Environmental and Social Sustainability

We find it helpful to look at sustainability as two key areas – Environmental and Social Value. This means when we assess how sustainable we are as a business, we don’t just check if we are doing the right thing for the environment, but if we are doing the right thing to support the community we are part of.

Environmental

As individuals, most of us try to do the right thing for the environment, but we can’t always be sure the companies we work with are doing their bit too. When choosing us, you can be assured we always strive to work in good conscience and are always reviewing how we can make a positive contribution to the world we all share. Here are just some of the ways Allan Joyce Architects has been trying to make a difference to the environment: 

• Appointing a Sustainability Champion
• Holding a quarterly sustainability forum for staff
• Collecting rainwater for our plants
• Moving our website to a sustainable host
• Changing office policy to reduce paper usage
• Creating a roof garden
• Introducing a cycle to work scheme and having a bike rack fitted
• Car sharing for site visits
• Using more environmentally friendly cleaning products
• Tracking and reducing energy usage using the Zellar platform and timers
• Signing up to the RIBA 2030 Climate Challenge
• Make significant investments in the business infrastructure to support environmental sustainability including, having 2 EV charging points fitted and fitting PVs our roof to power the office with green energy

Social Value

We also know the importance of working with a social conscience and do our upmost to give back whenever we can. We appreciate the role we have in actively working with the communities we are part of because we know that together we thrive. These are some of the approaches we have taken to be socially conscious:  

• Offering 10 work experience placements per year
• Making regular charitable donations
• Providing work opportunities to part 1 and 2 students
• Teaching at universities and taking part in young person engagement schemes
• Working for reduced fees for social projects where it is viable for us to do so
• Creating an equal opportunities work environment, where women make up over 50% of the senior management team
• Encouraging staff wellbeing through regular socials and collaborative working
• Supporting local business

If you would like to know more about AJA and the approaches we are taking to be as sustainable as possible, please get in touch.