Had enough green?

Yesterday marked the end of another NI week here in Austin. And it ended on the best note I could have hoped for. Gradually everything here at NI has become all about being Green. The past 2 Company meetings have been the same old rhetoric about how we need to be good corporate citizens and do our part for the environment. They have at least 3 jokes about our green pond (there is a small pond in front of our office, that due to the abundance of algae in it, has turned green). Our corporate newsletter is always filled with stories about how you can reduce your carbon footprint singing the praises of recycling. To embrace this on a company level this month we removed all paper and Styrofoam from our cafeteria. Which may sound great to some hippie in Oregon, but it has just turned into a pain in the neck for the rest of us who have to balance plates of food that we carry up to our desk and then have to return back to the cafeteria.
Sick of hearing this broken record I wasn't eager to hear our final keynote speaker who had chosen the topic of "Green Entrepreneurship". But, I found myself thoroughly enjoying it. I didn't even realize why until half way through his speech he said "the only reason they let me come is I said, I would talk about green engineering...and I'll get to that later". He never really did, which is why I loved it. He talked about innovation and not just Green mumble jumble, he talked about getting good ideas out to market. So refreshing to hear a speech where they didn't spend half of it talking about global warming, social responsibility, and other ambiguous problems. And instead talked about what we actually do. Let's just hope the VP's and CEO of NI were talking notes.

Addendum: Apparently, I'm not the only one who is sick of hearing about green.