| The Simple Path to Recycling Bliss | | | | making the shift easy enough that all employees |
| There's really not much of a question about | | | | can participate without much disruption of their |
| whether or not recycling is a good idea. Any way | | | | daily routines. The first step would be to |
| you look at it, reprocessing existing resources to | | | | disseminate information about the benefits of |
| be used again is a better deal in many ways than | | | | recycling, preferably through online |
| spending effort, energy and virgin material to | | | | correspondence, so that paper isn't wasted in the |
| produce entirely new stuff. Not to mention, all the | | | | course of getting people informed. A meeting |
| trash that would have ended up in the nearest | | | | called for this purpose would also be good, to |
| landfill or garbage dump is instead returned to | | | | ingrain in people's minds that going green is a |
| circulation as new stuff. | | | | matter of office policy. |
| Following from this basic principle, it is clear that | | | | The next step is to place recycle bins for |
| recycling is the way to go when dealing with | | | | different types of materials in common areas and |
| discarded objects in the workplace. The average | | | | not too far from desk locations, so that people |
| office space is no stranger to waste material that | | | | will see them and be encouraged to use them |
| could use recycling. Paper of all shapes and sizes, | | | | regularly. Accessibility is essential to a successful |
| though most commonly in letter and A4, is | | | | recycling program, because a lot of employees |
| routinely found in the wastebasket, the victim of | | | | simply won't take the trouble to go all the way to |
| printing pointless e-mails and countless drafts of | | | | the recycle bins if they are concentrated in a |
| relatively unimportant documents, to say nothing | | | | faraway section of the workplace. |
| of the typical habit of printing documents on only | | | | Lastly, one has to reinforce the message of |
| one side of the paper. In the breakroom, | | | | recycling, reminding workers on a daily basis to |
| disposable plastic and Styrofoam litter the area or | | | | recycle, in a gentle but persistent manner. Of |
| pile up in the trash can, after having served their | | | | course, this is best achieved through the use of |
| users with a single beverage's worth of content. | | | | recycling signs, which are to be positioned near |
| More paper waste also comes from here in the | | | | the recycling bin areas so that employees will be |
| form of newspapers, magazines and catalogs, | | | | more conscious about the office recycling |
| which end up getting food and drink on them and | | | | movement. Workplace recycling signs work |
| are thrown away without a second thought. And | | | | capably using the power of suggestion, and have |
| we haven't even considered the enormous | | | | something of a snowball effect when it comes to |
| wastage of non-reusable office supplies. | | | | persuading your employees to do the right thing. |
| Certainly, we want to encourage workplace | | | | Once the more diligent of the workers starts |
| recycling, to reduce our collective environmental | | | | actively recycling, other employees will gradually |
| footprint on the world, which is looking more and | | | | start to do the same, first out of shame, then |
| more like a mark from a crushing boot. The best | | | | out of habit. |
| way to do it is with a fair amount of handholding, | | | | |