7 Easy Ways to Increase Employee Engagement in Workplace Sustainability 

Ariel Canie | January 10, 2023 | 5 min read

Engaging Employees With Sustainable Initiatives

The best way to introduce, and maintain, sustainability in the workplace is to get your employees involved in your efforts. After all, there’s strength in numbers. However, increasing engagement, especially through giving and volunteer opportunities, can sometimes be easier said than done. To help, we’ve outlined some of our top tips to start or help you keep up engagement for workplace sustainability. 

7 Easy Ways to Increase Employee Engagement in Workplace Sustainability 

employee meeting

1. Start a sustainability committee 

Having a few people volunteer to lead your sustainability initiatives can help ensure that everyone is on track and focused on your company's goals. Creating a sustainability committee also gives employees a chance to take the lead, working toward environmental causes that they’re passionate about and can help increase job satisfaction.

laptop email

2. CENTRALIZE SUSTAINABILITY communications

Create a designated group or portal (we like Benevity) that makes it simple for communications and social engagement around sustainable opportunities to be shared across your organization.
This will keep employees updated in real-time and give them the freedom to check the latest stats whenever they please. 

women in meeting

3. Have a flexible approach 

When you have a one size fits all approach, employees can sometimes feel excluded or uninterested in your sustainability goals. Customize your programming for your employees and be open to feedback on how your employees would like to participate in a way that best suits them. 

group planning and reviewing

4. SET GOALS AND TRACK YOUR SUSTAINABILITY PERFORMANCE

Tracking and reviewing donations, employee participation, and setting realistic goals for your workplace sustainability program through software like Benevity can assist with measuring employee engagement, while also keeping employees motivated to help make difference. 

meeting brainstorm

5. KEEP UP TO DATE WITH THE LATEST SUSTAINABILITY NEWS

It’s important to stay updated on the latest sustainability news and keep your employees in the loop as well.
Our monthly Good News! blog posts are a great place to start, delivering global sustainable wins each and every month. 

corporate meeting in office

6. SCHEDULE CONSISTENT MEETINGS

Be sure to hold consistent meetings to keep your team updated on your sustainability initiatives and results. Consistent meetings will ensure that your sustainability projects will stay top of mind and keeping a schedule of weekly, monthly or quarterly meetings will help keep up momentum.  

Incentive plan papers

7. Offer incentives and feedback

Last but not least, offering sustainability incentives for employees, such as an award or point system for achieving green goals, is a great way to keep employees motivated. Celebrating wins (small and large) lets your team know that you recognize and appreciate all of their contributions. 

Creating a sustainability program and keeping employees engaged will not only help make a positive impact on the Earth, but it will also create happier, more fulfilled employees and a positive corporate culture. 

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Tree Certificate
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Alberta landscape with dog playing
Tree sapling
Planting site
Alberta trees and mountains
Tree Certificate
Owl in a tree
Alberta landscape with dog playing
Tree sapling
Planting site

Plant Trees Where They're Needed Most

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With your help, we will:

  • Reforest lands damaged by record-setting fires
  • Support habitat for iconic biodiversity
  • Create a positive impact for generations to come
  • Year after year, forest fires grow in intensity as climate change continues to provide the perfect conditions for these fires to flourish. The good news is, reforestation can help restore these lands. Planting trees in Alberta is an effective method to revitalize the land and eventually return the area to a spruce-dominated mixed wood forest. Soil stability is an immediate ecological benefit of reforestation and the area provides enough light for a new forest to grow efficiently. 🌲
  • As the forest regenerates, it will provide a critically important regional habitat (nesting, denning, foraging, and hunting) sensitive migratory songbirds, sensitive raptors and owls, sensitive amphibians, black bears, and ungulates. The trees are carefully planted to prevent invasive species from colonizing burn scars.
  • personalized tree certificate (see gallery) to say thanks for your donation. We'll also send you reports about our Alberta project, so you can track the impact your trees are having on the ground!
  • We always plant a mix of diverse, native species from local nurseries. This project is working to replenish local forests, so the native species grown in the nurseries include black spruce, white spruce, tamarack, jack pine, red osier dogwood, balsam poplar, and mixed native willow species.

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