Climate East Midlands' local authority partners win Carbon Trust awards.

Ethical Weddings shares top 12 wedding tips for 2012.

Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust's friendly robin photograph wins National photography award.

Climate Change Gardening shows us how getting rid of our lawns can help the climate in 2012.
Photograph © Climate East Midlands

Foxglove Covert LNR volunteer video shows a day in the life of volunteering at the nature reserve

Ask Iris share their list of top iPhone Apps to support pupils with Autism.

Fifi Bijoux, add ethical opal and pearl designs to their luxury Jewellery collection.

Creative Nottingham review the Lowry exhibition at the Djanogly Art Gallery

Just So Festival offer volunteers the opportunity to attend this year's event for free!

Greenhouse PR share 6 home improvement tips to save energy and lower your bills

Rob at The Social Business tell us his plans and advice for reducing energy use at home.

Polar England launch their new online shop by Factory Design, "representing recreation as an art form"

This is news from just a handful of our clients. We know you're all doing great work out there so drop us a line and tell us your news so that we can share it here!

However, last week, along with 650 other web designers, developers, project managers and creative folk we escaped from our desks and screens and gathered at the beautiful Albert Hall in Nottingham for the much anticipated New Adventures in Web Design Conference 2012, or NACONF as it has become known. We attended the very first NACONF last year and you can see our review here.

I'm not going to write in detail about the event again as there is already lots of information online - especially at the NACONF website - about the speakers, talk topics and events of the day. Mr Collison (Colly) worked very hard once again to bring some of the top designers in our industry from all over the world to our home town of Nottingham to share their ideas, experience and thoughts for the future of web design.

For any web folk who weren't able to make it on the day or for non-web folk who'd like to delve into the webby world you can buy a pdf of the New Adventures newspaper for just £1 and get a copy of last year's for free. The newspaper contains opinion articles, interviews and useful information for when the videos are released, so look out for those.

In the meantime, check out this short film (made by Relly, one of the conference volunteers and her husband Paul) which sums up the spirit of the day.

New Adventures conference 2012 from nicepaul on Vimeo.

We will be closed from 5pm on Friday 16th December to 9am Tuesday 3rd January.

Emergency support arrangements

If you have an emergency hosting support request during that time, please use our online support helpdesk to send us a message. It will be useful for you to note the website address of the helpdesk just in case you need it: makehay.zendesk.com

Please don't send us an urgent e-mail to our usual addresses as we won't receive your message until we're back in January. For all non-hosting enquiries, e-mail us as usual and we will reply when we return from Christmas break.

Thank you!

Finally, we'd like to say thank you for your custom this year and in previous years and we look forward to continuing to work with you into 2012 and beyond.

Have a peaceful and happy holidays and a great New Year!

Vicky & Jez xx

New Green Hosting Clients:

Third Rock - Communications consultancy specialising in environment and green PR.

My nPoint Exactly - A print and online magazine created and produced by a group of friends.

Project Warren - Hand crafted home and garden projects

Parents Carers Forum - A place for parents to give their views about services in Nottingham & Nottinghamshire

More client news...

Climate East Midlands launch a survey to find out how resilient local businesses are to extreme weather

Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust's Ecominds project which aims to improve mental health and wellbeing has won an award! Congratulations guys!

Foxglove Covert Local Nature Reserve mark a record in number of birds ringed. A significant part of their conservation work.

Ask Iris says congratulations to a local teenager for winning the Nottinghamshire Outstanding Achievement 4Uth Awards

My Climate Change Garden anticipates the launch of the new iPad vegetable garden planner.

Fifi Bijoux becomes UK authorised reseller for ethical diamond brand

Just So Festival announce the winners of their great photo competition 2011

Attenborough Nature Centre invites visitors to join in their Christmas crafts activities on 4th December for children aged 6 and over.

Greenhouse PR share their highlights of the 'Feeding the 5000' event to raise awareness of the problem of food waste.

Cherrygorgeous post their winter warmer wedding mood board and their range of pretty winter eco stationery.

Rob at The Social Business discusses the Occupy Movement and how he identifies himself as the 99%

Grasslands Trust launch 'Nature's Tapestry' an in-depth report into the state of England's grasslands.

Photographs above © Foxglove Covert LNR and Ted & Miki c/o Just So Festival respectively

Many other businesses are also reviewing their energy consumption, the waste they produce, the activities they support and the suppliers they choose. Consider your suppliers for a moment. Have you thought about the company that creates, maintains and hosts your website and how they address the environmental issues of their industry? Using an environmentally responsible web design company means that your online presence, a significant and growing aspect of your business, has positive eco-credentials too.

Green & Ethical Web Design
Since Make Hay was founded in 2004 we have employed both ethical and environmental policies in our everyday work. It’s the only way we wanted to do business but it is also a means of supporting our clients to be greener and think about the impact of their website too. Our ethical policy demonstrates that there are some activities that we just won't support through our services, we don;t want to make money from businesses who deal in the exploitation of people, animals or the planet, simple as that.

Our websites and our office are powered renewable, wind generated electricity which we use efficiently, switching off idle equipment and lighting. Waste from our office is minimal and when we need to dispose of equipment we recycle as much as we can, including stationery, furniture and computer components. Most of our communication is digital but stationery we do use is made from recycled or FSC paper as are printed publicity materials, which also use vegetable-based ink. We seek out ethical suppliers and eco products when possible, use The Cooperative for our business banking and a motor insurance company which offsets all of our car’s carbon emissions. We are Wildlife Guardians at Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust, members of Gedling Fairtrade Group and sponsors of Creative Nottingham and All Ours for people experiencing mental ill health.

100% Wind Powered Website Hosting
As well as web design we supply green website hosting powered 100% by renewable electricity. Using Green Hosting means that our clients’ websites are powered by the wind, not fossil fuels which contribute to the rising carbon emissions of non-green data centres, reported to have an equivalent carbon footprint of the aviation industry!

Excellent Web Design and Hosting Service
Providing an excellent service and beautiful, standards compliant web design is equally important to us as running a green and ethical business. We genuinely care about the work we produce, using modern techniques and careful processes in our craft. We handle all of our web development projects personally and foster long-term business relationships. This is why we continue to attract clients who care about quality as well as social responsibility. Take a look at a our portfolio to see some of the great organisations we're fortunate enough to work with and please do get in touch if you would like to know more.

The My Week features follow local business owners and professionals from a range of industries. This was an interesting experience for me because, like most people, I'm too busy getting on with the job to stop and reflect on the past week. Maybe its something we should do more.

Here's the My Week article.

New Green Hosting Clients:

Angels Housekeeping - Cleaning and domestic services for older people in Leeds.

Chinese Calligraphy Society of Europe - Promoting the skills of Chinese calligraphy.

Douglas Lee Dental Practice - A caring family dental practice.

Marumi - Creations inspired by Viennese and Japanese art of cake making.

In other client news...

Climate East Midlands launch a series of workshops to support local councils to implement carbon management plans.

Ethical Weddings gives an interview to Environmental Protection magazine on how to reduce your carbon footprint at the altar.

Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust needs moo! They are looking for support to raise funds for a herd of grazing cattle.

Foxglove Covert Nature Reserve enjoyed a day of spooky Halloween activities.

Seal Protection Action Group reports huge reductions in Scottish seal killings

Creative Nottingham introduce their new guest blogger from Nottingham Hackspace

Hanna's Orphanage covers school volunteers, droughts in Ethiopia and fundraising in their October newsletter

Factory Design continue their winning streak. They've now won the DBA Design Effectiveness Award!

Just So Festival are delighted to share the great family reviews of this year's event.

Cherrgorgeous gives us inspiration for Autumn weddings ideas.

Orbis Marketing shares their expert advice on blogging best practice.

Greenhouse PR tells us about 5 interesting green products that run without electricity.

Grasslands Trust trustees publishes new book 'Wildflower Wonders of the World'.

Photographs above © Angels Housekeeping & Foxglove Covert Local Nature Reserve

The story begins back in late 2006, when I was in the early stages of designing my PhD research. Being a bit of a greenie, I wanted to bring this into my scholarly endeavours so I enrolled on the PhD with the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility (ICCSR) at Nottingham University and drew up my plan to explore environmental sustainability and start-up business.

Subsequently I found myself scanning the internet for recently established, UK-based ethical and environmentally sustainable businesses to take part in the research. Make Hay caught my attention, not least as they seemed pretty much the only such start-up in my near vicinity! Without delving into too much academic jargon, I began to interviews founders with the joint aim of (1) understanding what motivates such business founders to embark upon setting up this kind of business, and (2) determining the key sources of tension they encountered as they introduced new ethical and sustainable practices to their respective sectors.

Due to time and space restraints, I’ll focus on talking about the first aim - motivations. This seems even more relevant for these pages as it was during my first interview with Vicky from Make Hay that a concept which ended up anchoring my research – authenticity – first captured my interest. Vicky had spoken with passion about the decision to cement their own values and principles firmly in the very essence of Make Hay; she hoped it would be a route towards more authentic careers/lives. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the concept of authenticity, it can be understood as the pursuit of one’s inner voice to live one’s life in a way true to oneself (Taylor, 1991 ). In terms of careers, authenticity is about working in a way is consistent with your inner values. However, it is not simply about satisfying yourself alone but authenticity demands consideration of our external responsibilities to other people and our surrounding natural/ social environment.

With other interviewees apparently also searching for greater authenticity, I sought insights into whether other academics had explored the role of pursuing one’s authenticity as a driver for entrepreneurship. Surprising, there was very little that explicitly linked the pursuit of authenticity with entrepreneurship. Passion, determination, self-efficacy, creativity - these all offered insights into the drive to launch one’s own business. But the role of authenticity? I found had not been adequately discussed.
Whilst not being directly applicable, existing work did turn up some interesting insights that I’d like to share with you. Firstly an inspiring piece tracing the career of the Spanish film director Pedro Almodóvar, demonstrated that a sense of being authentic had characterised his career path: “Experience has taught me that the more honest and personal my work is, the more successful I am” . So authenticity has been recognised as a motivation for those with untraditional careers, such as those in the creative industries. However, even here restrictions on bringing one’s authenticity to life through one’s work exist. For example, this research showed that in the creative industries the journey to being able to truly portray oneself in one’s work has to be understood as an enduring struggle.  A struggle which is gradually overcome as someone, such as Almodóvar, becomes more established and is hence freer to express their own ‘voice’ as they see fit.

Secondly, a body of research on authenticity has focused on the experiences of individuals employed in constraining workplaces such as call centres and in well-established professional roles such as management consultants. The focus of this research has been on an emerging trend for organizations to encourage displays of an authentic self in the workplace as a means to alleviate the mundane nature of the work. However, the ability to portray oneself by dressing as one likes or by a blurring of the boundaries between one’s social life and the workplace only allows for a superficial portrayal of authenticity. In this work there have been discussions on the sense of self-alienation experienced by some employees, such as junior management consultants . Where a ‘corporate culture’ penetrates all aspects of these consultants’ lives, it was found not only that some experienced an inability to ‘be themselves’ but also that they were out of touch with their inner voice almost entirely. The demands of work had led the loss of a sense of authenticity. I believe this is worrying as it sends a signal that those within certain job roles would be less able and indeed willing, to challenges the superficial nature of some corporations’ values. Such a scenario seems gloomy if we are to rely on values-driven and inspired employees to initiate and deliver progressive social and/ or environmental activities through, for example, genuine CSR programmes.

To summarise the background to my research it can be said that our understanding of authenticity as a career driver (1) had been concerned with the constraints that working life places on being able to portray a sense of your true self, and (2) had given little consideration to the activities of individuals to remove some of these constraints by leaving a prior role/ workplace. Vicky at Make Hay and my other research participants had set me on a path to try to better understand authenticity’s role in driving people’s careers transitions to self-employment and to running their own businesses. I will share some of my insights with you in part two of this blog.

References:

1) Taylor, C. (1991). The Ethics of Authenticity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
2) Pedro Almodóvar in Mata, 2003, p. 38, see Svejenova, S. (2005). ‘The path with the heart: Creating the authentic career’. Journal of Management Studies, 42, 947-974.
3) See Costas, J. and Fleming, P. (2009). ‘Beyond dis-identification: A discursive approach to self-alienation in contemporary organizations’. Human Relations , 62, 353-378.

New Green Hosting clients:

Planetary Collective - Filmmakers and visual media creatives working with cosmologists, ecologists, philosophers and futurists to inspire people to look deeper.

Marie Krag Therapy - Psychotherapist and counsellor with a specialised interest in working with the field of universal energy.

In other client news:

Ethical Weddings celebrate National Cupcake Week by listing their top 10 cupcake companies.

Leicestershire Support for Carers announce set up of new local carers' support groups.

Climate east Midlands ask for your help to shape support for climate change adaptation.

Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust are looking for nominations for their Green Guardian Awards 2011.

Creative Nottingham publish a special feature from their sponsors - That's us!

Grasslands Trust have published new free advice leaflets on how to create and manage wildflower meadows.

Just So Festival have put together a photo gallery of this years' event and launch their photo competition.

Cherrygorgeous create DIY wedding stationery options for crafty couples or those on a budget.

Greenhouse PR talks about Estethica, London Fashion Week's eco hub

Cycle Hire UK gets involved in our 'Meet our clients' feature

If you're one of our clients and have exciting news you'd like to share here on our blog then do get in touch.

Please introduce yourself and tell us a little about your work.
We launched our website in June 2011 with the aim of making it easier for people to hire bikes. As regular cyclists ourselves, often travelling around for work and fun, we recognised the need for a simple-to-use online directory bringing together all the information about cycle hire companies across the UK.

How is your business different to that of others in your industry? How do you stand out from the crowd?
We like to think that our website is about as user-friendly and intuitive as you could hope to be, and a lot better than anything already out there.

How would you say your work is ethically and / or environmentally responsible?
We have an environmental policy that clearly sets out our aims for minimising the impact of our business on the environment. So as well as hosting with Green Hosting, we look at everything else we do in association with the business with the aim of making it as ethical and environmentally responsible as possible.  Added to this, the whole business is about encouraging people to cycle more for recreation and as a utility transport option, so by making information on hiring bikes more accessible, we can help this happen.

What motivates you to do business this way?
As well as running this website, we both work full-time for a sustainable transport charity, so these issues are very close to us. We want more people to cycle because it's good for their health and better for the environment, both locally and globally.

How do you communicate your positive work with clients and potential clients and how do they respond?
Working within the cycling sector, many of our current and potential clients are aware of environmental and ethical issues. So our policy is readily available through our website and approach and beliefs are transparent. Response from clients has been positive and our environmental / ethical credentials have also helped to open doors in the way we have publicised and promoted the business.

Do you see your work as part of a movement of ethical business?
We see our work as helping people to live a healthier lifestyle, with the added benefit of supporting businesses with environmental benefits. We therefore consider ourselves part of a network moving in the same direction.

Share your top 3 tips on how other businesses can work more responsibly.

1. Having a 'day job' aside from this project means we don't have to put profit above service, so we can afford to offer excellent value to our clients and follow our principles in sourcing our support services like hosting, banking, promo materials, etc. Not everyone is in this position of course, but it certainly helps!
2. Be transparent and celebrate your achievements, but make sure you are consistent as people can spot 'green wash' a mile away
3. Choose who you bank with carefully as where you put your money can undo a lot of the good work you do yourself.

How do you see the future of your business and what are you most excited about?
Our aim is to have every cycle hire provider in the country listing their services with us. We're about a quarter of the way there after 3 months, so give us a year and we'll have achieved this aim!

Is there anything else you would like to tell us about your work?
If there are any Green Hosting clients who would like to work with us, please get in touch (contact through www.cyclehireinfo.com). We are particularly keen to hear from businesses who have a service they can offer to our clients, that we can help promote as a special discount. We already work with a couple of like-minded businesses in this way and would like to develop this aspect of our service further.