The Strategic Alliance Team participated in a volunteer event on April 17, 2012 to benefit the Exodus Residence in Mnneapolis, MN, on behalf of Target and the United Way. The team washed walls, floors, stairwells, and tidied up wherever they could reach. Here is a brief description of the Exodus Residence’s mission:

“The Exodus Residence provides safe, low-cost housing to 78 men and 15 women in downtown Minneapolis, most of whom have previously been homeless. Here residents develop skills and work to overcome the barriers that prevent them from obtaining permanent housing.”

Source: saintolaf.org/st-olaf-ministries/exodus-residence/

Thank you to all who participated, and thanks to Joel Bartlett for arranging the event. The event is in support of Target’s United Way campaign.

Target has supported United Way since we opened our first store, T1 in Roseville in 1962.  United Way was a strong partner then and continues to be now. This year we celebrate a 50-year partnership that continues to carry-out our legacy of giving.

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Banks and other businesses in Mexico City are using EPC passive UHF tags to track office furniture, and are testing a system that uses active tags to detect when specific office areas are in use.

It’s often difficult to locate office furniture or ascertain when specific office areas are in use. Steelcase Mexico is now providing its clients with asset management solutions that help them track the locations of their furniture and office equipment.

The passive ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) EPC Gen 2 RFID tags, which are attached to the underside of chairs, make inventory management more efficient. They transmit a unique ID number to a handheld device, or to a fixed reader installed as a portal within the user’s office space.

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The title of Jim Meredith’s interesting article refers to ideas, concepts and technologies that are prematurely aborted, but might have real value in other contexts, times, combinations or applications if the right work opportunities presented them.

Meredith is concerned that if more people in the company were not made aware of these ghost innovations and technologies, the potential of their eventual application and productivity would be negated simply through an inability to efficiently and effectively communicate, and then connect the dots. He talks about how most organizations have employees with valuable skills and capabilities but are overlooked as these workers are pigeonholed in their usual day-to-day jobs. This can seriously hinder the growth of the company.

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An interview with Kevin Rose, Operations Manager, A&M Business Interiors, our service partner. A&M is an operating company of Omni Workspace.

What materials do you recycle?
We recycle pretty much anything that comes in our door—from metals to plastics to wood, electronics, appliances, batteries and lights.

What kind of quantities?
The majority of what we recycle is steel. Being in the furniture industry and supporting a Steelcase dealership, we come across large quantities of retired assets that are primarily steel. *In 2011, we loaded 72 trailers with over 1.5 million pounds of steel out of our Minneapolis warehouse alone.

How long has your recycling program been going on?
We have been recycling in small amounts for over 20 years, but in the last 5 to 7 years we have made recycling a strategic initiative in our overall business plan.

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