What is Mission Zero all about?
Mainly, it's all about enlisting the support and energy of millions of people who can help correct the world's environmental course.
It's about a big goal of zero environmental impact that is achieved through little actions that make a difference. It's about hope and commitment. It's about challenging ourselves to greatness. It's about collective action.
Ray Anderson, the Chairman and Founder of Interface, Inc.
speaks about his vision for Mission Zero.
Here's what the Mission Zero community offers the daring:
- Community: A vibrant place where like-minded people go to meet, share and swap fresh ideas and valuable resources.
- Thought Hub: A place to find out about current sustainability best practices and to learn ways to put those practices into action in your life, at home, and at work.
- Information Warehouse: A vast repository of resources concerning the modern sustainability movement, of ideas that have shaped the Mission Zero community, and a safe location to list, post and warehouse your own ideas and information for others to enjoy.
Mission Zero will inspire you.
It will compel you. It will inform & delight.
It will move all of us in a new direction, step-by-step, act-by-act, day-by-day,
person-by-person.
An Urgent Calling
Mission Zero started with one man who decided it was time to change course. In 1994, Ray Anderson, the founder and chairman of Interface, Inc., the world's largest manufacturer of commercial carpet, experienced an epiphany. "I discovered an urgent calling and an unexpectedly rewarding new role for myself," Anderson wrote. "Thus began my third life, with a new vision of what I wanted Interface, my child, to grow up to be."
Anderson began reading voraciously, gaining inspiration and insight from leading thinkers in the field of sustainability such as Daniel Quinn, Paul Hawken and Rachel Carson. Gradually, Anderson envisioned a new role for himself and his company, one of a sustainable enterprise and a journey toward zero environmental footprint.
Anderson's enthusiasm for his vision, which was later named Mission Zero™, was contagious. His vision became the company's vision, embraced by employees at every level and integrated into the company's culture and beliefs. Employees became ambassadors for Mission Zero, introducing the idea to customers who quickly saw it as a way to meet their own clients' needs and expectations. Nearly 15 years later, Mission Zero has friends and followers far and wide, across many countries and industries.
The Mission Zero online community is a natural evolution of the Mission Zero movement. It is our intent to continue to expand Mission Zero's circle of participants and advocates. The larger the conversation about sustainability, the more people we will inspire and motivate to join us on the mission to zero.
Read about the Interface model for sustainability at:
interfacesustainability.com
Dare Mighty Things
If one man and one company could change the course of the world, there would be little need for a community such as Mission Zero.
But no single person or enterprise can. Mission Zero must be broad, deep and wide if its goal is ever to be met. It's for everyone.
We know the challenges ahead are huge, even daunting. But, as Theodore Roosevelt once urged generations past:
Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.
One day we will awake to see millions upon millions who have decided to take up the Mission Zero challenge. That morning we still won't be at zero, but we will be millions (billions?) of steps closer. When that day comes, we'll realize how big zero really is. And how attainable it truly can be.
Founding Partners
© 2010 Interface, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
