Sustainable Purchasing Online Course

A GREEN OFFICE ACADEMY COURSE
There are a lot of decisions when you are responsible for purchasing. Make sure you are making the best ones.

Do you find yourself:

    • Wondering about all the plastic your organization sends to the landfill?
    • Worried about harmful chemicals in the products that you buy?
    • Concerned about the worker and environmental impacts of your purchasing choices?
    • Frustrated because you want to make some changes but don’t know where to start?

Here’s a Sustainable Purchasing Online Course that can help

We have distilled this vast and complicated “green procurement” subject into criteria and procedures that you can easily implement and understand. We’ve done the hard work, so there’s less guesswork for you.
This self-paced, online course will take you step-by-step through the considerations you need to know to create a successful sustainable procurement program so you can:

 

    • Make clear and confident purchase decisions that are socially responsible
    • Stop wasting time and getting lost in sustainability research and  ideas
    • Have a positive impact on the environment as you transform your supply chains

Sustainable Purchasing Course Description

The Sustainable Purchasing course will arm you with what you need to know about what to buy and who to buy from.
This course will benefit people who are just starting out and those already familiar with sustainable purchasing but want a solid framework on which to build their process.
All concepts will be introduced in practical and digestible lessons. We will start with the foundational understanding of the environmental impacts of a product’s lifecycle and then move to the criteria that should be considered. These criteria go way beyond concepts such as recycled content paper or energy-efficient light fixtures.

COURSE DETAILS

  • Unit 1: Sustainability Overview

    This is a fast-paced overview of the lifecycle of a product. It concludes with examples of some commonly purchased items.

     

  • Unit 2: Sustainability of Products & Packaging

    The environmental and social impacts introduced in Unit 1 are distilled into criteria that you can apply to everyday purchases.

     

  • Unit 3: Selecting Vendors & Manufacturers

    This focuses on what vendor criteria to evaluate and how to decide whom you should buy from.

     

  • Unit 4: Choose Your Path and Developing a Green Procurement Plan

    How you take what you have learned in the previous units and apply them to the situation in your workplace and office.

     

BONUS MATERIALS INCLUDED

  • #1 Sustainable Criteria Booklet

    This booklet takes the environmental issues associated with office products, including personal illness, habitat and species loss, pollution, and resource depletion – and codifies those impacts into simple, easily identifiable criteria for products commonly purchased for office operations.

     

  • #2 Selection Tools Booklet

    This is an index of the Terminology, Ecolabels, and Apps that will help you make the best product selections.

     

  • #3 Ranking Worksheet

    This is a spreadsheet tool where you can list what you are already purchasing as a baseline, choose applicable criteria you would like to aim for, prioritize them, and plan which changes you will implement over the next three years.

     

Pricing

GBB MembersJoin GBB & Save

$ 49

Employee
  • Available to Active GBB Members
  • Includes one login per employee
  • Active for 3 months from course registration
Join Now

Non-Members

$ 199

Employee
  • Available to Everyone
  • Includes one login per employee
  • Active for 3 months from course registration
Join Now

INSTRUCTOR

Julia Craighill

Chief Sustainability Officer
Green Business Bureau

Julia is the Chief Sustainability Officer of the Green Business Bureau and is responsible for the company’s sustainability program and services. A frequent speaker and author on issues of sustainability, she is known for her pragmatic guidance that helps organizations make the leap from good intentions to long-term, profitable and sustainable performance.
Her tried and tested methods have helped dozens of companies, ranging from a two-person yoga studio to the global headquarters of a hospitality company, successfully create plans to green their workplace. They can work for you too.

FAQs

What is GreenOfficeAcademy.com?

Green Office Academy is a strategic partner of GBB and currently our provider for online training courses. GreenOfficeAcademy.com is the training website which requires a separate account and login.

How long does it take to complete this course?

The course is totally self-paced and you can move through the materials at a pace you’re comfortable with. The four video lessons total 30 minutes. Reviewing the two booklets should take about an hour. However, the time to fill out the Ranking spreadsheet tool will depend on how much analysis and research you and your team choose to do.

What’s the level of this course? Can I take it if I’m a total beginner? And what if I already know a lot about sustainable purchasing?

This course will benefit people who are just starting out and those already familiar with sustainable purchasing but want a solid framework on which to build their process.

I’m so busy at work; how can I fit this in?

Of course, work priorities come first. That’s why I streamlined the content so you can make the most progress in the least amount of time.

How do I know if this program is for me?

This program is for anyone charged with purchasing or sustainability policy for their company, including office managers, procurement professionals, and green team members. All of this applies regardless of your level of sustainability knowledge or the type of business you are in.

Money-back Guarantee

Our goal in this course is a win-win-win (you, us, and the planet!). If, for any reason, you feel that the program isn’t working for you, we’ll  refund all your money, if requested, within 30 days of the start of the course. No questions asked. However ,we would love it if you would share your reasons and help us improve the course.