Travel behaviour change – 5 tips for business engagement

Working with businesses and other organisations at a town centre or other area-wide level can be a cost effective way to deliver workplace behaviour change initiatives. and at the same time contribute to the effective operations of a business. We have put together our top five business engagement tips gained from over a decade’s experience delivering behaviour change projects with businesses either at an area-wide or site specific level.

1. Leverage on existing trusted sources – our recent experience working on business engagement for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games tells us that a key first step in working with the business community is to maximise relationships with business intermediaries (and other trusted sources) in your target area. That could be, for example, economic development officers within the local authority, groups such as a local Chamber of Commerce or a town centre manager. These groups will have good working relationships with the organisations they represent and using them as advocates of any initiative can be invaluable.

2. Set meaningful performance indicators – our experience from supporting the Smarter Travel Richmond programme suggests that in many cases, a full travel plan may not be what is required. Performance indicators linked to the number of organisations (for example a target of 100 organisations with a travel plan) will influence the delivery of a project very differently to performance indicators linked to an increase in participation or modal shift (for example a 10 per cent increase in cycling). Why? Because although you may achieve a target of 100 organisations with a travel plan document in place, this does not necessarily mean that there is any change in behaviour whereas a 10 per cent increase in cycling is an actual result. Performance indicators coupled with an effective monitoring regime will also help local authorities to understand the effectiveness of interventions delivered through the Local Sustainable Transport Fund.

3. Divide the project into distinct phases – in any area-wide behaviour change project there are likely to be two distinct phases, the first being business engagement, the second being travel plan development or delivery of the behaviour change initiative. Knowing the number of participating businesses will help you to allocate resources and support in the delivery stage of your project. When resources are limited, there is merit in structuring delivery around these two phases to enable efforts to be channelled effectively into each stage without one detracting from the other.

4. Integrate with another initiative – such as a Business Improvement District. For many organisations, transport - and particularly commuter travel - is not a business priority. Linking travel with an initiative that may be or seem more useful to business can facilitate engagement and gain commitment from organisations. Opportunities should be sought to use existing initiatives or contacts to sell the benefits of sustainable travel to businesses and act as a link between them and project sponsors.

5. Focus on outcomes and measures – emphasising what the business stands to achieve through their involvement with the initiative is crucial, from reduced demand for car parking spaces through to a local grant for on-site cycling improvements. For example, businesses in the target area could be given a ‘menu’ of sustainable transport collateral available to them – akin to some personal travel planning projects. It is interesting to note that the most significant catalyst for business engagement in the London 2012 Games initiative is business resilience – there are merits in learning from this and appealing much more to the economic performance of a business as being a driver for engagement.