Experience a sustainable work style at Fujimi Mori Office’s GREEN COMMUNITY Workcation

Just like home, we spend much of our time at an office on a daily basis. The reduction of waste and other environmental considerations that come out of this process can only be achieved if the awareness and actions of the company and its employees are well coordinated. In addition to the difficulty of proceeding with just individual will, like with efforts at home, the setting of standards that companies should aim for is also an important point.

This particular one-night, two-day workcation program where participants can experience a sustainable work style may give you the solution you are looking for. The program is designed for companies and office managers aiming for a more sustainable working style.

GREEN COMMUNITY WORKCATION – Background and goals

Fujimi Mori Office (below, Mori Office) is a coworking space that opened in 2015. It started GREEN COMMUNITY, a project for spreading awareness and action for the responsibility we have towards the natural environments from our workplaces, in 2020. Mori Office has also actively cooperated with sustainable management efforts and companies that promote sustainability for other working spaces. This cooperation includes efforts to reduce the environmental burden in this facility and public awareness campaigns for Mori Office staff and regional businesspeople.

Mori Office believes that efforts for reducing environmental burden are an unavoidable business condition for continuing business on our earth. As many companies use the SDGs as an opportunity to begin facing these global-scale issues, many people are demanding responsible actions even in office and workplace environments.

The GREEN COMMUNITY Workcation that Mori Office offers is a one-night two-day training program in which participants can learn about sustainable policies in office environments that Mori Office has worked on until now through experiencing them directly.

Shared office businesses that participate in this program are eligible for simplifying the application process for Zero Waste Certification for coworking spaces and shared offices, provided by the NPO Zero Waste Japan. In addition, participants will receive clarification on the necessary efforts for obtaining that certification, as well as certification items that companies must aim for.

Workcation plan

＜Day 1＞
1) Classroom Lectures
Mori Office will talk about the process from when it was established to its current sustainable operations. It will also discuss the state of coworking spaces that are needed in future generations, and the workstyles that workspace managers should aim for.

2) Study Tours
Mori Office management staff will guide participants inside the Mori Office building. Here, participants can actually study ideas for making workspaces more sustainable. Participants can study these topics and also hear know-how conveyed by Mori Office staff that they learned from implementation, such as management issues that arose after implementing sustainable policies, as well as what to be careful about when implementing these policies.

3) Workshops
Mori Office also provides a space for generating ideas to shift workspaces to sustainable management. Along with Mori Office staff, participant companies can brainstorm sustainable policies that they can actually strive for in their workspaces. Participants will also think about user workcations that lead to changing user awareness and actions through policy.

＜Day 2＞
Various retreat options are prepared to meet visitor needs, including forest therapy, yoga and forest art therapy.

Comments from participants and experts

Zero Waste Japan Representative: Akira Sakano

The Zero Waste Certification was born in 2017 in Kamikatsu Town in Tokushima Prefecture, well-known as Japan’s first Zero Waste Declaration City. This certification began as a way to assist businesspeople who operate spaces that connect various people with issues such as establishing guidelines for waste reduction efforts and visualizing waste reduction efforts that may be difficult to understand or see at a glance. It first began as a certification aimed at establishments such as restaurants. However, through trial and error along with the staff at Mori Office, in 2021, we began a certification aimed at shared offices.

The office that we spend our days in is a place that can become a connecting point for individual awareness and action, and awareness from companies and business entities. The shift to a sustainable society and economic system is an urgent matter. Along with large-scale investment, shifting the entire supply chain in company and business entity activities is extremely important. On the other hand, if the awareness and actions of working individuals are abandoned, then we cannot shift things entirely.

As part of their efforts to support changes in action and awareness during those days, the time spent thinking with staff members at Mori Office’s space filled with implementation and trial and error is no doubt a time filled with realizations and emergence. Participants can also look forward to expanding their network throughout Japan!

Creative Lounge MOV staff / NPO 530 (read as “go mi zero” or “zero waste” in Japanese) Representative: Genki Nakamura

Waste is an issue that is extremely close to all of us. Yet because of that closeness, many people cannot grasp it as a serious problem. Also, waste is an issue that builds up little by little. People tend to only realize how big the problem is after it’s gotten too big to deal with easily.

I think it’s exciting to attempt to solve this issue first by changing the environment of our offices, places where we spend many hours each day. In the same way, I continue to look forward to future attempts as someone who manages a coworking space in Shibuya in Tokyo. I think we can all enact change ourselves. More than anything, I’d like people to participate in this on-site program as soon as possible so they can bring back the experience to their own office.

We look forward to encountering new allies that can spread positive impacts from their places of work to natural environments throughout the world. I would be thrilled if people took this opportunity to think about future workstyles surrounded by Nagano’s beautiful nature.

Changing awareness and action from our workplaces

Offices act as connecting points for individuals and companies. They can be important places for spreading awareness and action for reducing environmental burdens. Even considering that, this program, in which participants can not only learn about but also directly experience sustainable workspaces, can serve as a valuable opportunity. We recommend this program as a way of thinking about future office environments while in the satoyama areas of Fujimi.

Originally published on Livhub.
Translated by Chris Lee.