Sustainability is all about using renewable and reusable resources to create a stable and eco-friendly environment. In class we discussed how more and more businesses are taking on a sustained and environmental approach with their companies.  Even UBC is doing its part to try and create a more sustainable approach to its facilities. This includes the various recycling and compost bins around campus, the highly efficient CIRS building and the reusable containers given out to students in resident dining rooms.

I was most interested in the class assignment about ways that we could make UBC more eco-friendly.  After thinking about it further, I feel as though driving is a huge issue that should be addressed. I was surprised to learn that the most common source of pollutant for a household is cars. In actuality, this fact a lot of sense. For example there are many people that must commute to UBC and quite a few of them drive. This wastes a lot of gas when other alternative methods could be found. I noticed in my fellow classmate Annie Huang’s Blog that she mentioned raising the cost of parking at UBC in order to discourage students to find other means of transportation. Although this is a solution it doesn’t solve the means by which students can get to school in a more eco-friendly and sustainable manner.

This is when I did some further reading into my fellow classmate Omneet Madan’s Blog. She mentioned using “Car2Go” as source to achieve a more eco-friendly means of transportation to school. This business uses one of the key words defining sustainability and that is “reusable.” Now this alternative wouldn’t be a way to change the whole world but by everybody doing their part to reduce a little bit of pollutant consumption then there could be a significant impact on the world as a whole.

Source of Car2Go: https://www.car2go.com/en/austin/

In my opinion Free the Children is one of the most inspiring social enterprises. This is because it really emphasizes on how youth my age  can make a difference. Children and teens often feel like they are too small to have an impact on the world. It seems as though everything is run by adults because they are the ones with the ideas, the creativity and the power to inflict change.

Craig Kielburger proved at the young age of 12 that this assumption is wrong. Free the Children was an organization that began when Craig read the story of a 12 year old like himself who lived in Pakistan and worked as a slave for a carpeting company. When the Pakistan boy was released and tried to alert citizens to his story, he was murdered. Craig then went on to form a committee of his friends and family members to raise money in order to get word out to officials to free child slaves in Pakistan. Eventually his plan succeed and all child slaves in that facility were released. Since then Free the Children has participated in numerous causes to help with child slavery, poverty etc around the world.

They have built several schools and even started conferences like the Me to We conference held every year in Vancouver and Toronto. I have been to three Me to We conferences and feel inspired every time by how much passion and commitment Craig Keilburger, as well as everyone else involved, has for what they do. This operation which started in the mind of a 12 year old has grown to become huge and well known around the world.

The link listed below is the blog for the Me to We conference that shows ways to get involved and accomplishments that this social enterprise has embarked on. It also shows what others, who were inspired by this business, have done in their efforts to help change the world.

http://www.weday.com/we-day-blog/

Me to We Website: http://www.metowe.com

Free the Children Website: http://www.freethechildren.com

Organizational structure is defined as the way a business divides up its tasks. The way these objectives are grouped and organized can greatly effect the running of a company. Therefore finding an organizational structure that is appropriate for a specific company is detrimental to that company’s success.

For example a tall pyramid organizational structure involves a more centralized decision making process with a distinct chain on command. This would work well with organizations  such as banks or militaries. In contrast a flat pyramid organizational structure involves a decentralized decision making process that would be more suited towards businesses that need more creativity among employees. I feel as though neither structure is better than the other because it simply depends on what kind of business is being run under them.

Another way to divide an organizational structure is by work specialization. I feel like this has a key connection to the discussion in class over money not always being the best factor to motivate better performance. With work specialization each employee specializes in one task. Over time with repetition they grow better at this task which enhances the quality of the product. The only problem is that this becomes tedious and tiring which increases job dissatisfaction. Sometimes pay is not enough within this kind of organizational structure.

An example is with the Ford company around the time when Henry Ford created the assembly line. Workers grew tired of repeatedly completing the same task with limited breaks and little pay. It was efficient for the company in the amount of cars produced but not for the works whom soon began to quit. Ford simply raised the amount of pay and doubled wages in order to entice more workers to join his business. Although this approach did work at gaining employees, it did very little to help with job satisfaction and many workers were still  unhappy doing their jobs.

This just shows that money doesn’t always create better performance and it isn’t the only factor to a successful business with happy employees. The structure of the organization can play a large factor into the inner working of the company.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QtYRLtT8bvY&feature=related