If your business isn’t environmentally friendly, your employees will react negatively.

According to recent research by OnePoll, environmental friendliness is an important value for a massive swath of US employees. Based on the study, the majority of American employees (63%) have left a company over ethical and environmental concerns. Furthermore, 31% identified these concerns as the deciding factor in their decision to leave.

Conversely, an environmentally-friendly company is a huge draw for potential employees. Just over half of the study’s respondents claimed that they would take a pay cut in order to work for a more environmentally friendly company. 80% also said that they would work harder if their company was taking positive actions to support the environment. Just under half also said they would be more likely to stay at a company long-term if they demonstrated more concern for the environment.

The overarching theme of the study is that when a company demonstrates an effort to improve its effects on the environment, current and potential employees respect it more. They would be willing to be paid less and work longer hours to support such a company. So, there’s now clearly a more direct incentive for companies to care more for the environment; it leads to happier and more productive workers!