Rethinking consumption and retention

I have worked at Bupa for seven years in the Health Insurance team and now lead a team focused on customer retention. The concept of retention is pretty much all about keeping or holding something and from my perspective, there are two ways to go about it.

1. A reactive model: Build a dam to hold back a river
2. A proactive model: Nurture that river and give it room to evolve

The proactive model certainly takes a lot more work, but it creates more meaningful results and connections between a business and its customers. The same can also be said of humanities retention activities with planet earth.

Are we as people just trying to hold back the tide of climate change by reacting to the facts on the ground? Or are we actively looking for ways to improve the health of our planet?

We’re at an important point in history where businesses need to take leadership roles in creating the change necessary for a bright future for our people and our planet. This is why I’m really proud that Bupa has introduced the eco-Disruptive program, a global initiative that sees teams work with startups or social enterprises to identify and shape innovative solutions to environmental challenges aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

My team has a specific focus on the idea of circular economy and responsible consumption which is essentially about how we take a resource and use it for the most amount of times during its lifecycle.

For example, a disposable coffee cup is something you use once but it can take many years to break down (a big problem when you consider Australians use 1 billion disposable cups a year). Whereas an edible takeaway coffee cup, which our start-up partner Good Edi is developing, is something you can use once and then eat it or it will break down naturally.

We are just in the early stages of our partnership, but I’m really enjoying the positivity and how its opening our eyes to other opportunities for more responsible consumption. When you think of the challenges facing planet earth, it’s easy to be overwhelmed by how the future might look bleak, but when you take a proactive approach and start to think about the scalable possibilities you start to believe that we can not only retain the earth’s wellbeing but also nurture it into a state of flourishment.

For more information on Bupa’s eco-Disruptive program visit here.

For more information on Good Edi visit here.