sustainability

Sustainability is focused on establishing a balance between nature’s ability to provide, and our need to consume. Through a reduction in consumption of raw material, a strict policy of recycling, as well as more efficient working processes, the company can operate in a more sustainable way.

Responsibility

The Managing Partner is responsible for implementing and maintaining the sustainability policy.

Principles

Our sustainability policy is based upon the following principles:

• To comply with, and exceed where practicable, all applicable legislation, regulations and codes of practice.
• To integrate sustainability considerations into all our business decisions.
• To ensure that all staff are fully aware of our sustainability policy and are committed to implementing and improving it.
• To minimise the impact on sustainability of all office and transportation activities.
• To make clients and suppliers aware of our sustainability policy and encourage them to adopt sustainable management practices if they don’t already.
• To review and to continually strive to improve our sustainability performance.

Practical steps

In order to put these principles into practice we will:

Travel and meetings

• Any travel undertaken by a member of our team will (where possible) be via that most environmentally-friendly method.
• Avoid physically travelling to meetings etc where alternatives are available and practical.
• Reduce the need for our staff to travel by supporting alternative working arrangements, including working from home.

Purchase of equipment and consumption of resources

• Minimise our use of paper and other office consumables, for example by sending documents electronically, and identifying other opportunities to reduce waste.
• As far as possible arrange for the reuse or recycling of office waste, including paper, computer supplies and redundant equipment.
• Reduce the energy consumption of office equipment by purchasing energy efficient equipment and good housekeeping.
• Purchase electricity from a supplier committed to renewable energy.
• Reduce water by using it sparingly.
• Purchase fair-trade and/or organic beverages.

Working practices and advice to clients

• Seek to offset carbon emissions from our activities.
• Ensure that any associates that we employ take account of sustainability issues in their advice to clients.
• Include a copy of our sustainability and environmental policies in all our proposals to clients.

Performance

Design It is committed to monitoring, managing and seeking to improve its environmental performance. We aim to implement methods of measuring our achievements when systems have been evaluated.

Policy review

We will periodically evaluate our performance towards meeting the objectives of this policy and will continually investigate how additional improvements can be implemented.