Sustainability Should Be A Cooperative Effort Between TSPs and Customers: Gartner

Almost all organizations are increasing investments in sustainability initiatives so technology and service providers must develop and deliver solutions, services and IT/digital infrastructure that enable their organizations to meet sustainability goals.

Investments in sustainability are on the rise

Organizations are increasingly investing in sustainability to achieve practical outcomes meant to be explicit and measurable, but often less tangible than other types of business outcomes.

According to Gartner survey data, by 2025, top benefits from sustainability programs will include increased company brand/reputation, improved resource efficiency, innovation and new products, higher customer satisfaction/engagement and better risk management/mitigation.

Sustainability priorities for technology product managers

You play a key role in enabling sustainability outcomes by developing and delivering products and services that help your organization achieve its desired sustainability outcomes. Also, ensuring that customers consume and operate product and service offerings using sustainability best practices is a technology product manager’s key responsibility.

Some technology providers have been criticized for sourcing technologies from suppliers that do not meet sustainability standards across environmental, social and economic dimensions. When products or services cannot be produced sustainably, other mitigation strategies can help, such as supporting initiatives to offset the impact of production like carbon offsetting.

To ensure your organization meets sustainability goals:

• Demonstrate a commitment to sustainability principles in your product and service offerings by publicizing goals and progress against metrics.
• Account for sustainable practices in the delivery of products and services by demonstrating adherence to standards through the supply chain associated with product and service offerings.
• Capitalize on increasing investments in sustainability by prioritizing and highlighting benefits of specific product and service offerings.
• Make the sustainability value proposition explicit by documenting and demonstrating economic, environmental and social benefits of the product and service offerings.
• Highlight sustainability benefits in marketing campaigns to help customers recognize the specific outcomes they can expect from their providers.
• Enforce sustainability standards through all suppliers associated with your product or service offerings.
• Deliver a value proposition that customers can use to communicate the benefits of the product or service to meet their needs and requirements.
• Provide product or service documentation highlighting sustainability benefits with pertinent metrics.

(The author is Mr. Ed Anderson, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner and the views expressed in this article are his own)