Can ESG initiatives help the planet and bring workers together?

As discussions around climate change and corporate environmental responsibility intensify, many companies are still trying to figure out how they want to approach environmental, social and governance (ESG) initiatives in the workplace.

The founders of sustainability and wellness platform Treekly believe they can provide some answers. For every 5,000 steps an employee walks, Treekly plants a tree in varying reforestation sites, from Mteza Creek, Kenya to Scotland. Founded in 2020, Treekly was initially intended to help lower the rising obesity rates in the U.K., but the COVID-19 pandemic pushed the company to rethink the purpose of its platform.

"Most people are able to walk, and lots of people already count their steps," says Jon Bunning, founder of Treekly. "But if we can create an embedded walking habit, then we can also improve well-being post-COVID and do something to help fight climate change."

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The subscription-based platform is open to individual users as well as companies as an employee benefit. Bunning notes that users can even buy trees as a gift or add trees to their own count without walking. However, the platform's ultimate goal is to bring people together — and this especially relates to workforces, where remote work might make it hard for everyone to feel connected, underlines Keith Mortimer, founder and CEO of Treekly. Notably, the app allows employees to create teams and compete in step challenges in an effort to increase employee engagement and opportunities for team bonding. 

"The 'E' and 'G' in ESG get lots of attention from businesses, and [employers] are realizing that social value is also so important," says Mortimer. "Treekly provides that community element, and the gamification piece really engages people."

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For Mortimer, a great ESG initiative is one that the entire workforce can engage with and see their impact. For every tree planted with Treekly, the company shares the location and photos of said tree to their user. It should be clear the user's efforts are truly making a difference, stresses Mortimer.

"About every six months, we receive photo updates from the reforestation project," he says. "We're providing as much evidence as we can to give people the comfort that the trees have been planted, that your order has gone through."

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Bunning and Mortimer agree that by connecting environmental well-being and employee well-being, employers can take ESG initiatives to the next level. But if employers want their initiatives to go the distance, they also must consider how they can be integrated and even enrich their workplace culture.

"It's so much nicer to be involved as a team in an initiative around helping support climate change than it would be just to be told what your organization's doing," says Bunning. "There's a shared responsibility across teams, which we believe is beneficial to organizations."