Government Technology

Promoting sustainable working practices and reducing carbon emissions is a priority for civil servants in their day-to-day roles. A survey commissioned at Civil Service Live – the annual UK event for government department employees – reveals that nearly half (49 per cent) of the respondents stated it is a high priority with a further 38 per cent setting it as a medium-term objective.
    
The greener option
Using video conferencing instead of traveling to attend events and meetings is becoming an increasingly popular way to reduce carbon emissions. Natural England, the government advisory body on the natural environment, reported a 31 per cent reduction in emissions when compared to the previous year’s annual event, by bringing together 2,500 people over seven locations using video conferencing.
    
“The use of web to power meetings and video-conferences is gaining momentum in the public sector in a bid to meet government carbon reduction targets. It is inevitable that UK plc will follow in this quest for sustainable event dialogue especially in light of growing commercial carbon emission legislation,” states Toby Lewis, Managing Director of The Live Group plc.
    
Increased productivity
Using green event technologies is also a better option in terms of public expenditure and can lead to increased productivity as less time is spent out of the office. Toby Lewis explains: “An average London-based conference for 400 delegates held in a hotel can cost in the region of £115,000 when taking into account venue hire, daily delegate rates, AV equipment, event management, overnight accommodation and standard train travel from 12 major city locations.
    
“In comparison, the same event can be condensed to a fully facilitated golden four hours, powered by video conference in 20 regions with 20 delegates in each location. This costs near to £39,000 and is a 66 per cent cost saving. The other savings include greater workforce efficiency with minimal time spent out of the office and reduced carbon emissions.”

Audience engagement
The survey also highlights that 84 per cent of respondents rate the use of audience engagement at events as very or quite important to gain live delegate feedback when running an event. The main advantages that touch pad voting systems provide were cited as generating better and quicker response rates (21 per cent), encouraging a greater feeling of involvement for delegates (17 per cent) and being more engaging than paper based questionnaires (22 per cent).