Concerns about global warming have become part of corporate thinking, with more and more companies making an effort to encourage their staff to think green.

Many companies now have a formal paper recycling initiative, while others have adopted green projects in the form of vegetable gardens or clean-up campaigns.

But we need to go beyond separating paper from plastic and tin: both as individuals and as companies, we need to change the way we work.

The UCT Graduate School of Business has taken a step in this direction by launching a new course in sustainable investment for asset managers.

Stephanie Giamporcaro, a research fellow based at UCT's environmental policy research unit and the programme director of a short course in sustainable investment for asset managers , has researched environmental issues as they relate to corporates.

Her investigations showed that South African asset management companies have not taken environmental issues into account when making investment decisions.

The course is just the first step in making investors and asset managers more aware that business is often the enemy of the environment.

Giamporcaro says: "Some respondents emphasised that there is still too strong a belief that investors will lose their beneficiaries' money if they make social and environmental concerns a focus of their investment choices."

Of the 22 investment organisations surveyed, only half had some awareness, understanding and action around climate change, while a mere 53% believed the inclusion of environmental concerns was a step to be taken in the future beyond the existing focus of corporate governance.

However, companies will need to start paying more attention to how they affect the environment as corporate governance rules become clearer and tougher.

Giamporcaro says: "The King III report incorporates important aspects of governance relating to the environment and South Africa will see legislation here in the next few years - all South African businesses will come under increasing pressure to treat sustainability as a business imperative."

The investment sector needs the skills to adequately deal with this emerging shift and to ensure that they can achieve financial performance in a sustainable way."

And it's not only asset managers who need to become more environmentally aware. Tracey Czakan, marketing director at personnel provider Kelly Group, says that most professions will need to add a green dimension to their existing job description.

She says: "It could well become a requirement for accountants to manage corporate carbon emission offsets and for IT technicians to manage data centres in the most efficient way possible."

Yashivan Govender, the director of operations at youth consultancy FirstStep.me, says companies and individuals need to change their approach to tackling environmental issues.

He says business principles need to be applied to the environment to ensure that the process is a success.

If green concerns are seen as another project to be handled rather than a problem to be sorted out in isolation, the projects would be more successful.

He says more information about the environment is needed so that businesses can make better decisions and have more to draw on when setting up projects.

Greg Walton, the CEO of The Green Shop, which sells eco-friendly items, believes that the green revolution will take off only when environmental issues are seen as mainstream concerns rather than a radical view.

"The careers to consider are those where people, who regard themselves as non-hippie or non-greenie types, have found products or services that are interesting to them in a 'normal' way."