Corporate campus gardens are a good initiative for corporations and businesses of all sizes.
The benefits of taking on the task of building a corporate garden can be vast and bountiful, including for employees and company image.
1. Team building
Employees from every part of a company can come together and work toward a common goal, growing the bounty. This can create an environment of connecting people from different ranks within the company and foster a bond between individuals that don’t often connect. Of course, the efforts can also help create stronger ties between teammates.
2. Employee retention and recruitment
Recruiting and keeping employees is a difficult task for any company, especially following the major shifts that took place during and following the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. For employers that must, or choose to, have a physical office space, culture is important–and creating culture around a common goal such as a corporate garden can be a beneficial activity for all employees to create and operate.
Culture, of course, can lead to retaining and recruiting new employees for the company. And as already stated, finding and retaining employees has not been an easy task in recent years.
3. Promoting healthy lifestyles
A healthy lifestyle plan that already exists can interconnect with a planned corporate garden, easily. Promoting a garden can also fit within the mission and values of a company already experienced in the Corporate Social Responsibility or ESG space. Additinoally, employees can learn about the value of a health diet by interacting or participating in a corporate garden program.
4. Employee performance
For those that are thinking about installing a garden on their corporate campus or small business, building a positive workplace culture can also lead to better employee performance. As mentioned already, a corporate garden can assist in creating a positive workplace culture.
As far as evidence of the trend toward culture, employees were over 10 times more likely to choose to stay in a position that had a good culture when compared to compensation levels, according to a report from MIT Sloan Management Review: “Toxic culture is driving the Great Resignation.”
5. Improved corporate image
The creation of a corporate garden can help improve the public’s image on a company or corporation, potentially leading to increased customer retention and general interest by consumers.
For companies that focus on B2B sales, many downstream companies are looking for sustainability across their supply chain. Taking action on creating a positive culture by upstream entities may lead these enterprises to positive outcomes via creating a competitive advantage, such as focusing on a positive culture (better employee treatment) and thus an improved image.