplies can have a significant impact on your company’s bottom line. 

The 2009 MassDEP pilot study also looked at order consolidation. Before the pilot, New England Office Supply was required to provide next-day service for office supply orders placed from participating agencies at $8.78 per order for packaging, processing and delivery (without fuel). The next-day service often resulted in multiple deliveries to state shipping locations each day.

By reducing deliveries to just one day per week, the 25 state agencies at more than 70 locations in nine communities participating in the pilot were able to help reduce the orders shipped by 26 percent.  This amounted to savings of roughly $46,000, and allowed NEOS to put 24,450 fewer miles on their delivery trucks – not to mention they saved 2,750 gallons of fuel.

LaValle says the successful pilot may be transformed into legislation this year, but you don’t have to have a law, environmental purchasing policy or large business to benefit from the way supplies are ordered. Consolidated ordering can be used by small businesses as well. Even individual businesses that share an office complex may get better rates and help conserve fuel if they work together to place orders.

LaValle says, “There would certainly be costs savings associated with the reuse of packaging materials and, as mentioned above, if you couple this with the practice of reusing office supplies to maximize their life cycle costs for each purchase you could see direct and immediate savings.” He adds, “there could be reduced fuel costs with less deliveries to a facility, but this would have to be measured against the supplier actually reducing its route for all its customers on that route not just for your delivery.”

Even consolidating orders within a single company can be difficult and may not produce benefits if there is no streamlined approach to ordering. “Those companies that use a more fragmented system will have more difficulty herding the cats so to speak and will have to resolve any issues related to budgetary management (making sure that there is no overlap between department budgets for the purchase of office supplies),” says LaValle. “Some companies operate under a more streamlined operational system where purchasing and warehousing is done in a central location and I could see those companies implementing this type of system [consolidated ordering] very easily.”

And how did Sink’s moratorium do since it was announced at the end of January of this year? According to O’Rourke, fiscal year-end figures from June 30^th revealed that they reduced expenditures on office supplies by $225,000 – exceeding CFO Sink’s goal by $5,000. Additionally, while final figures on the ‘CFO Depot’ component of Sink’s initiative are not yet available, O’Rourke said a report issued in March showed further savings – “ use of the ‘CFO Depot’ feature on our website along with other swap/reuse actions (instead of new purchases) [has] saved over $11,000.”

An office supply reuse program may not win you the governorship; however, it will be a big win for your company’s bottom line and our valuable natural resources.

Start the conversation…^®

A single standard 033 gauge paperclip from a local office supply store costs roughly 4.5 cents. What small-change items are in surplus in your office that can help contribute to significant reuse savings?

You can learn more about the Florida Department of Financial Services support of CFO Sink’s reuse initiative in their CREW (Commodities Review & Efficiency Workgroup) Project Report.

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The key to success with corporate sustainability programs is employee buy-in and engagement.   Park Howell, of Park&Co, recently wrote a blog post “Feeling all green and tingly inside: How to promote your corporate sustainability initiative internally”  that explored how some organizations are using sustainability programs to involve their employees in “greening” their organizations.

There are those systems, such as “Personal Sustainability Projects,” and “Green Champions,” that encourage employees to take small steps to reduce waste, water and energy use. Park went on to say how GreenNurture’s  online system not only helps other companies do just that but also rewards employees and allows them to pledge to “eco-actions,” or ways to improve efficiency in the workplace that are suggested by anyone in the organization. Other systems involve people within and outside the organization, as does Environmental Entrepreneurialism.

Small steps over time…

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Sustainability is a term that can be applied to just about any human activity.  Mostly used in reference to the natural world and man’s impact on it, sustainability can also mean those business practices that contribute to the lifespan of an organization.  Sustainability encompasses activity both within the organization, as well as its impact on the environment and people outside the organization.

Some indicators of “internal” sustainability include:  employee engagement, employee satisfaction, turnover and absenteeism rates, morale, levels of collaboration and communication.  These indicators may be more difficult to quantify than other “hard” indicators, such as financial data, but they measure aspects of an organization which ultimately impact the bottom line.

Absenteeism and turnover is significantly lower in organizations that have high levels of employee engagement, collaboration, communication and morale. To that point, engaged employees stay for what they give (they feel their job has purpose) and disengaged employees stay for what they get (favorable job conditions, growth opportunities, job security) according to the 2008  Blessing White study titled The State of Employee Engagement.

Happier employees work harder, are more innovative, provide higher levels of customer service and contribute positively to the bottom line.  This synergistic cycle perpetuates the life of the company.

How can your organization create a sustainable culture?

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It’s official:  Being out in nature is healthy. 

If you needed scientific proof of what would seem obvious to most people, you now have it.  And in this day and time of obsessive peering into computer screens, maybe everyone needs to be reminded on the powerful impact on human beings on being out in nature. 

A New York Times article this week revealed that scientists have proven that being outdoors leads to several health benefits.  Forests, parks and tree-lined areas can increase immune function, lower stress, lower pulse rate and lower blood pressure.  Indeed, in Japan, going to parks for their therapeutic effects has a name, “Shinrin-yoku,” or “forest bathing.”  So if you need to give yourself a reason to take a break during the workday, aside from the pure enjoyment of it, now you can rationalize it with science and taxonomy.

And as set forth in another Earth-shattering article from Outside Magazine, more and more research is revealing the health benefits of vitamin D.  This too, seems obvious.  But to get such benefits as strengthened immune system, lower risk of numerous cancers, protection against joint and muscle pain, osteoporosis and weakening muscles is whether we are  getting enough of it.

According to the experts, Americans are suffering from severe vitamin D shortages, with 77 percent of the population at insufficient levels and depression, hypertension, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, autism, fibromyalgia all are being linked to its deficiency.

The experts agree that the current Recommended Daily Allowance of 400 international units (IUs) is woefully outdated and that between 1,000 and 2,000 IUs per day is more appropriate.  But getting this amount from food is difficult. An eight ounce glass of fortified milk only provides 100 IUs.  A seven ounce piece of salmon has a whopping 1,400 IUs, but if you are worried about mercury poisoning, you can only eat about 12 ounces a week.  If you can’t get it from food, you can take supplements, but even that is not a sure cure, when the experts disagree about what exactly the recommended amount should be, and what amount is safe.

At five to 15 minutes of sunshine, three times a week, it would seem a no-brainer to simply go outside.  But then, the American Academy of Dermatology insists that no amount of unfiltered sun is safe.  What do you do?   

I have had my share of sun damage, including a basal cell carcinoma. And living in Phoenix makes avoiding the sun particularly difficult. I have been covering up with sunscreen and long sleeve shirts for years, but sometimes I just can’t help myself. Call me reckless, but I will risk a few minutes of sunshine every day to get all the benefits of vitamin D, rationalizing that those will offset any harm that may be caused to my skin. And as a nod to my dermatologist, I do, however, still shield my face.

Forest bathing, sun bathing.  Call it what you like, just get outside and do it!

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When it comes to having engaged employees, perhaps even more influential than an employee’s direct boss is the boss’ boss. According to Julie Gebauer, Don Lowman and Joanne Gordon, authors of Closing the Engagement Gap: How Great Companies Unlock Employee Potential for Superior Results (Penguin Group), the top driver of employee engagement is “senior management’s sincere interest in employee well-being.”   Yet while 75 percent of employees trust their immediate managers, only about half (53 percent) of employees trust their organization’s senior leaders, according to the 2008 Blessing White study The State of Employee Engagement.

How can senior management earn the trust of their employees and drive employee engagement?

Because senior managers’ main focus is on their direct reports, they tend to overlook employees at lower levels. While it may be difficult to enlarge the scope of senior management responsibility by dedicating more time and energy to lower level employees, it is certainly worthwhile.  Engaged employees contribute more to the bottom line, and their turnover rate is significantly lower.

The authors have devised five ways to increase employee engagement through more involved senior management.  Regarding lower level employees, senior managers need to:

1. Know them – As companies spend enormous resources analyzing the preferences and habits of their customers, so they should get to know what is important to their employees. This is the first step in getting employees to change the way they work and improve their level of engagement.
2. Grow Them – Creating a culture of learning that furthers the financial advancement of the company, while simultaneously giving professional and intellectual opportunities for growth of the individual, is paramount to stimulating employee productivity and engagement. 
3. Inspire Them – Employees want to feel like their work has meaning and value. Managers can inspire their employees by clearly setting forth their values and priorities and by creating a sense of pride in the work that they and the company do.
4. Involve Them – People give more to their jobs when they feel like active participants. Involving them includes informing employees about business operations and challenges; gathering employee input; encouraging collaboration with colleagues; and giving people freedom to act to further the mission of the company.
5. Reward Them – While pay and benefits are important and cannot be overlooked, appreciation and recognition are even more effective at boosting engagement.

Engagement is the key driver of overall organizational performance.  Reaching out to your employees, getting to know them as individuals, and being open, communicative and helpful is the most direct route to higher engagement.  

As Expeditors International of Washington Inc. CEO Peter Rose said to the Wall Street Journal, “You take care of employees. They take care of customers. And that takes care of Wall Street.”

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Tangiers, Morocco

It’s vacation season, and with the economy in the doldrums, many are staying at home (“staycations”) or traveling on the cheap.  Low budget travel does not have to mean low levels of fun and indeed is usually even more interesting and exciting than higher priced alternatives. Further, low budget travel can be sustainable and give many benefits to the traveler, as well as to the people and places one visits.

Budget travel usually means going to one place and staying there long enough to really get a feel for it.  Immersion in a small town or village can be quite an adventure.  It starts by:

• Staying in low budget hotels, hostels or pensions.  Often, people will rent out rooms in their own homes, giving you a real inside look at how people live in different areas of the country or world, and the opportunity to establish relationships with people you otherwise would never get to know. On a trip to Honduras, we stayed in remote areas with hostels that had outhouses and outdoor showers, but the owners of these places were so friendly that they went out of their way to help us.  At one hostel, they organized a spontaneous community dance, with our teenagers freely intermingling with the locals.
•  Eating what the locals eat.  Depending on where you go, you may have no choice but to eat what is served.  I can’t say I have ever had a craving for mashed plantains and beans since eating them daily for weeks in Uganda.
• Taking local transportation.  There aren’t many people who can compete with your stories of travelling on buses filled with chickens and goats strapped to the top.  It’s cheap, colorful and you never know when you will reach your destination! 
• Buying locally made mementos.  When you buy the arts and crafts made by the people you are visiting, you are supporting and strengthening their culture.  Some of the mementos that mean the most to me are those that cost next to nothing, but gave much needed cash to the artisan.  Trading is also a good way to bring home prized souvenirs.  We traded fishing hooks and line for wooden spoons carved on the spot by a Pygmy tribe in Zaire.

Sustainable travel overseas doesn’t have to be expensive.  Our 17-day Honduras trip cost $1,500 per person, including airfare.  A recent two-week overland trip to Mexico’s Copper Canyon only cost $500 a piece.  Buying local is not only less expensive, it also significantly helps the local economy by supporting family businesses and keeping revenues where they help most, in the community.  But traveling on the cheap is not for everyone.  To do it right, you need the following qualities:

• An appetite for adventure.  As Yvon Chouinard, of Patagonia, once said, adventure begins when things go wrong.  You need to see mishaps and failed plans as opportunities for new experiences and be able to go with the flow
• You like spontaneity; you are flexible; and you don’t have to plan everything out in great detail in advance
• You want to learn as much as possible about the local culture by immersing yourself in it, even if it means a little discomfort
• You are willing to slow down and to cover fewer miles in more time

My husband and I once met up with a friend who was traveling in Europe at the same time we were.  We decided to go to Morocco together by taking trains from France through Spain, then by boat to Tangiers.  As we got closer to our destination, and the environment more foreign, our friend became increasingly agitated.  Upon landing in Tangiers, we were surrounded by a large group of men and boys all trying to sell us something, or take us to a hotel, or give us a tour of the city.  Goats roamed the streets, it was dirty and totally exotic.  Our friend took a look around and after about ten minutes, re-boarded the boat and headed back to Europe.

Sustainable travel doesn’t only apply to faraway places.  You can enjoy the benefits by going somewhere close – even a couple hours drive from where you live will usually take you to a relatively unfamiliar environment.  You can save money, help sustain a local economy and culture, and have memories that last a lifetime.

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