To question the relevance of sustainability to any organisation is in itself no longer a relevant question. Rather, ‘What are you doing?’ in relation to organisational policies, strategies and operations is highly relevant, and urgent. These are long-standing concerns for Chow:Hill and are examined at Board, management and team levels, internally thorough day-to-day activities, and externally in the work we do with clients.
Our drive for sustainable business performance internally comes from the energy and commitment of those at Board level; externally it is driven by our vision for ourselves as innovative designers, recognised for shaping authentic places and inspiring people. With the latter it means working with clients to create environments that are enhanced socially, economically and environmentally for their stakeholders. Our Internal activities are manageable and measurable; external activities significantly less so, yet offer the greatest opportunity for meaningful impact.
We set three strategic Priorities this year – Brand, Quality, and Sector Development. The first focused on clear and consistent communication through website, company documents and publications; the second on the quality of our design outputs and training; and the third developing knowledge and promoting what we know to target markets. These are medium to long-term priorities and will flow into the following years.
The most significant benefit of this has been the process itself – priority areas having owners, a programme of activities and set goals against which other activity such as marketing, training, technical resources, research, and collaborations can cluster and gain coherency.