Building a travel policy that sets out clear guidelines for company travel is an essential way of making your business more sustainable. With transport emissions representing around 25% of the EU’s total GHG emissions, any company that cares about sustainability must address its travel policy.

We have made radical changes to our travel policy, such as going fully remote and limiting flights to only the most essential journeys. We want to share Life Size’s experience and advice on defining a sustainable travel policy to help other companies wanting to make transformative change.

Identify your company’s biggest emitters 

Travel is likely a big part of your company’s carbon footprint. Start by listing ways your employees travel and estimate the general emissions that each of these activities generates in a given time frame. You don’t have to find an exact number, but a quick Google can show you what the biggest emitters are. For example, taking just two two-hour flights each month emits one tonne of CO2 equivalent per passenger flying, whereas driving a fairly typical commuting distance of 10km to and from work every day emits 0.1 tonnes.

You should, therefore, make it a priority to reduce the most emissions-heavy forms of transport. What could this look like for your company? Banning flying where rail or car travel is possible instead? Limiting the number of employees flying abroad to events to one person per event? Or, if your company doesn’t fly, can you swap taxi rides for public transport? All these adjustments can have significant impacts on your company’s carbon footprint.

As an international company, the Life Size team travels abroad fairly regularly to meet clients, and with aviation being one of the biggest sources of greenhouse gas emissions, we were determined to limit aviation travel specifically. Though we can’t operate without occasional long-distance travel, we can change how we travel. 

We have made it company policy to use trains as our main mode of long-distance transport rather than planes, apart from in the most exceptional circumstances. This meant that for last year’s annual team building event, or ‘Annual Adventure’, no team member travelled to the Netherlands by plane, with most taking the train instead. 

Bringing eight employees from eight different locations in Europe together without plane travel may sound difficult, but we made it work for us. We found great accommodation in Limburg in the Netherlands, a central meeting point for our team spread across the UK, Germany and Sweden. And we all travelled in a way that worked for us: some carsharing, some breaking up the journey by visiting loved ones on the way  and others taking long train journeys that were used as an opportunity to connect as a team. This saved an estimated 90% in emissions. Adding slow travel to our Annual Adventure has made it even more rewarding.

Think outside the box

Start by thinking as big as possible. If you feel resistant to a radical idea, like stopping all air travel or shutting down the office and going fully remote, ask yourself what is stopping you from taking this step. Is there a legitimate roadblock, or is it simply fear of the unknown?

At Life Size, we were given the push to go fully remote by forces out of our control. In 2020, like most companies across the world, the COVID-19 pandemic forced us to switch to remote working almost overnight. 

We already had an ‘agile working policy’ in place to accommodate team members’ work-life balance, so remote working wasn’t a completely new concept to us. Those less familiar soon adjusted and we found solutions to new problems as a team. 

When restrictions were lifted, we decided to remain fully remote and we haven’t looked back since. Our impromptu trial run revealed some excellent benefits outside of dramatically reducing our carbon footprint. By no longer travelling to and from work every day, employees gained more flexibility and the business saved significant costs on office rental.

So trial new ideas – start big – and you may surprise yourself by finding that the most radical change is the best decision for your company.

Build a policy that works for your company

It can seem overwhelming to make a sustainable travel policy when emissions are associated with so many essential parts of running a company. Making a sustainable travel policy is not about eliminating emissions entirely, but about changing habits to make travel more sustainable. 

Making our travel policy has revealed to us that breaking old habits is often simpler than it seems. Going fully remote was a case of adjusting some old processes and finding new ones that we are now comfortable with, while reaping the cost savings and wellness benefits of flexible work. Reducing air travel has made travelling more enjoyable for our team and given us impressive emissions savings that we can be proud of.

Get your whole team involved so that everyone feels they have a stake in the policy changes and can work together to find a solution. Take the leap!

What does your company’s travel policy include? We’d love to know more about what has worked for you. Follow us on LinkedIn if you’d like to keep up to date with our sustainability journey!