The triple bottom line refers to a business model that seeks to achieve more than just making lots of money. With this broader view of why we go into business, there are three essential areas that can be taken into consideration: people, the planet and profit – or the three Ps.

'People' concerns ethical labour practices and the communities affected by a business's operations. Fair trade coffee would be an example of where the people dimension of the triple bottom line has been carefully considered, put into practice, and successfully commercialised. Well-documented cases of sweat factories are examples of where it has not.

'Planet' refers to an environmentally responsible approach to a corporation's practices that will seek to reduce its carbon footprint, material wastage, energy use and pollution, as well as limiting any other damage to the environment and wildlife to which it may contribute.

'Profit,' meanwhile, is self-explanatory.

But all of these concepts can be considered as part of a general philosophy of sustainability throughout a business's operations and processes. How, though, can a suite of tools such as that which Glasscubes provides, help a business put that philosophy into being?

People

With an online workspace people are empowered to collaborate better and form effective teams that can work flexibly and remotely. This offers many advantages to the worker, who can benefit from a considerate and employee-centred approach to staff management that expresses trust, allows them to spend more time at home, and offers them greater control over how they go about fulfilling their responsibilities.

Planet

The cloud storage of documents is environmentally responsible for two essential reasons. Firstly, the move away from a paper-based set of practices significantly reduces the use and wastage of material goods, especially paper and ink. Also, though, there is a massive drop off in energy consumption in an office that no longer needs to produce dozens or even hundreds of copies every day, that requires less physical space, and that does not require as many people to travel to work and back on a daily basis.

Profit

Research has shown that home workers experience a significant boost to their productivity. This combined with the fact of reduced expenditure in materials and office space, as well as a lower turnover in staff, can have a direct impact on a business's profitability and longevity. But as a result of that flexibility and improved efficiency, many businesses also benefit from their leaders' being able to focus more on key strategic choices.

By using a smart online workspace solution for collaboration and project management, organisations can successfully work towards practising sustainability throughout everything that do, benefitting the business as they do so, while also contributing to happier workplaces and a healthier environment.