CISCO sustainability strategy ,” she says . “ CIOs and IT leaders have a key role in supporting their Chief Sustainability Officers , environmental leaders , C-suites and other stakeholders . They are in a strategic position to reimagine their networks to provide a robust platform , for both IT and for operations , and to enable technology solutions that can help reduce their energy consumption and costs while transforming crossdepartmental processes to achieve more sustainable outcomes .”
But there is an acknowledgement that technology can be a double-edged sword . For Sielen , this particularly applies to generative AI , due to its immense demand on electricity and water as well as data centre infrastructure . But she believes AI ’ s sustainability benefits have the potential to outweigh negative impact thanks to the critical data insights it provides .
Plenty are established in or beginning to leverage technology to accelerate their sustainability journey , but , for CIOs who may be intimidated by the prospect , Sielen is quick to urge them to get started , sharing how it ’ s paramount to get the ball rolling . Cisco has even written a white paper on the topic .
“ It ’ s important to start and get educated ,” she declares . “ What are the sustainability goals or commitments of your organisation ? What are the timelines ? You then need to familiarise yourself with rapidly developing stakeholder demands and the regulatory landscape .”
From there she encourages exploring public funding opportunities and learning from peers with more mature sustainability strategies . It is then important to enable visibility as well as aligning and collaborating with internal stakeholders to develop an integrated sustainability roadmap for the organisation .
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