What stage are you at in your sustainability journey ?
Jennifer Motles The complexity for PMI is that we ’ re simultaneously managing the impact of two value chains – we ’ re trying to minimise the impact that the cigarette business that we ’ re leaving behind creates on society , but we ’ re also proactively starting to think about what the new business looks like .
We ’ ve talked a lot about how to embed sustainability into strategy . There ’ s also something to say about the external environment because businesses don ’ t operate in a vacuum . PMI is a company that has 70,000 employees present in more than 160 countries . The realities in those countries are obviously different .
These are complex issues because they ’ re systemic – like women in leadership . There ’ s a lot that we can do , but there ’ s also a lot of hurdles and constraints in terms of how .
This is also connected to climate change . If you want to transition into renewable energy – away from fossil fuels or from smoking or from leadership that looks very homogeneous – you need different parts of society to play their part , whether different regulations , civil societies raising awareness , consumer engagement . That doesn ’ t happen overnight , it takes time to turn a moving ship . It ’ s about perseverance .
Christina Shim I think we ’ re also actually on a pivot point . IBM used to be a manufacturing company , but we set up our first environmental policy in 1971 . That was a long time ago , so there ’ s a really strong legacy that the company has built on around manufacturing and sustainability . We are no longer a manufacturing company . Our current CEO , who came in about five years ago , has completely pivoted our strategy around hybrid cloud and AI .
AI in sustainability is seen as a hot topic . That ’ s where a lot of my focus is with my team – how do we think about AI to support sustainability use cases , energy efficiency , data centres , buildings , climate risk mitigation , adaptation . And how do you also increase the sustainability of AI ? We ’ re working with our R & D teams and others to make sure we ’ re focussed on building chips that are more energy efficient and creating smaller AI models that are then more energy efficient and cost effective for our partners and for ourselves . The journey continues because the world evolves and our companies are evolving . It ’ s the only way that we ’ re continuing to make sure that we ’ re staying relevant and innovative .
We are on a journey . We ’ re at this intersection of the past and the future and we ’ re trying to make sure that we are across both .
110 January 2025