Green Tech: Practical Strategies for Sustainable Data Management | DataOps Day

Hello, and welcome to DataOps Day. I'm Bonnie Schneider, sustainability contributor for the Techron Group and your moderator for today's panel discussion. Green Tech Practical Strategies for Sustainable Data Management.

Today we aim to delve into the intricacies of sustainable data practices, exploring how organizations can maximize their eco-conscious impact. Through strategic information governance will uncover strategies for integrating sustainability into data management, the role of systems thinking in green data practices, and the transf transformative potential of AI and machine learning in this domain. Now it's time to meet our esteemed panelists.

First we have Greg Rivera, vice President of Product for Cast Highlight. At Cast Greg is the at, at the helm of strategy, focusing on application modernization, open source risk management, and green software initiatives. With over two decades in tech leadership, Greg combines his expertise with a passion for enhancing business through technology.

Welcome, Greg. Thank you. And we have Joanna Klut, c e o of Green, K p i A Systems thinker at heart.

Joanna possesses a unique knack for connecting the dots in sustainable ways. Her commitment to the voice of future generations underscores her approach to problem solving in the realm of sustainability. Welcome, Joanna.

Lovely to be here. Thank you. And Justin Bean, sustainability strategist and bestselling author of what Could Go Right.

Justin's multifaceted experience spends Fortune five hundreds startups and nonprofits always with a focus on achieving triple bottom line results. His insights into sustainability technology has been recognized and sought after by major publications. Justin, welcome.

Thanks for having me, Bonnie. Great. And Simone Ren, director of Business Operations and Environmental Social and Governance Practice at New Relic.

Simone's role at New Relic revolves around implementing systems and building partnerships that pave the way for a more sustainable and livable future. Welcome, Simone. Nice to see y'all.

Great. Well, we've got a fantastic panel here and a really interesting topic. So it's time to dive in.

First I'd like to pose a question to all of the panelists to comment on, and the first question is, how do each of you define sustainable data management and why is it pivotal for the future of business? Um, Simone, we'll start with you. That's great.

Uh, this is a foundational question for question for us at New Relic. Um, you know, making observability ubiquitous is, uh, for engineers is our mission. And so along with that, we've set a really rapid pace of innovation, and it comes with an increase in data and data complexity.

Um, to be more specific, our cloud footprint is the, or our cloud usage is the biggest part of our footprint, uh, as a business. And, um, so as we look ahead to building a resilient business, we know that we must plan for how to be responsible stewards of the data and the energy that that data requires. Um, so sustainable data management is a key piece of how we have to plan not only for the future of the planet, but also for the future of our business.

That's a great point, Simone. And I also wanna encourage everyone that's watching, we are taking live chat questions as well, so please, if you have any questions for our panelists, just go ahead and put them in the, in the chat and I will definitely pose them to the panelists. Next we have Greg with his comments on that question.

Sure. Thanks Bonnie. Uh, so in order for me to answer that question, I, I very quickly need to call, talk about something called software intelligence, which is insight into the inner workings of software and data applications by understanding the source code that developers are writing for these data management systems and applications.

So at my company Cast, we make products that produce software intelligence by automatically reading application code, understanding it, and producing insights on things like the health, the resiliency, the cloud maturity, open source risks, and now more recently green impact. So, so back to your question on sustainable data management. So, um, there's a really interesting organization out there called the Green Software Foundation.

I highly recommend checking them out. And according to them today, data centers that basically run these data management systems account for about four to 5% of global c o two emissions. So just to put that into context, that is about the same as the air rail and shipping industries combined.

So think about that. Data centers that are running data management systems and applications generate the same carbon emissions as airlines, railways, and the shipping industry combined. So it's, it's huge.

And the other interesting thing is about 85% of those emissions coming from the data centers and the software and data management systems running in them is actually attributable to how those systems are designed like the, the software engineering of those systems, not just the hardware or the infrastructure it's running on. So there's a huge opportunity to make data management more sustainable by basically engineering the software applications that they're running inside to be more efficient and use less resources. And in addition for it to just being the right thing to do for the planet, it just so happens that making these software systems greener or more sustainable also typically means they're gonna perform better, cost less to operate and be more resilient.

So there's some great business benefits as well that come along for the ride when making, you know, data management systems more sustainable. So basically, sustainable data management to me is about designing or changing the software applications that manage data to be more efficient, use less power, and ultimately emit less carbon environment. Okay, great.

Uh, Justin? Sure. Uh, I think often when we hear about data and sustainability, we hear about data-driven management, data-driven business, data-driven sustainability, and that's all about using data and analytics to do things more sustainably.

And we've seen that in climate science and smart cities, smart business, all of that. Um, and a lot of the tools that have come out of that data are empowering people to do things more effectively and efficiently. Um, but where does this come from?

Right? This comes from the management of data and we hear less about this, but I think data managers have this really unique and really complex challenge to make data itself more sustainable, like Greg mentioned. And so, you know, traditionally we think about this in terms of, of risk and performance and cost.

And I think integrating the sustainability narrative, the ethical narrative, uh, is really fits very snugly into those, those main categories that we consider. But it's just thinking about it from a new dimension and, and doing that well is what's gonna support a more data-driven and sustainable society and more sustainable businesses moving forward in the future. Okay, great.

And Joanna? Yeah, um, I, I think the, the, my three previous panelists have, have said, uh, pretty much everything I have to say. What I can add is that, um, I see technology as being, um, as being an answer to the, uh, the, the energy side of it.

There are, um, some really good options coming out recently with various materials that are being able to store data. So I think that is the way to get to sustainable data management as well as the way the software is written. So we've got that.

And then to add that, uh, from a sustainability point of view, um, a lot of data is being digitized now and that will just increase the load. So between the fact where the great thing about the, the, the data being digitized, it means that we can then start managing that data in such a way to start seeing those trends heading towards our transition, uh, to sustainability. So, um, so to summarize, it's the technology to get us to a place where we don't have to use so much energy to actually store the data and manage that data, but then using a lot more data that's coming our way to improve sustainability.

That's a great point, and I really appreci all your perspectives. I have individual questions now for each panelist, and once again, I encourage everyone in the chat to please chime in and go ahead and put your question in the chat and we will get that to our panelists. The first one I'd like to pose is to Greg.

Greg, in your role and at cast highlight, how have you observed the integration of sustainability principles into software development? And what impact do you find that it has on businesses? Uh, it's really good question, Bonnie.

So, uh, this is still quite new, uh, some of the things I was talking about. So we just released this capability to analyze software applications and data management systems for green impact earlier this year. However, the initial results we're seeing are quite encouraging, in fact.

So what we're seeing is companies including ourselves, using the intelligence that our technologies produce to change their software applications to be more efficient. So let me give you an overly simplistic example to kind of make this a little bit more tangible. So our technology looks for patterns in application code that are inefficient, but can be implemented in an alternative way.

So, for example, running a SQL query, like a data access query, uh, inside of a loop, meaning that, just to get a little bit technical, meaning that the data access command is running many, many times unnecessarily. We actually see this frequently. However, there's an alternate way to engineer the system so that this query, this data access query occurs outside of the loop and only runs when it's needed, right?

So that's much more efficient. Imagine this type of thing happening in a massive enterprise software application or a big, you know, public commerce system with thousands or even millions of users a day. This one change could have a huge impact on reducing carbon emissions.

And as I mentioned earlier, it's also likely gonna make the system perform better and cost less to operate. So that's just one simple example. There are dozens and dozens of these different types of patterns that, you know, we're looking for in the code of applications to make them more efficient.

So what we're starting to see is organizations integrate this kind of intelligence into their software development processes, looking for opportunities to make their software greener and more efficient. The earliest adopters, I would say, are coming primarily from banking and financial services. It makes sense 'cause those industries have a heavy reliance on software and data, but they're also very focused on financial r o I obviously, and they're seeing benefits there as well.

So in addition to, you know, improving the green impact or they're also seeing those performance and cost benefits as well. So that's kind of what we're seeing out there from that software perspective. Thanks so much, Greg.

Um, Joanna, given your systems thinking approach, what strategies would you recommend for organizations to holistically integrate sustainability into their data management practice? Hmm. Look, first off, I think we need to establish an understanding that where we're thinking about the future here, and we are on the brink of, of the floodgates opening on data, we have a confluence of AI and quantum computing.

We're right on that verge, which will mean a lot more data. But the good thing about that is that we've got a lot more data at our disposal to make decisions to make sustainable decisions. So things around procurement, we can get a lot more information around choices of products to be able to purchase that have reduced biodiversity impact and reduced carbon emissions associated with them.

But the, but the basics stay the same. To understand that trend forward being a positive trend, we need to understand our baselines, but our baseline measurements will also be improved because we will have so much more data to establish those baselines. And then to act in a, to act basically carrying out actions.

And this is what green K p I does. We provide the actions on how to become sustainable, and then we measure the change, and then we automate the reports around that change. So my focus is action.

And so when you have enough data at the fingertips of decision makers to act, then we can then measure that change. There are so many fundamental simple things that people can do. Every time a person is making a decision about what they're going to buy or how they're going to operate, what they already have within their business, they can make sustainable decisions.

That's great. Thank you Joanna and Justin, uh, with your extensive background in climate tech, how do you anticipate AI and machine learning will reshape the sustainability narrative in the tech sector? Sure, thanks, mon.

I think this is a, it's a really fun question. Um, and so due to the availability of all of this data, we've seen a proliferation of all kinds of new ai, especially generative ai. So the way I like to think about that is that, you know, Siri gave us all, uh, a digital assistant and generative ai ga gives everyone a digital intern.

So basically another person on your team that can go out and do the research, synthesize a lot of information, and give it back to you in a way that you can understand it. And so this isn't just for climate scientists, but this is for everyday people. And then now what we're seeing on top of that is that there are so many new tools being built that can extend the capabilities of one person or of a small team of people to do the work of a larger team.

And, you know, so some of the narrative today is around, uh, job losses around that, and that's something serious that we need to consider. But on the other side of that coin is the immense amount of work that we can all do with less resources and the more that we can achieve with smaller groups. So I'll, I'll give you an example, and I think this is really speaks to the democratization of the building of solutions for sustainability.

So, you know, generative AI and, um, OpenAI came out with chat G B T just, you know, last year basically. And there's already over 360 generative AI companies, uh, that CB Insights has, has identified. But 27% of those over a quarter of them have yet to raise any outside equity funding.

So this is crazy for startups because usually startups go straight to VCs, they get funding, they get capital, and then they can build a business. But because of the power of generative ai, these teams of people have built businesses without having to get capital. And I think that's only gonna accelerate.

And so for investors, that's an interesting question of, uh, you know, how you place your betts, there'll be a lot smaller betts and smaller teams, but really I think the narrative is moving towards the democratization of the solutions to sustainability challenges. And we can all get involved as technical and non-technical people can get on board and, and building tools and building solutions that can really help to move the needle. And in addition, that AI can synthesize the information that's out there and help us get closer to the truth, because we know that disinformation is a big issue and really understanding what's actually happening and what the solutions are that can really help is what will help change the narrative for people to feel empowered to go out and, and create solutions instead of getting caught in this mix of, uh, being sort of downtrodden about the, you know, the doom and gloom that we see all around us.

Um, and that doesn't mean that there aren't huge challenges, but we can all do something about it and we can do more about it. Now, thanks to ai. Thanks Justin.

Uh, Simone, from New Relic's perspective, what are the pivotal considerations for businesses when they're striving to align their tech operations with E S G benchmarks? I, I wanna take pieces of what Joanna and Justin said, because I feel like one thing that I talk a lot about when I'm doing things like this is the fact that everybody ha inside of a business and outside, of course, um, has a role to play in decarbonization. Um, but I'll be more specific from new relic's perspective.

So we have set a goal to achieve net zero, uh, greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. And we've underlined, uh, that commitment by, um, setting, uh, attempting to set near term, uh, science-based targets with the science-based target institute. Um, and as a SaaS company, a lot of what that will mean for us is working on our internal operations, um, working on internal efficiencies and working with our cloud vendors, um, to get us to that net zero future.

Uh, so we have four key pillars to our strategy, um, to improve our efficiency, and this would be similar for many businesses, I think. Um, but we're engaging with our vendors on their climate goals. So like I said before, um, our cloud emissions or our cloud usage is the biggest part of our emissions footprint.

And apart from that, our scope three emissions, so the emissions of our vendors, um, are the biggest piece of our emissions pie. So we have to work with our vendors, um, and we have to understand their climate plans, um, and the role they play in our emissions in order to reduce our emissions down the line. Um, Joanna was saying, you gotta have, you gotta have that data in order to do that work.

Um, and we have to get better and better at tracking all of the data around our emissions, um, so that we know when we pull a lever, whether it's having the intended, uh, impact. Um, and then like the other panelists were saying, also getting our business to a place and getting the data to a place where we can provide information to the stakeholders across the business so that they are building climate considerations into their everyday decision making. It can't just be these sweeping, you know, policy changes that we make, but it's also gotta be just embedded in everybody's decision making, um, as, as we move forward.

That's great. Thank you so much for that. I, I appreciate all of your individual perspectives on those questions.

Now I have more panel wide questions for everyone to chime in on. So the first one is, in your experience, what are the common pitfalls businesses should avoid when embarking on their green data journey? And I'd like to start with Joanna this time Focusing on emissions.

Uh, the problem emissions is, is a symptom of a wider problem. Uh, the, the way I describe it to people is that imagine that you've got a deep cut in your arm and you are bleeding to death. Are you going to measure how fast you are bleeding when you're going to cover the cut and stop the bleeding?

What we need to be doing is acting to stop the bleeding. Unfortunately, a lot of resource and time is going into just measuring emissions, not acting to change the level of emissions. And emissions is a, is a, a symptom of unsustainability and emissions isn't the big problem around sustainability.

Sustainability is also around social equity. It's about biodiversity loss and of course emissions, uh, and, and many other areas as well. But I think emissions has stolen the show and a lot of businesses are just hearing about emissions and you're falling into the trap of let's just measure our emissions, tick that box, we are done.

So I often speak to businesses about looking at the larger picture. And so when you carry out actions around energy, water, waste materials and other items, you are cutting your emissions. So act first, have the focus on acting.

The measurement shows the change that you've been able to achieve and be able to report on what you did and what you achieved, the actions you completed, and the metrics that you've been able to show a reduction in resource use, you reduce your resource use, you reduce your emissions. Great. So just trying to keep it really simple.

Yeah, no, that is, uh, excellent advice. Uh, simple is always better. Alright, Justin?

Sure. I I think in a similar vein, um, siloing sustainability is a common pitfall. So thinking about it in very narrow terms and not holistically around the organization.

Um, and so I think we've kind of covered that a lot of times we hear about p u e, right? So power usage effectiveness for, uh, for data centers. And that seems to be, you know, the measure of sustainability, but there's all kinds of other ways to measure from water usage effectiveness, um, embedded carbon in the actual infrastructure.

You don't want to just throw out a bunch of e-waste and buy new sustainable servers like think holistically about the entire, um, operation that you're running. Um, and then I'll just say one more thing. So greenwashing is obviously a big problem and no one should do it, but what we're starting to see is some of these companies are actually doing what we call green hushing.

Uh, and so that means they have, you know, gotten so afraid of even being accused of greenwashing that they don't talk about any of the initiatives that they're working on. Um, and I think that's a loss for the industry because we need to share, uh, the successes that we have as well as the failure so that we can learn from each other's, um, journeys and be more effective in our own sustainability initiatives. That's interesting.

I never heard green hushing. I've heard greenwashing, but not green hushing. So, uh, interesting term, uh, Simone, I, uh, yes to what both of the other panelists have said, and I would add to that, don't wait.

Um, you know, a lot of the work that we're talking about and the measurement that we're talking about right now is optional depending on where you operate as a business. Um, but that won't be true for long. And also you're not setting yourself up for long-term business resiliency.

So get started. Don't wait, act now. That's a good advice, uh, Greg.

Yeah, two, two quick things. Again, focusing on the, the, uh, data management sustainability and making software more efficient. I would say, first off, don't make this a check the box exercise, or maybe that's another way of saying greenwashing to be some kind of pressure, right?

This needs to be a formal part of the business. And if you need support selling this kind of concept into management, as I've mentioned a couple times, a nice thing is that there are some tangible business financial benefits to making your data management systems more sustainable. You know, the performance, the cost, et cetera.

So that, so that would be one thing, and there is good, you know, additional financial benefit, um, to doing this, right. The second thing I would say, however, is don't try and boil the ocean, right? Especially if this is new to your organization.

Uh, and you're gonna need kind of to, you know, prove that it's something that, uh, the organization should be doing and investing more in. Start by finding some quick measurable wins to gain some confidence, gain some credibility, maybe earn some more support to adopt these types of practices more widely. And what I've seen is your goal, if you embark on trying to make data management systems more sustainable or software greener, et cetera, is to show measurable meaningful results in the first two months.

And that is very realistic, is within the first two months, you actually have some tangible proof to show that this is, uh, benefiting not only the planet, but also the organization. That makes sense, you know, and even breaking it down in smaller goals too, because it can seem overwhelming, uh, when, when people are in the midst of that digital, digital transformation and looking to make things more sustainable. Uh, with that said, and I, and I would love to hear, since uh, we have a little more time, even if you could name more than one of these, I would love to know from each panelist what emerging trends that you predict will shape the future landscape of sustainable data management.

So even if you have your top three, um, that would be great because I think that, you know, we're coming to the, the end of 2023 soon enough, and people are wondering what's ahead for 2024. One of the things we do know is that we're seeing increasing regulations, uh, from the eu, for example, that will be in effect, uh, soon enough, and that's going to be affecting global companies and, and there's gonna be a lot more of that likely to come. So this is kind of a two part question of where do you see the future landscape?

And if, if you can comment as well on the, uh, upcoming regulations and, and where you see that moving forward as well. Alright, so for the first, uh, person to comment on this, we will go to Simone. I would actually love to hear from my other panelists on this one.

I've got a perspective of kind of internal data trends that I'm watching, but I think my other panelists will have some great insight on some sort of international data trends that we're seeing. That's a, that's great. Uh, for Justin.

Now, why don't we, I know Justin is a bestselling author, so he's looking at the big picture. Um, so Justin, why don't you go ahead and jump in on this. Sure, sure.

I'll try out. Um, yeah, I think, you know, in, in the olden days of, of data management, I think, uh, everybody in business in general, people thought of sustainability being sort of at the cost of other measures, at the cost of financial, cost of performance, the cost of risk. But now I think everyone's kind of realizing that this is becoming a strategic advantage, and the companies that are diving headfirst into sustainability and moving forward with it, are actually seeing the kind of benefits that get them ahead of the competition and help them enter new markets that are growing much more rapidly.

And so this is, you know, not just for data management, but across the board we're seeing that this is becoming one of the fastest growing, um, areas, uh, with startups and, and bigger companies. I mean, if you're a startup today after the sort of bust that we saw in the last year, um, you know, who's getting funded? It's climate tech and it's AI and, you know, everybody else is having a rough time.

So I think there's that, and then you'll see a lot of, a lot more sustainability specific tools, um, you know, similar to what Greg Ha has talked about with specifically focusing on how we can optimize, uh, all of our operations, all of our data for sustainability specifically, and then it kind of reaches out to the rest of the organization to break down those silos. That's a good point. Uh, Greg, Yeah, I'd say there's, there's two trends that, that I have in my mind, uh, kind of in, in different arenas.

One of them is going back to the question on regulation, right? Obviously we know, um, we're seeing Europe as, uh, for example, pretty far ahead in this area relative to North America or specifically the United States, but I do think that's going to change. We're seeing more emphasis on E S G, we're seeing E S G scores now being listed for, you know, public companies.

If you go do research, uh, we work with a lot of, uh, private equity funds that, you know, will use our technology to assess a potential investment. Uh, we're hearing more and more from their, their investors that E S G is like the number one priority that they're thinking about when they're considering a potential target, uh, organization. So I think the, all of these things are gonna result in probably, uh, other parts of the world that are a little bit behind, especially from a regulation standpoint, catching up or moving forward, uh, pretty quickly.

So I, I think that trend is gonna continue in, in the United States. I think we're gonna see some movement in that area over the next few years. So that's one thing.

Um, the second trend I'm seeing is, uh, and this is interesting, this is my personal opinion, but it's related to ai, artificial intelligence, but probably not how you might think. Ai, as we know, requires huge amounts of resources to operate. So AI is unfortunately going to make our software and data access management, the, the systems themselves less sustainable in the near term because it, you need to expand such huge resources to train these AI models.

So if you're just looking at it within that little, uh, uh, you know, kind of world, like just the technology itself, AI is gonna become less, make software less sustainable in the short term. However, what I do predict is that we will get better on being more selective on when and where AI makes sense to use and when, uh, quite honestly, it's a little bit too much. It's overkill for whatever given system or application, and that there's other more efficient ways to design or operate a data management system that uses less resources and will be more sustainable.

So maybe that's wishful thinking, but I see us getting there. Will we build be a little bit more selective about where and when we use ai, uh, to be more efficient? Hmm, that is a good point that the AI is definitely using a lot more power and we're using a lot more ai.

So, um, it's something that'll be in under consideration even more going forward. Uh, Joanna, Yeah, I see that the acceleration of, of, uh, regulation globally happening spreading and also the financial institutions requiring E S G and understanding of a company's, uh, climate plan and their E S G reporting. Um, and also, you know, the customers are looking for companies to spend their money with that are obviously, um, being sustainable.

Uh, the area that I also think that will grow is at the moment, sustainability is quite often a top-down approach. I think that there will be a groundswell of a bottom up approach where staff will be involved in driving sustainability within a company. 'cause it's staff that often have the great ideas.

And at the moment, you know, we've just, there's been this suggestion box, or a staff might do some training, but no real systematic way of staff to actually engage with sustainability. So you'll have the bottom up work of the sustainability being carried out, the actions being carried out, but supported from the top down. So almost like a circular economy of sustainability with, with, with human resources.

So I see staff within companies being a lot more involved and also the regulation going at the moment, it's usually aimed at the much larger companies. I can see over time that the regulation will be bringing in the, the small getting, you know, targeting smaller and smaller and smaller companies as time goes by. That's A great point.

I'd like to throw in an extra question, uh, for the audience, kind of based on everyone's comments. When you're working with organizations or within your own, um, talking about sustainable data management, how do you find communicating, uh, the, the messaging within individual organizations? Because a lot of people look to IT departments, well, they're the ones that are using all the energy and this is where we have to make the changes, but it seems to me that there is a relationship within the entire organization and communicating it with right, the right messaging, um, and getting that point across that it might be an all wide organizational effort as part of digital transformation.

So even if you can comment on some of the experiences that you've had, um, in your efforts in making data more sustainable and how your communication is within individual organizations, I think people would relate to that. And maybe if you have any advice of, um, and, and when it comes to messaging to, uh, get those efforts across. And, um, Simone, I'd like to start with you because I know you work a lot in E S G and, um, it's still, it's something that a lot of people are aware of, but, um, maybe you can talk about how you've been able to manage to, uh, make it, uh, make those goals more known and connect it to sustainable data management.

Right. Yeah. Um, so I think I've got sort of two perspectives on this one first.

Um, when we talk about, so as a company who set a net zero target, that means that we have to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions as much as we can. And, um, only then are we going to look at removals, um, for the re remaining portion of it. So when I talk to my working group within New Relic, I talk to them about the fact that, okay, let's say you're the facilities team and you've got whatever it is, 12% of our total footprint, um, that kind of lives under your umbrella for you.

That's a hundred percent of the work that I need you to do. Um, so I definitely had some people within the business feeling like, oh, you know, the thing thing I've gotta do is such small potatoes, like, look at the cloud team. They've got so much work ahead of them in this area.

Um, but when I talk to the facilities team about that, you know, we really just emphasize that they have this huge role to play and we're talking, you know, hundreds of tons of carbon. So there's there, there's a lot of work for them to do. Um, and then I would also say on kind of the human side of things, the thing that has worked really well for me is reminding people that everyone inside the business has a role to play in this.

You don't have to have sustainability or E S G in your title. Um, and finding those people within the business that already have a natural passion for this work, um, really makes my job so much easier because I don't need to do all that work to bring them along to get them excited. We have so many people already within the business who wanna get engaged, and it's, um, you know, it's a great employee retention tool.

It's a great employee engagement tool, and it also makes my life easier. That's a great idea. Uh, Justin?

Yeah, I mean, I would echo what Simone said, that this is becoming a really popular topic, and you'll find a lot of people in any organization that are really excited about this. And so if you're working on sustainability, generally, you'll have people, you know, reaching out to you and saying, how can I get involved? Um, that being said, sometimes it has to be done in addition to their day job, and that's not easy.

Uh, and so however you can, you know, one message it in a way that, um, shows the opportunity for their part of the organization, um, you know, whether that's sales or IT or marketing or, you know, operations and financing the above. Um, but also the, the best you can do to sort of take that into bite-sized pieces so that you're not the task master who's over there, like, Hey, when are you gonna complete this big project? Um, you know, make it easy for people and, you know, help them not burn out on, you know, helping you and, and make it exciting for 'em.

Uh, so it, it should be a lot of fun. A lot of people are excited, so leverage that energy and, and try to push it forward. That's great.

Uh, Joanna? Yeah, so Green, k p I works with companies and so, um, they're strangers at first. So my strategy is to find the champion as soon as I've the, the most highest level champion that I can find, and they probably know who the other champions are in the company.

So find my first champion and then bring the other champions into a team. Then spread the love through through to the other staff members by involving them in sustainable strategies. Uh, so it's, it's, but the first step is find the first champion.

That's great. Uh, Greg, I know you mentioned the Green Software Foundation, and that's a great thing to be a part of because you're, you're meeting with like minds. What about, uh, individual organizations and how do you, uh, get the messaging out and every, and have everything work together?

Yeah, so basically speaking as just an employee, uh, of our company, it's obviously an, uh, a priority for us. We've heard during the trends how historically it's been a very top down kind of thing from the communication and, and an initiative and priority perspective, but that's obviously very critical is to have that top down, that support at the highest levels. Um, but I'm also seeing this trend that, uh, that, um, Joanna was talking about is that we're seeing more and more bottom up.

I mean, we all know, no surprise, we have this younger generation that's entered the workforce or entering the workforce where this is much more important to them. It's something very personal, and they're very passionate about them. And even though I work for a small company, I see it a lot here where we have these newer employees that are raising their hands and making recommendations and suggesting ideas.

And thank goodness our c e o is very supportive of this. So, like, it's, it's a very open communication where like, we have like a, like a teams channel, or some companies might use Slack, like a Slack channel that is dedicated to, you know, green ideas and initiatives, things to make the company more sustainable. Uh, our company fosters that, and maybe it's a little harder to do that at a much larger organization.

You know, we're we're, you know, several hundred employees in our company. So it's, you can kind of do this a little bit easier, but seeing that at this level, I hope to see that at bigger organizations and that it is being supported from the top levels and that there's forums that are created for employees to actually have these conversations and, and drive these types of initiatives. Uh, I think just that open communication and that, uh, employees feel comfortable, uh, bringing ideas to the organization is, is critical.

Uh, absolutely. I've seen it here. That's great.

Um, before we get to our last question, I was just wondering if anyone and each panelist, you can chime in if you have a comment, um, that when it comes to sustainable data management, uh, one of the concerns is how do we keep all the data secure? And, and that is definitely a concern for a lot of our viewers on, on Techstrong tv. I know about cybersecurity.

Is there anyone that wants to chime in about sustainable data management and, um, keeping the data secure, especially since we're getting so much more sustainable data available all the time? Any panelists wanna chime in? Uh, Justin, Um, I am not a data security expert, but when we do have these conversations, obviously data security comes up as one of the top concerns of any company that works with data.

So it's incredibly important. And I think sustainability and thinking through the lens of sustainability helps to improve the resiliency of that data also. Um, and so not just having, you know, mirrored data centers in different places, but thinking about the long term of how, how they get back up and running after a, uh, you know, cataclysmic weather event that we're seeing more and more of, or, um, you know, where to locate them in terms of, you know, the weather's, the weather's changing, right?

So putting a data center in middle of Arizona is not a great idea. Good point. So, you know, thinking about that sustainability leads to better resiliency, which, you know, feeds into the security conversations.

Uh, Joanna, do you have any comments on that? No, no. I, Anything it's, um, okay.

I'll just leave it to you Yes. Is my Thing. No, no problem.

Uh, Simone or Greg, I'll the table's open to either of you. Uh, sure. I mean, very quickly, again, I, um, not a data security, uh, expert, but what I am seeing from folks that I do trust, that I know in the industry, partners, clients, is that there's a lot of, uh, encouragement, uh, and encouraging progress being made by the major cloud, you know, providers, you know, and that's where a lot of data is moving.

Uh, security is a priority for them. So, uh, they are on the forefront from what I can tell in not only, uh, data security, but also sustainability. So that's a trend that I'm seeing and I'm hearing very good things from folks that know a lot more about this topic than me mm-hmm.

That when they've moved their data, uh, to one of the major cloud vendors, they're not only obviously getting, uh, very high, uh, marks on the data security side, but they're also very happy with, uh, some of the work, many of them they're doing into the sustainability area. So, so that's one thing I I'm definitely, well, I appreciate No, thanks for that on the fly answer. Um, Simone, if, do you have any comments on that?

Otherwise I'll move on. Okay, great. So we, I have our last question finally.

If each of you could just give one brief strategy tip, um, we'd love to know your tip to our audience on how to successfully manage sustainable data, what is your tip? And, um, if you feel free, we still have a couple minutes, so, uh, I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on that. Um, let's start with, uh, Simone, since you're up next.

All right. Uh, I mean that you've heard it from all of us in various forms today, but I think get your stakeholders, particularly the executive team bought in, help them think about E S G as part of a resilient business plan. Um, really rather than an initiative that you do for Earth Day or a siloed effort somewhere else in the business, it's the work of everybody.

Um, the data comes from everywhere and the work to mitigate the impacts of, um, you know, your business operations is everybody's work as well. That's great. Thank you, Simone.

Uh, Joanna, I'll be clear on the purpose and then let that purpose define the strategy. That's great. That is a good tip, uh, Justin?

Sure. Um, I think it's good to recognize that change is coming faster than we think. Um, you know, Greg made me think of this really interesting stat that, you know, ARC investment, which is Kathy Woods Invest Technology Investment Group.

Um, last year projected that a model to train a model like G P T three, which now costs $450,000, or did in November, 2022, uh, would take about eight years to get down to a hundred dollars to train. Uh, and then in December, Stanford alpaca did it for 600 bucks. So this acceleration, this, you know, these exponential trends, whether we're talking about the, the risks of climate change, you know, the weather events, those are all accelerating and, and coming much faster than we previously thought.

But also the opportunities and the tools and the change in technology is happening so much faster than, than we think it is. So, you know, when you're making your three, three to five year plan, you know, think 10 years out, That's a, that's a great point. And, uh, we are definitely seeing more extreme weather events due to climate change, and it does seem to be accelerating.

I mean, we just had July was the hottest month ever reported on, on the planet. So, um, uh, very timely tips. And finally, we'd like to hear what Greg has to say.

Uh, so in terms of strategy tip, uh, obviously I work for a commercial software company, so I could just say buy our product, but that's a little too simplistic. Just kidding. Uh, seriously, my best advice is to just simply educate yourself.

Uh, and there's so many incredible, freely available resources out there. I keep mentioning one, and I can't recommend them enough. They're a nonprofit organization called the Green Software Foundation.

They have an incredible website. I I'm there almost every day myself. So if you're looking, uh, for ways to improve and make data management more sustainable and you're looking to educate yourself, that's a great place to start.

I highly recommend it. I completely agree. I'm on that site myself all the time.

The Green Software Foundation. Thank you, Greg. And to conclude, I'd like to express my gratitude to all of our panelists.

We have Greg Rivera, vice President of Product for Cast, highlight at Cast Joanna Klut, C e O of Green, K p i, Justin Bean, sustainability strategist and bestselling author of What Could Go Right, and Simone Ren, director of Business Operations and Environmental Social Governance Practice at New Relic. Your expertise of this panel and insights, um, on the State Ops Day panel has just been terrific. The title, once again, green Tech, practical Strategies for Sustainable Data Management, all these tips have been invaluable.

And to our audience watching, thank you so much for watching. And, um, I love to see that everybody, uh, is enjoying this panel and getting something out of it. We hope this discussion equips you with the knowledge and inspiration to drive sustainable data management initiatives in your organizations.

com. I'm Bonnie Schneider with the Techstrong Group. And welcome, uh, thanks again for everyone joining us on this panel, and we wish everyone a great rest of your Data Ops Day journey.

Thank you.