A Sustainability policy is a written statement outlining your company's vision and commitment towards its
objectives, targets and performance improvement in all four areas of Sustainability.
The policy:
Should provide a vision about the company's aims and objectives and forms the basis for your Sustainability performance management.
Needs to be agreed by and actively supported and encouraged by senior management and accepted and implemented by all staff.
Allows the company’s management team to communicate the business' Sustainability targets and objectives to employees, shareholders, customers and suppliers.
- Should be at the core of your company's business strategy.
Writing a Sustainability policy is currently voluntary in the UK although the Companies Act 2006 states that
'A director of a company must act in the way he considers, in good faith, would be most likely to promote the
success of the company for the benefit of its members as a whole, and in doing so have (amongst other matters)
regard to -
- a. the likely consequence of any decision in the long term
- b. the interests of the company's employees
- c. the need to foster the company's business relationships with suppliers, customers and others
- d. d. the impact of the company's operations on the community and the environment'
All British companies, except small companies (unless Public) have to include a business review in their
Directors’ Report. Small companies are not required to file their Directors' Report at Companies House.
A small company is one that satisfies two of the following criteria:
- turnover less than £5.6m
- balance sheet total less than £2.8m
- not more than 50 employees
Medium companies that satisfy two of the following criteria
- turnover less than £22.8m
- balance sheet less than £11.4m
- not more than 250 employees
have to prepare a Business Review, but are not required to include information about key non-financial
performance indicators. However, they are strongly encouraged to report, where appropriate, on these issues
voluntarily in recognition of the benefits such disclosure brings to the operation of the business.
Vision
Write your vision about your company's aims and objectives.
- Where is the company going regarding Sustainability?
- What do you mean by Sustainability?
- What are your overall targets or what are you trying to achieve?
- Eg. For 2008 our CO2 emissions were 5.62 T CO2. Our target for 2009 is to reduce our emissions to 5.4 T CO2.
Look at the four key areas for Sustainability:
Environmental Impact
Building energy efficiency & management
How are you being energy efficient and what are your plans for the future?
Transport/Travel Policies
How do you now or intend to improve your transport and/or travel? Eg. Our transport emissions for 2008 were
0.55 T CO2 per employee and we aim to keep that to 0.55 T CO2 for 2009 and aim to set reducing targets for 2010.
Energy Usage
What Renewable sources of energy are you using? What are you intending to do?
Reducing, Re-using & Recycling
How much are you recycling, how are you looking at cutting your waste down and how are you minimizing
your use of packaging?
Supply Chain and Market Place
Supply chain
Where position are you in a supply chain and what are its sourcing plans and targets?
Products and services
How do you encourage and promote sustainability in your community or wider afield?
SustainIT views its suppliers as an integral part of our business and work with them to obtain the very
best value from goods and services we order and use to develop our business. We use a variety of techniques
and give consideration to quality, reliability, logistics, costs, maintenance, supply chain information and
maintenance requirements.
All suppliers are required to provide their Sustainability Policy to us and their policies are evaluated and
noted.
Community Investment and Social Impact
What Partnerships and projects are you involved in? Do you have any connection with your local community or
any social enterprises. How much have you spent on donations this year? Have you sponsored any of your
employees for any charitable events?
SustainIT actively supports various community and social groups. Our employees help their communities
by volunteering their time to various programs and donating time and skills to local causes. All employees
vote for 1 local and 1 national charity that we support each year. Fundraising projects and community
activities are arranged to help both charities.
Employment Practices
Do you have any Employee initiatives? Eg Do you offer a cycling to work scheme, have lunchtime fitness /
yoga sessions, offer a free annual health check to each employee or have you created an annual "Family day".
If you don't do anything at the moment what could you do? Ask your employees for their suggestions.
SustainIT's ongoing programme of reviewing contracts will try to ensure we move towards a position that all
staff receive a fair wage reflecting the environment in which they work, and that they enjoy contractual terms
which represent reasonable minimum standards and which provide for family friendly, flexible and diverse working
environments.
We will seek to promote the benefits of adopting fair employment practices through the supply chain to our
partner organisations, suppliers and the market.
