Putting a Spotlight on Sustainability in IT & Change at SmartestEnergy

Our VP IT & Change, Claire Talbot, recaps on her department’s efforts to cast aside project work and business as usual operations for the day, to focus on sustainability and Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) topics. Her team galvanized internal and external speakers for a day dedicated to driving awareness and engagement in SmartestEnergy’s wider business purpose ‘to empower, educate and enable everyone to make better, greener energy choices and transition to net zero’.  

Annually as a department, we host an away day and come together as a team to cover pertinent topics, share learnings and network internally. In the past we’ve covered a range of topics, from strategy to AI, but this year we turned our attention to sustainability. It’s a key topic for our business with our purpose in mind, but also relevant to our role in the energy industry as we strive to lead the way to a 100% renewable energy system that delivers a better future for all.  

Our aim was to raise awareness and drive engagement in sustainability, which is one of our global ambitions for the business. We wanted to build a common level of understanding and show the relevance of sustainability within IT & Change. Our Global Head of ESG Sustainability, Kim Taylor, kicked off the day defining and explaining ESG Sustainability, highlighting the related value creation opportunities for the business. We also had our VP of Sales, James Graham, and our VP Strategy & Business Development, Beth Reid, share their perspectives on customer needs and industry trends; these sessions helped to bring broad-ranging sustainability topics to life for my team and made goals feel relevant and attainable.

Meanwhile, our external speakers helped convey the variety of sustainability efforts underway across the external IT & Change landscape. We heard perspectives from PwC, Salesforce, HP Enterprise and the Green Software Foundation. It was valuable to take the time to look beyond SmartestEnergy’s immediate office environment and direct sphere of influence, to better understand progress being made within our supply chain, which forms part of our wider Scope 3 emissions.

We took the time to consider what personal and team sustainability pledges we can make and group them according to theme. We plan to refer back to and build on these IT & Change pledges to drive action and assess our progress over time.  

It was a real team effort to make this day possible, so I’d like to extend thanks to my direct reports and all the internal and external speakers that collaborated to create such a packed and thought provoking agenda – taking the time to commit and learn from you all has been refreshing and has reinvigorated my team no end around sustainability and our business purpose. 

I’d like to wrap up with some quotes from some of the team to convey the impact this day had for us all:  

“What a great day. Thought provoking, engaging and fun,” - Casper Byrne, Change and Transition Manager 

“As many of us spend quite a bit of time working remotely, getting together in person for something like this was incredibly valuable,” - Rob Pringle, Chief Technology Officer 

“Everyone I spoke to was energised by the company and personal purpose embedded in the theme of the day! We are Smartest when we are together!” - Henrik Magnusson, Head of Architecture