Revisiting Green IT

It’s more than 20 years now from the first collective industry recognition (Energy Star ratings) and the desire to do something about reducing power consumption by IT equipment. The cycles of heightened awareness and hype coincide with economic cycles or at times a paradigm change brought about by new technology or use of existing technology like virtualization or cloud computing. So when one of the organizers asked me to talk about Green IT, I was perplexed on the unexpected resurgence; or was it a red herring or just a slot filler ?

Researching the market beyond personal experience to understand the current traction and prominence of Green IT, I started talking to CIOs to understand their journey or milestones on the subject; I was hoping to use some of the insights in my presentation to an audience of CIOs. Thus over the next few weeks the data points that I gathered did not focus on public or private clouds, but to understand if Green was still a discussion in different industries and industry leaders or has Green fatigue set in ?

Less than a decade ago carbon credits were a boardroom discussion and some people made a lot of money trading them; then they just vanished. Data Centers started touting Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) or Data Center Infrastructure Efficiency to demonstrate how Green they were. Overhead non-compute power usage for cooling and other uses ranged from typical 80% to highly efficient 10%. Power used by servers and computers for the same task has been reducing almost linearly over time challenging PUE.

CIOs finished fixing the data center quite early and also created efficiency for end compute devices with power management policies and improved awareness. From there on they focused energies on office infrastructure, ambient lighting and temperatures, electronic documentation, communication and as a result saved trees. A few also took control of energy usage monitoring with embedded and targeted sensors linked to BMS (Building Management Systems) and reduced power consumption in good measure.

The question is, with so much getting done and almost every enterprise reaping the benefits over the last decade, is Green still a relevant discussion ? Who if anyone is tasked with overall enterprise Green initiatives ? Is it only about controlling power used or creating a movement to conserve natural resources ? Is Green an integral part of decision making explicitly mentioned in evaluation parameters or implicitly used in every decision making ? Have people stopped flying around for meetings and embraced Video Conferencing ? The answer is Yes and No.

I don’t believe that CIOs are measuring and reporting metrics around Green. None of the CIOs I met did, but there is a discussion around power efficiency and overall cost of running BAU or keeping the lights on. CXOs are not enamored by earlier conventional solutions which are now basic hygiene as are new LEED certified buildings. Reality is that for technology and compute power, the bar keeps shifting every 4-5 years; what was green in 2000 or for that matter even 5 years back appears archaic when compared to currently available hardware.

At the conference the audience engaged in a discussion and debate on the relevance, challenges and opportunities; one of the participants sought suggestions to break the cultural vice around personal printers which gave his global centurion company a person to printer ratio of close to one. Someone shared extreme automation to switch off lights and air-conditioners when there was no movement resulting in hilarious and occasionally dark and sweaty situations while people were in the room working !

Green is here to stay and awareness of the new generation brings new opportunities. For CIOs it is important to seek avenues beyond the conventional interventions of the past. Cloud computing is shrinking the data center and mobility is driving the workforce out of offices. Power generation is focusing on renewable energy sources which reduce the global carbon footprint. Some of the power hungry enterprises are going to embrace these as the world works towards creating a better tomorrow.

The role you play in this evolution is up to you !

Customer Advisory Boards

“You can't just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they'll want something new.” So said the most iconic leader in the IT industry and stuck to this philosophy as his company built some of the most vied for products; the success that followed remains unparalleled though the bull run has slowed down a bit. Everyone wondered exasperatedly on how they can replicate this model as it is contrary to conventional wisdom and what they were taught in B-school.

Until not too long ago the software industry churned out products with features and functionality based on internal discussions on what the customer may need or in some cases based on what their initial customers asked for. With generic solutions not fulfilling the expanding needs, over time they started hiring industry domain experts to create vertically aligned solutions. This did address the gap partly for a while and then customers started demanding better aligned solutions for their specific problems and opportunities.

Some companies recognized the need early and started creating Customer Advisory Boards (CAB) with CIOs of their large customers to participate in the product roadmap. This was extended to include some of the innovative adopters of their solutions though they may not have been high revenue customers but brought value to the discussion. The ensuing engagement, discussion and debate influenced the prioritization of new features and in some cases the positioning of their solutions resulting in a win-win situation.

Some of the services vendors took the cue and hired from the industry to strengthen their industry practices; consulting companies followed suite thereby changing the discussion with their customers. They determined that the need was to embed the resources internally and not limit to an advisory role. Now the software industry is going through a transition with even mid-sized companies thinking of CAB to gain the benefit of customer connect and better alignment of their product features and evolution to what the industry wants.

Interestingly hardware manufacturers have remained disconnected; they continue to launch products with the philosophy of the icon attributed with the famous quote. Past practice of customer focus groups has largely been discarded by marketing teams. Faster processors, bigger, brighter and higher resolution screens; consumers love it and they do more of the same. Then they have attempted to push the same products to enterprise customers and wondered why it is not gaining traction the way consumers are lapping them up.

CIOs are not excited; what else do you want has been the lament ? Over the years the clear message from many CIOs to the IT industry enamored by all things mobile (phones, tablets, and applications) has been that the faster, better, cheaper does not connect with enterprise use cases. Enterprises need manageability, serviceability backed by service levels, and reasonable (measured in years not months) longevity. Consumer devices require additional investments to make them work in our environments.

Consumer applications and games are great; couple of apps on the app store for some customers or pilots on industry specific use cases does not make you an enterprise ready development partner. We don’t want to explain everything from the basics to your team; how are you going to fill in the gap between what we say and what your team understands. Do some homework and more than anything else listen before you start crafting solutions; you have an advantage over your big competitors, use it well.

The question is then, is CAB the way to go for companies who want better traction of their solutions or services in the enterprise space ? It is a model that may work for the larger IT companies; how does a smaller outfit get the benefit of the experience ? In “Scaling Startups” I had referred to a mentoring model and role that CIOs can play; maybe it is time for IT companies to embrace CIOs to help them forge ahead. What is important is the change in mindset and philosophy with internal agreement on the new way of working. I hope IT companies understand this sooner than later.

As a CIO, are you up to the game ?