首席信息官（CIO）有责任也有能力成为企业ESG战略中的关键角色

译者注：ESG是英文Environmental（环境）、Social（社会）和Governance（公司治理）的缩写，是一种关注企业环境、社会、治理绩效而非财务绩效的投资理念和企业评价标准。基于ESG评价，投资者可以通过观测企业ESG绩效、评估其投资行为和企业（投资对象）在促进经济可持续发展、履行社会责任等方面的贡献。

对环境、社会和治理(ESG)举措的承诺是当今组织的赌注。无论是承诺实现碳中和，重新评估供应商的可持续性要求，还是制定多样性、公平性和包容性(DEI)倡议以及其他活动，遵守这些承诺都会对企业的未来产生真正的影响。普华永道消费者情报系列2021年的一项研究发现，超过四分之三的消费者和员工更有可能从支持ESG问题的公司购买和/或为其工作，76%的消费者会与那些对待员工、社区和环境不好的公司断绝关系。

提供透明的、数据驱动的见解和衡量ESG承诺进展的能力，使技术领导者成为任何ESG战略成功的关键。首席信息官们有越来越多的机会为他们的组织定下基调，并在定义企业范围内的ESG战略以及将可持续性纳入自己的数字化转型计划方面发挥重要作用。然而，考虑到这些举措的广度，许多领导者往往不知道从哪里开始。

第一步：确定IT可以通过数字化转型实现的企业ESG目标

在评估你的数字化转型计划如何推动ESG成果之前，首先确定和理解企业层面的主要ESG目标是很重要的。一些组织已经建立了这些目标并将其传达给利益相关者，而另一些组织的目标充其量只是松散地定义。在理解当前状态之后，考虑技术功能可以驱动哪些目标。

常见的技术主导ESG目标包括:

（一）环境：结合物联网、远程监控、人工智能和机器学习来降低排放

（二）社会：通过建立人才和供应商多元化计划和投资促进健康和福祉的解决方案来支持DEI

（三）治理：加强数据安全性，维护法规遵从性，并标准化整个组织的ESG报告

第二步：将ESG融入你的数字化战略

在了解了企业ESG目标和技术可以发挥作用的想法之后，现在是时候将这些目标与组织的数字路线图相一致了。这样做可以确保组织在推动ESG计划的同时，从其转型计划中推动所需的敏捷性。我们的客户通常关注四个重点领域：

（一）数字化的运营、体验和产品

数字化运营、体验和产品不仅可以节省时间和金钱，还可以通过打破竖井和使关键数据更容易获得来加快洞察速度。作为数字化过程的一部分，技术组织可以测量和跟踪ESG指标，如能源消耗、温室气体排放和用水量。

例如，石油和天然气行业的一家客户最近为他们的美国生产资产配备了传感器，以生成数字化的甲烷检测数据并指示甲烷泄漏，使他们能够改进现场安全措施并降低排放。在ESG计划中，IT领导者可以找到有选择性地部署物联网设备等数字技术的领域，以实现高效、自动化的数据收集和标准报告。

（二）通过集成数据和分析实现更智能的运营

从大量可访问数据中产生的见解可以成为AI/ML等高级分析的基础，而AI/ML又可以生成数据驱动的预测和建议，并随着数据量的扩大而改进。分析对于组织来说特别有用，因为他们希望与具有可持续发展意识的供应商合作并优化供应链。预测潜在制造缺陷或即将到来的供应问题的能力将帮助技术领导者更主动地满足对环境影响、安全工作条件和产品质量的要求。

（三）创建专门的数据隐私和安全团队

执行一个成功的数字战略需要有正确的人与正确的技能跨总线和职能一起工作。将资源组织到跨职能的、面向产品的团队中，可以培养响应不断变化的客户需求所需的敏捷性，同时通过加速反馈循环和增强来快速交付价值。

产品团队可以进一步治理计划，特别是那些满足客户对数据隐私和安全的更高期望的计划。在您的运营模型中建立一个资源团队，致力于改善员工和客户数据的访问、存储和处理方式，这将使您的组织获得客户的信任，并增加他们对您维护其隐私和保护其个人数据的能力的信心。

（四）云迁移和企业架构

随着企业重新审视企业架构，将其作为数字化转型目标的一部分，将内部工作负载转移到云端可以提高速度和敏捷性，同时有助于实现ESG目标。

通过优化使用更少、利用率更高的数据服务器，公共云数据中心使用的能源明显低于私有数据中心，使得迁移到云是一个更加环保的选择。根据451 Research进行的建模，“将应用程序从内部企业基础设施转移到云服务可能会减少多达70-80%的IT能源足迹。”

第三步：为战略ESG计划建立业务案例

在确定数字战略举措如何最好地支持组织的ESG目标之后，在整个组织范围内推广你的想法和建议，并开始获得同事的支持。很重要的一点是，这些想法中的许多不能仅靠数字技术和It实现。主动与其他职能部门讨论ESG机会，可以更好地了解哪些举措可能是最可行的。

一旦你用ESG目标分析了你的数字化转型战略，并与必要的合作伙伴和利益相关者达成一致，就可以考虑在向企业交付的价值和实施的努力水平之间进行权衡，以确定优先考虑哪些计划。为那些最高优先级的计划建立一个商业案例，并开始为更大的ESG战略奠定数字基础。

与数字化转型一样，ESG计划影响组织的所有部分，并需要跨职能结缔组织来执行。CIO跨业务部门和职能的职权范围使他们能够召集企业领导层来概念化、协调和加速ESG议程。抓住这个机会，巩固你在一个日益重要的战略话题中的作用。

原文：

This article was co-authored by Katherine Kennedy, an Associate at Metis Strategy

Commitments to environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives are table stakes for organizations today. Whether pledging to go carbon neutral, reevaluating supplier sustainability requirements, or enacting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, among other undertakings, following through on these promises can have real impact on a business’ future.  A 2021 study by PwC’s Consumer Intelligence Series found that more than three-quarters of consumers and employees are more likely to buy from and/or work for a company that stands up for ESG issues, and 76% of consumers would discontinue relations with companies that treat employees, communities, and the environment poorly.

The ability to provide transparent, data-driven insights and measure progress toward ESG commitments makes the technology leader critical to the success of any ESG strategy. CIOs have a growing opportunity to set the tone for their organizations and play a fundamental part in defining ESG strategy enterprise-wide and adopting sustainability into their own digital transformation initiatives. Given the breadth of these initiatives, however, many leaders often don’t know where to start. The recommendations below can serve as useful first steps.

Step 1: Identify enterprise ESG goals that IT can deliver through digital transformation

Before evaluating how your digital transformation initiatives can drive ESG outcomes. It is important to first identify and understand the primary ESG goals at the enterprise level. Some organizations have established and communicated these goals to stakeholders, while others have goals that are loosely defined at best. After understanding the current state, think about which goals the technology function can drive. Common technology-led ESG goals include:

• Environmental: Lowering emissions using a combination of IoT, remote monitoring, and artificial intelligence and machine learning
• Social: Supporting DEI by establishing talent and supplier diversity programs and investing in solutions that promote health and well being
• Governance: Bolstering data security, maintaining regulatory compliance, and standardizing ESG reporting across the organization

Step 2: Weave ESG into the fabric of your digital strategy

With an understanding of enterprise ESG goals and ideas about where technology can play a role. It’s now time to align those goals with the organization’s digital roadmap. Doing so can ensure that the organization is driving the desired agility from its transformation program while simultaneously propelling ESG initiatives. Our clients typically look across four focus areas:

Digitized operations, experiences, and products

Digitizing operations, experiences, and products will not only save time and money. But also increase speed to insight by breaking down silos and making critical data more accessible. As part of the digitization process, technology organizations can enable the measuring and tracking of ESG metrics. Such as energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, and water usage.

For example, a client in the oil and gas sector recently equipped their U.S. production assets with sensors to generate digitized methane detection data and indicate methane leaks, allowing them to improve safety measures onsite and lower emissions.  Across ESG initiatives, IT leaders can find areas to selectively deploy digital technologies like IoT devices to enable efficient, automated data collection and standard reporting.

Smarter operations through integrated data and analytics

The insights generated from the abundance of accessible data can become the foundation for advanced analytics like AI/ML, which in turn can generate data-driven predictions and recommendations that improve as the data volume expands.  Analytics can be particularly useful to organizations as they look to partner with sustainability-minded suppliers and optimize supply chains. The ability to predict potential manufacturing flaws or upcoming supply issues will help technology leaders to more proactively fulfill requirements on environmental impact, safe working conditions, and product quality.

Create dedicated data privacy and security teams

Executing a successful digital strategy requires having the right people with the right skills working together across BUs and functions. Organizing resources into cross-functional, product-oriented teams can foster the agility needed to respond to changing customer needs while delivering value quickly by accelerating feedback loops and enhancements.

Product teams can further governance initiatives, particularly those that address heightened customer expectations for data privacy and security. Building a team of resources within your operating model dedicated to improving how employee and customer data is accessed, stored, and handled will credential your organization with your customers and increase their confidence in your ability to maintain their privacy and safeguard their personal data.

Cloud migration and enterprise architecture

As organizations revisit enterprise architecture as part of their digital transformation objectives, moving on-premise workloads to the cloud can boost speed and agility while simultaneously helping to achieve ESG goals.

By optimizing the use of fewer, highly utilized data servers, public cloud data centers use significantly less energy than private data centers, making migration to the cloud a much more environmentally friendly option. According to modeling performed by 451 Research, “moving applications from on-premise enterprise infrastructure to cloud services can potentially reduce the IT energy footprint by as much as 70-80%.”

Step 3: Get buy-in and build the business case for strategic ESG initiatives

After determining how digital strategy initiatives best support the organization’s ESG goals, socialize your ideas and recommendations across the organization and begin to generate buy-in from colleagues.  It is important to communicate that many of these ideas cannot be brought to life by digital technologies and IT alone. Proactively discussing ESG opportunities with the other enabling functions can provide better understanding of which initiatives may be the most feasible to implement.

Once you’ve analyzed your digital transformation strategy with your ESG goals in mind and reached alignment with necessary partners and stakeholders, consider the trade-offs between value delivered to the enterprise and level of effort to implement to determine which initiatives to prioritize. Build a business case for those highest priority initiatives and begin to lay the digital foundations for the larger ESG strategy.

Like digital transformation, ESG initiatives impact all parts of the organization and require cross-functional connective tissue to execute. The CIO’s purview across business units and functions uniquely positions them to convene enterprise leadership to conceptualize, coordinate, and accelerate the ESG agenda.  Seize this opportunity to cement your role in a topic of increasing strategic importance.

本文由数字化转型网翻译而成，作者：Michael Bertha，Katherine Kennedy；翻译：数字化转型网郑亚茹；翻译审核：数字化转型网默然。

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