One of my favourite quotes is Mahatma Ghandi's 'You must be the change you wish to see in the world.'

I've been thinking a great deal this week about these words. I used only to apply them to myself and to what I was doing in my home and personal life, but recently I have realised that you can take the concept of change out of your own comfort zone and start to gently encourage others to change too. My way of doing this is through The Big Green Idea and also through the talks I do.

Someone I met after a recent talk asked me what else they could do because they were already doing everything they could in their home. We talked about her workplace, a large open-plan office on a trading estate, and came up with a few ideas for her to take in to work.

It's difficult enough sometimes to try and persuade the people you live with to live greener lifestyles, so it can be pretty daunting trying to effect change on a larger scale. I'm sure there are many different ways to effect change in the workplace, but we decided that rather than trying to influence the people who work alongside you, it might be best to go straight to ‘the top'. This is far easier if you are well prepared and able to offer your boss some ‘easy-to-implement' strategies. The good news is that you don't need to reinvent the wheel, because there are plenty of organisations out there who have already thought this through and come up with ideas and guidelines for businesses and offices.

I've had a look around the internet and found a wealth of information about ‘greening up your business' ... but the best I've found has been this on ‘Friends of the Earth' website.

So, if you have done pretty much everything you can at home and are looking for new ways to ‘be the change' ... have a look at the above link and pass it on to the people who run your company!