How Leidos UK drives sustainability with interactive platform Giki
Worldwide, nearly 70 percent of employees say they want their employers to invest in sustainability. Four out of five C-suite executives also support the requirement that businesses be more accountable to sustainability goals. Yet, even with both leadership and individual employees aligned in a commitment to sustainability, the challenge is channelling that energy into demonstrable results.
“At Leidos we are both an innovative company and an ethical company, so finding ways to educate people on sustainability is part of what we do as standard,” says Leidos UK Social Value Manager Silka Patel. “But how do you measure the impact of that?”
For Patel the answer is Giki Zero, an interactive platform that enables employees to track and reduce their carbon footprint through engaging challenges and team-based competitions.
“Giki is really where the rubber hits the road,” she explains. “Because you’re getting a dashboard with all this data and getting metrics that you can pull from in real-time.”
Beyond providing a means to assess the impact of individual activities across Leidos, a crucial part of the Giki effect is how it connects these individual behaviour changes to a larger campaign.
“What engaged me was that it’s not just an app in which you are left to your own devices,” Patel explains. “A team lead can invite members to join their team on the platform, and then you get a leaderboard ranking your team against others based on how well you’re doing on five main areas of carbon reduction. So, it gets competitive because you can have functional teams sign up against each other.”
But while many employees care about sustainability, only a small percentage actively attempt to take action on environmental concerns. The challenge was in supporting this small group of dedicated sustainability advocates, or "Green Champions," to bring their colleagues along with them via a variety of internal communications, such as vlogs, emails to new hires, and presentations at all-hands meetings.
Once they’re signed up, however, a stream of new campaigns and themed challenges keeps them coming back for more.
“The continuous nature of it makes a difference,” says Patel. “You can tell people once or twice but having green initiatives and content going out every month keeps people interested and engaged.”
Our continued collaboration with Leidos employees this year has seen a strong step change in engagement. By focusing on both personal and professional impacts, from sustainable fashion to office energy efficiency, we've witnessed healthy competition, consistent encouragement, and informative sessions driving positive climate action.
Helen Chambers
Impact Director, Giki
Giki is just one component of Leidos UK’s broader commitment to the ambitious targets carbon reduction targets highlighted in a recent Leidos UK Sustainability Report. This report follows on from Leidos UK serving as a proud member of the Government Digital Sustainability Alliance working to promote digital data sustainability. And, as a company that works with so many different clients and partners, Patel points out that Leidos is well-positioned to magnify the impact of its sustainability initiatives.
“We’ve recently begun to make commitments as part of the bidding process that we will have specific Giki targets for the contract team that loop in not only the customer but the whole supply chain,” she explains. “So, we’re not only educating our employees, we’re saying that we are happy and willing to educate the entire ecosystem of a contract so that everyone can benefit.”
Our partnership with Giki helps us continue to raise the awareness and importance of sustainability and our commitment to our planet. The platform’s delightful user interface leverages gamification, which has been key in engaging employees across the whole of our organisation. Additionally, it helps us maintain a competitive advantage by improving our brand recognition and popularity, thus setting us apart from our competitors.
Paul Bucur
Talent Acquisition Director & Executive Sponsor, UK Green Team, Leidos UK
These initiatives align Leidos UK nationally with the ambitious targets announced by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer at COP29 in November to reduce emissions by 81% by 2035, an increase from the previous goal of 68% by 2030. It comes as the UK is phasing out coal power and lifting the ban on onshore wind with companies needing to play their role too.
Learn more about Leidos UK's sustainability initiatives
