Events round-up

 

Sustainability path delivers success

 

Sustainability was the hot topic under review at an analyst discussion lunch on January 28th at the BT Tower.

 

The event was hosted by Julie Woods-Moss, president of strategy, marketing and propositions for BT Global Services, with contributions from BT experts and a range of industry analyst attendees.

 

The underlying premise was that it was important to increase the focus on sustainability during a recession, not sideline it.

 

Jack Hidary, business entrepreneur and member of BT Global Services strategy and marketing advisory board (MAB), opened the discussion by outlining a challenge: How can technology companies such as BT be a transformational agent of change for the marketplace as a whole?

 

This concept was expanded on by José María Figueres, also a member of the BT GS MAB and the chief executive of Concordia 21, the sustainable development organisation.

 

Figueres noted that sustainability covers a multitude of issues and that it provides genuine business and economic opportunities, but that it was critical that it becomes part of the core model of doing business, rather than one aspect of corporate social responsibility.

 

In addition, he said, companies would need to decouple business growth from carbon emissions.

 

A numbers game

 

This point was a key theme of the whole discussion - could sustainability strategies achieve meaningful success until they had relevant economic value, such as in a system of full cost accounting, or if substantial carbon taxes were introduced.

 

However, BT's ability to help organisations cut costs and carbon through services such as video conferencing were referenced as an alternative approach to sustainability that did not require government action.

 

Woods-Moss pointed out that frequent business travel had a significant productivity and health impact on employees. BT Global Services was now holding 75 per cent of its board meetings using TelePresence video conferencing instead.

 

As a market leader in video conferencing services, this was one area where sustainability and business strategies were completely aligned.

 

Chris Tuppen, BT's chief sustainability officer, reminded the audience that all new BT product ideas are assessed against specific sustainability criteria before they move to development.

 

There was also a lively discussion around whether it was the role of government or business to lead on sustainability issues, particularly in light of the new UK legislation - the Carbon Reduction Commitment - due next year.

 

While many felt there were areas of legislation and funding that were lacking, Woods-Moss said she believed that BT was benefitting financially by investing ahead of the market in sustainability based services to reduce the carbon footprint of customers.

 

Dinah McLeod, head of the sustainability practice at BT Global Services, added that when considering product lifecycles, it was important to assess ways to increase customer efficiencies before assessing their need to buy new hardware.

 

Overall, while the discussion was further proof that there are no easy answers to sustainability challenges, it also highlighted the significant range of innovative thought and ideas on the topic, as voiced by the participants. A full opinion piece is being developed following this event.