Ten years ago, if you asked most office professionals what office supplies they needed for work, they’d probably give you a list like this: a desk in a cubicle (though an office would be nicer), a desktop computer, a telephone, access to a printer and a fax machine, pens, pencils, paper and notepads, and file cabinets. Essentially, just ten years ago, office workers relied on office supplies that took up lots of space, used lots of energy to manufacture, and wasted natural resources like paper and water. In fact, even now,
the average office worker uses 10,000 pieces of paper each year.
Today, if you ask the typical office professional what supplies they need for work, the list is MUCH different. First, while many offices still have them, things like fax machines and printers are becoming obsolete - which means file cabinets and wasted paper are too. List makers, note takers, and doodlers will still enjoy pens and pads, but many people are making the switch to virtual note-taking. Office telephones have taken a backseat to office-provided cell phones. The bulky office supplies that ruled the world and used up resources are being replaced by smaller, greener office supplies.
For reduced paper alone, we save forests worth of trees from being cut down in more ways that one. Every tree that is left standing, rather than cut down for paper, is still available to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, reducing greenhouse gas buildup. Instead of cutting a 15-foot tall tree down to make a half-box of paper, that tree can be left standing to
absorb 60 pounds of pollutants from the air annually.
Noticeably missing paper, here are the office supplies needed by today's professionals:
1) A laptop or tablet computer
2) Reliable high-speed Internet connection
3) Access to networked files or cloud tools like Google (News 
- Alert) Docs
4) A smart-phone
5) Collaboration software like Yammer, Skype (News - Alert), and other instant messaging programs
Notice another BIG thing that doesn’t necessarily make the list anymore? An office or cubicle! Three out of five workers say that they don’t need to be in the office to be productive. Over 17 million Americans telecommute at least one day each month, and if given the chance, 79 percent of office workers say they would telecommute. As these numbers keep growing by double-digit percentages, the office cubicle will continue to decline in necessity and so will air pollution due to commuter traffic.
Along those lines, professional telecommuting jobs are becoming more commonplace as work becomes more mobile. Over the past four years, FlexJobs, an award-winning job service for telecommuting and flexible schedule jobs, has seen a 400 percent increase in the number of available telecommuting jobs since 2007.
And even telecommuters don’t necessarily need dedicated office space in their homes. “Offices” for telecommuters include working from living rooms, kitchen counters, patios and porches, a small desk in a master or guest bedroom, and desk closets (small closets that have been converted into a desk space). Outside of their homes, you’ll find telecommuters in work-share spaces, coffee shops, local libraries, and casual restaurants and lunch spots. In a new twist of a classic movie quote, “If you provide Wi-Fi, they will come.”
Today’s office professionals rely less on space-consuming, resource-wasting office equipment, and more on green-friendly telecommuting equipment that exists in the cloud and moves through the air. Rather than building an office to work from, the ever-more-popular vision of work is that the world IS your office, making it all the more important to work green.
Brie Weiler Reynolds is a freelance writer and the Manager of Content and Community Outreach at FlexJobs, the leading site for telecommuting and flexible job listings, where she blogs and manages social media. A college career advisor by trade, Brie writes about job search and career advice, workplace trends, personal finance, and lifestyle. She finds joy in discovering and creating useful information and resources which help others to bring order and purpose to their lives, and she is passionate about work-life balance and environmental sustainability. A native of upstate New York, Brie has lived in Boston, New Jersey, and Atlanta over the past ten years, and enjoys traveling at home and abroad.
Edited by
Stefania Viscusi
