IT

PhoneCycle provides a convenient mobile phone recycling service that will protect the environment and generate revenue for your organisation or nominated charity. 

How it Works

1. We organise a FREE courier collection for 10 or more mobiles, or a reply paid label for under 10
   
2. We assess the value of the mobile phones
   
3. We organise payment to your organisation or nominated charity
   

The Benefits

•  Generate Revenue

•  Save valuable world resources

•  Divert toxins from landfill

•  Reduce your carbon footprint

•  Protect your data

How we pay you

Many of the organisations we work with benefit from the revenue generated from their recycled mobile phones, others choose to donate their proceeds to charity as part of their commitment to corporate social responsibility.

What happens next?

We will contact you within 24 working hours upon receipt of your equipment with a current market valuation. On confirmation a quote and Certificate of Recycling will be issued immediately for your records and payment will be arranged to you or one of the following charities:

·         Cancer Council

·         Australian Conservation Foundation

·         World Wide Fund for Nature Australia

·         The Jane Goodall Institute

·         Cystic Fibrosis Australia

·         Motor Neurone Disease Association

·         Doctors Without Borders

·         Engineers without Borders

·         Headspace

·         Mission Australia

·         The Children’s Hospital at Westmead

·         Cerebral Palsy

·         Lort Smith (Animal Hospital and Shelter)

·         Oxfam

·         Westcare (employing people with a disability)

Please visit www.phonecycle.com.au or contact me if you have any questions. 

Options for recycling old IT hardware

Herbert Geer: Server Virtualisation

Russell Kennedy: Server Virtualisation

Overview

Programme details

As a result of these findings the firms IT department investigated the potential to virtualise the datacentre rather than replacing the aging fleet of servers. This provided the firm with the opportunity to consolidate 27 physical servers to 3 physical (host) servers.
Russell Kennedy decided upon VM Ware as the platform for virtualisation after considering all the available technologies. The project was run by the firms IT department in conjunction with Thomas Duryea Consulting.

Virtualisation Challenges

The major challenge faced by the firm during the process of virtualising the datacentre was minimising the disruption to normal business activity whilst undertaking such a major back end change.

This was achieved by a mixture of out of hour’s outages and rebuilding existing servers in the new environment then performing a cut over to the new system from the existing systems. By taking this approach the IT department was able to virtualise all major systems (PMS, Email) with no downtime or data loss.

Virtualisation Benefits

Russell Kennedy was able to see tangible benefits from the virtualisation of the datacentre almost immediately. The most obvious benefits were seen in two areas, the maintenance/deployment of new servers and the reduction in power consumption.

Prior to this project when a new server needed to be deployed it involved the purchase of the hardware, configuration of the hardware for the purpose and the installation of the software (operating systems and application). Typically this process could take up to 3 weeks from the order date to the server being ready for testing.


It now takes between 30mins and 1 hour to deploy a new server with all software to the test environment. This has resulted in a significant saving in man hours and also the reduced carbon footprint from the hardware procurement process.

Maintenance downtime has also been reduced as systems are more resilient and can be moved between host servers to allow patching (software updates) to occur without an outage being called.

The largest gain so far from this project has been to the firm’s energy consumption, there has been a 44,000 KWh reduction in only 7 months after the virtualisation of half the physical servers. Once all the physical servers have been virtualised the firm will have no trouble meeting with the projects expected 149,000 KWh (107 tonnes CO2) saving per annum.

This reduction in energy use has been derived not only from reducing the physical power consumption of the servers but also the reduced heat signature of the datacentre that in turn reduces the cooling requirements.

Another major benefit to be derived from virtualisation is the reduction in datacentre size, whilst this may not be applicable for an existing datacentre it should be considered when relocating or building new datacentres.

As the physical size requirements are much lower with a virtual environment, it will allow an organisation to build smaller more energy efficient datacentres and free up space to be utilised for other purposes.

More Information

Dinesh Rajalingam IT Manager Russell Kennedy drajalingam@rk.com.au Thomas Duryea Consulting www.thomasduryea.com.au VM Ware www.vmware.com

Procurement Guide: Records Management

Download as PDF

Issues

• Despite the various systems and technologies available, the legal sector is still a heavy consumer of paper. It is clear that we are still being challenged by achieving a 'paperless office'.
• Poor records management also means poor risk management.
• Generally inefficient record managing practices come from a bad culture or lack of policy adherence - or both.
  

Considerations

Identify Requirement

• Undertake a full review of how your office manages its records.
  
• Are you using electronic file management systems and smart technology to minimise paper consumption?
• Are your RM processes centralised or spread out amongst different parts of your firm?
• Is there full control and tracking of a file from its creation to destruction?
• Do you have a standard filing system in place or are there various methods used throughout your firm locally and / or nationally?
• Are there clear policies in place to manage your records effectively and if so are they being adhered to?
  

Plan

• Changing an inefficient RM culture can be very challenging but it is not impossible. It may end up being a slow process but the change will benefit your Partners and staff, your clients, it will improve your risk management processes, improve utilisation of your office space and will ultimately save your firm money and have a positive impact on the environment.
• Seek support from management as their buy-in is critical.
• Be prepared to communicate openly to staff and clearly explain the benefits of the changes and the reasons why they are happening.
  

Select

• File Management process - implement a national standard so that everybody is using the same filing method (eg lateral filing, lever arch etc) and make sure everybody is clear about what can be filed electronically or needs to be printed. Re-use your files where possible which reduces cost and landfill.
• Technology - use your office technology to support your RM policies and processes. Invest in databases to electronically store your correspondence / emails / documents etc and only print off what is needed. Set your printing devices to default to double sided printing and explore a secure or follow-me-print option to reduce unclaimed printing waste.
• Set up your mailroom to scan all incoming mail and send on electronically. Reduce the paperwork trial by making invoices / approvals and office forms (such as timesheets, leave forms etc) electronically available.
• Review all hard copy publications, magazines, reference materials that individuals receive and see if (a) these are still needed and (b) if so arrange for them to be received electronically if possible. You will find that many staff don’t even read the hard copy publications that they currently receive.
• Look at other alternatives to reduce the need for hard copy files being produced. For example, iPads and other similar devices can be uploaded with files and presentations and taken to client offices instead of hard copy files. Provide reports, training and firm materials to clients electronically or on a USB.
• Off-site storage - be smart with the file retrieval management of your off-site storage. The more regularly files are retrieved the more retrieval fees you will pay and the more emissions are produced by courier vans.
• Office storage space - minimise how much physical shelving space staff have individually or in team environments. Force staff to think about what they really need to print out and encourage electronic filing instead.
  

Manage

• Promote the good work that is achieved within your firm by individuals and teams, show others that being more efficient with managing their records is achievable.
• Calculate the paper used per person each year within your firm and stack this up in reams to show each person their true impact. Once improvements are made in managing your records then this will show with reduced paper usage. Communicate the changes and demonstrate to staff the reduced reams per person and highlight the environmental benefits achieved.
• There are true financial savings to be made in improving the management of your records in areas such as reduced paper and printing costs, time efficiencies, reduced amount of paper records being created if stored electronically, reduced storage needs within your office and also less to store (and later destroy) in your off-site storage facility and standardising your filing system will give you procurement cost efficiencies. Track and report on these savings to management.
• Remember that a 'paperless office' is not a 'paper free office' - be realistic with your expectations.
  

Prepared by  Jason Molin Operations Manager Clayton Utz