Keep sustainability at the core of business by empowering staff

As a small brand, there are myriad problems to solve, plus things to do and communicate internally and externally on a daily basis across sales, marketing, supply, logistics and financials. So I often get asked: how do you keep sustainability at the core?

This is where I think being small and nimble plays to one’s advantage. Without the resources to hire a dedicated sustainability manager creating a plan of action for the team to follow, it enforces a culture and need for every team member to be educated and aligned on the brand goals and purpose from day one.

For businesses to make a material impact, sustainability needs to be at the heart of every business component. And in an ever-evolving world, the best people to ensure sustainability is kept at the core are not the few at the top but the people doing the job day in, day out. So how do we empower people to ensure sustainability is at the heart of their work? I like to think this starts with understanding the impact of their decisions – without that, where is the incentive to change?

Humans are results-driven by nature. We need to know the output to put the effort in. Therefore, as well as understanding the company mission and targets, we need to know how that impacts our own area of responsibility. Tying sustainability goals to an individual’s targets empowers and aligns everyone.

And as obvious as it sounds, since change happens through the team, hiring people who share your passion for purpose is vital. We spend a lot of time onboarding team members to ensure they are clear on our goals and mission and, probably more importantly, where our boundaries lie – what we say no to as a business.

Once the team is aligned on the mission and understands their targets, keeping that passion alive is key. I think the best way to do this is constantly connecting to the bigger conversation around the problem you are addressing. For us, we get involved in every food waste event we hear of, go to talks, have a live calculator of our impact, and connect with as many other like-minded businesses to remind ourselves that we are part of a movement of change.

You don’t have to be big or ‘comfortable’ as a business to make meaningful change. You just need to keep it alive and at the core of everything you do.