Insight Global and Sustainability: 2025 Goals and More

In 2019, Insight Global tracked carbon emissions for the first time and took an important first step toward becoming a sustainable business. Prior to that, we hadn’t realized just how much of an impact a staffing company could make on the environment—and how much of an opportunity we had to help.  

Since then, we’ve committed ourselves to more environmental practices, outlined our goals for the future, and launched our very own sustainability program. Read on for a deeper look at the steps Insight Global is taking to be a better, more sustainable business.   

Our 2025 Goals 

In 2022, our Environment, Social, and Governance (ESG) teams announced Insight Global’s 2025 goals. Using internal analysis and market research, these goals were created to bring Insight Global into a better future.  

As part of that shared ESG mission, our sustainability program identified three key goals to support the environment:  

Goal 1: Track and disclose Scope 1, 2, and 3 Emissions to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP).   

• Scope 1: These are our direct greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that are controlled or owned by the organization. Most notably, Scope 1 refers to fossil fuel combustion like boilers or furnaces. 
• Scope 2: These are our indirect GHG emissions, which include purchase of electricity, steam, heat, and cooling. 
• Scope 3: These are indirect GHG emissions that occur in the value chain of the company, AKA emissions linked to the company’s operations. These emissions are sometimes called the “holy grail of emissions.” Prime examples of Scope 3 are emissions from business travel and employee commutes. 

Goal 2: Implement an Environmental Management System (EMS). An EMS refers to the framework an organization uses to implement, maintain, or improve sustainable practices.  

Goal 3: Become carbon-neutral in our Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 2025. To achieve carbon neutrality, an organization must offset their emissions by eliminating them elsewhere. And now that we’re tracking and disclosing our Scope 1 and Scope 2, we have plans in place to reach this goal. 

To support our 2025 goals and drive our overall mission toward becoming a sustainable organization, we’ve set up the following initiatives.  

Sustainability Ambassadors

Insight Global recognizes that it takes everyone to make a lasting and meaningful impact on the environment. That’s why we hired our first full-time Sustainability Program Manager, Katherine Slater. And within our sustainability program, Slater worked to build a council of 60 Sustainability Ambassadors across 36 of our offices.  

These ambassadors’ mission is to positively influence our actions at work, at home, and in our communities. By appointing ambassadors throughout our offices, we can more effectively educate our teams on sustainable practices and further ensure the success of our initiatives. 

Partnerships for the Environment 

One Tree Planted: Evergreen, our managed services division, has partnered with One Tree Planted—a philanthropy that has planted over 92 million trees, in more than 80 countries. Through this partnership, One Tree Planted plants one tree for every candidate successfully placed on an Evergreen role.  

5Gyres and TrashBlitz: To drastically reduce our waste footprint, we need to understand it—which is why Insight Gobal has partnered with 5Gyres. This is an institution that uses data and research to partner with organizations and help them track and reduce their waste. Through this partnership, and a task force led by ambassadors in 13 offices, we recently wrapped up TrashBlitz. This initiative will allow us to target areas for improvement and make better buying decisions—ultimately cutting down the waste we send to landfills and improving our overall sustainability.  

Working Toward Sustainable Offices

In 2022 we conducted our first Environmental Analysis of our leased offices. This gave us a much clearer idea of how energy efficient our offices were. And the process of identifying weak areas allowed us to create steps and solutions that are actionable and effective. 

This is an area that we’re still working to improve, but we’ve already made some major strides. As of now, 100% of our offices use LED/occupancy sensors and 59% are LEED or energy star certified.  

Additionally, we have overhauled our company-wide office supplies to reduce waste wherever possible. Through a Green Review with our Office Suppliers Vendors, we’ve swapped 50+ regularly purchased products with more eco-friendly options. Now, Insight Global opts for environmentally friendly products, like 50% post-consumer recycled material. 

And because we understand that it takes all of us to make an impact, we’ve taken steps toward educating our staff. At Insight Global headquarters, we’ve provided recycling and waste guides at every bin to help our staff recycle properly. We’re currently working on implementing these into every office, and with nearly 5,000 internal employees, that recycling will add up. By providing our teams with this knowledge, we hope to empower them to make better decisions for the environment.  

Tracking Carbon Emissions

Tracking and reporting our carbon emissions is a monumental part of our mission to become sustainable. In 2019 we tracked and reported our carbon emissions for the first time. And in 2021 we began reporting to both EcoVadis and CDP, allowing us to start capturing our carbon footprint.  

Since the start of our emission-tracking journey, we’ve also implemented Watershed, a best-in-class Carbon Accounting Platform that’s also used by Walmart, Airbnb, and DoorDash, among other companies. Watershed tracks our company’s carbon footprint, provides insight into areas of improvement, and enables us to report our progress to clients and investors. Most importantly though, implementing Watershed is helping us take major strides in our fight against climate change. 

IG is Committed to a Sustainable Future

We’re committed to working toward our 2025 goals and beyond by reducing waste, cutting down carbon emissions, and becoming a more sustainable organization.  

To read more about our initiatives and our impact so far, check out our inaugural ESG Impact Report.