{"id":38945,"date":"2020-05-21T15:23:49","date_gmt":"2020-05-21T14:23:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/?p=38945"},"modified":"2020-05-28T08:12:58","modified_gmt":"2020-05-28T07:12:58","slug":"how-going-digital-is-the-first-step-to-sustainability","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/2020\/05\/21\/how-going-digital-is-the-first-step-to-sustainability\/","title":{"rendered":"How going digital is the first step to sustainability"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Sustainability is key for organisations that want to stay competitive. A balanced, holistic approach is best, and that starts by going digital. Gabrielle Gin\u00e9r, Head of Environmental Sustainability for BT, shares her thoughts.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Going digital isn\u2019t just about making our working lives easier and more flexible. ICT solutions have the potential to help lower global CO2 <\/sup>emissions by 20% by 2030.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are many ways that digital technology can promote sustainable ways of working. Going digital means that there\u2019s less need to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. Travel. People can work together effectively even though they\u2019re not in the same place.<\/li>
  2. Have lots of equipment. Not necessary once a business has moved to the cloud.<\/li>
  3. Use energy keeping on-premise hardware online. Organisations simply won\u2019t need it anymore.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    We\u2019re already seeing some of the environmental benefits of digital working. Our products and services helped customers avoid 11.7 million tonnes of carbon last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    If you haven\u2019t made the move to digital yet, now\u2019s the time. With the right solutions, it\u2019s possible to find a balance between sustainability, security and efficiency that works for your organisation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    A balanced, tailored approach to sustainability<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    There\u2019s evidence to support a balanced approach to digital working, with some roles remaining face-to-face, for example in hospitality, and others \u2018going digital\u2019. Before Coronavirus, the move to digital working was typically a slow one. The key to success was deciding how digital working could add value and where there was still a need for a human touch. Under the current lockdown, many of us have quickly moved to a digital work environment but once things return to normal, the right digital working balance will be found by organisations using digital technology more flexibly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Develop the leading edge: technology, employees, customers and partners<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Sustainability isn\u2019t just about using laptops to work from home. It\u2019s also about looking at a business\u2019 entire operation to find out where they can introduce more sustainable ways of working. Below I\u2019ve outlined four aspects that should be at the top of the business\u2019 list of considerations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    #1 Technology<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Companies with a competitive technological edge are likely to do better than their peers but equally, sustainability is an important market differentiator<\/a>. In fact, it\u2019s becoming so integral to business that investors see a lack of interest in sustainability as a risk to their investment. So, by combining a leading technology platform with sustainable ways of working<\/a>, organisations can lead the way in their market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    #2 Employees<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Employees are another key consideration. In order to reach the carbon reduction targets of the region, companies need to recruit talented people who understand the importance of sustainability. The more sustainable an organisation tries to be, the more likely they are to recruit people who will help them to achieve this goal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    #3 Customers<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Like employees, customer focus is also increasingly shifting to sustainability. We work with Unilever and they have recognised the importance of having all their products related to a sustainability goal, whether ethical, societal or environmental.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    #4 Partners<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Strides toward sustainability shouldn\u2019t be made in isolation. It\u2019s important for an organisation to recognise their purchasing power and to work with others to ensure their supply chain is striving for sustainability. At BT we have 16,000 suppliers. We are starting to ask key suppliers to reduce their carbon emissions over the life of their contract with us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Sustainability is key for organisations that want to stay competitive. A balanced, holistic approach is best, and that starts by going digital. Gabrielle Gin\u00e9r, Head of Environmental Sustainability for BT, shares her thoughts. Going digital isn\u2019t just about making our working lives easier and more flexible. ICT solutions have the potential to help lower global […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":39023,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,6083,14,248],"tags":[1098,14757,14758,14317,14759,226],"class_list":["post-38945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-green","category-intelligent-technology","category-more-news","category-telecom","tag-bt","tag-carbon-2","tag-co2","tag-coronavirus","tag-gabrielle-giner","tag-sustainability"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38945","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38945"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38945\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38952,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38945\/revisions\/38952"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}