I’ve recently learned of a different way of limiting corporate travel, and I think it’s brilliant.

Every company travel policy I’d heard of until yesterday has been a variation on the same theme:

There’s an annual a travel budget. Management may or may not have priority and there may be limitations on who can travel together, but in the end the true limit is the amount of money in the budget.

The policy I learned of yesterday is almost, but not quite, unlike the others. The budget isn’t about money. It’s about CO2 emissions. Each department gets a specific amount of CO2 emissions for travel for the year.

The implications are interesting:

Travel within Europe has become train first as a natural consequence. Intercontinental travel has been reduced by a significant amount.

It’s an absolutely amazing policy and it should be the standard corporate travel policy everywhere.