Kirstie McIntyre on HP’s Full Lifecyle Responsibility
by Kirstie McIntyre, Global Director, HP Sustainability
Originally published on PNE Group Blog
HP has a long track record of placing sustainability high on its priority list and is recognized as a sustainability leader, recently receiving a 10 out of 10 rating by Gartner in its 2016 Supply Chain Top 25 rankings. Participating in and leading the circular economy is the next step in HP’s sustainability journey. It will help redefine how we function as a company, how our partners work with us, and how consumers work and live.
It makes business sense, by helping us develop longer-lasting, resource-efficient products and new, transformative business models. But the circumstances have also aligned for us to make now the ideal time to consider a new model. Companies have different expectations of how sustainable a product should be or how a service should interact and improve the way their employees work. Also, technology has caught up to allow us to make the most of improvements.
The Internet of Things has now connected makers with users in a way like never before. With this interconnectedness, we can better understand how and where products are used, how they are serviced and maintained, what fails and what lasts, and why people are moving on to the next technology. Sometimes we even discover customers use our products in ways we never expected.
All of this information allows us to enhance every aspect of making something that helps improve the way people live and work. We’re now working with our partners and customers to help them benefit from our efforts and to apply our learnings to their own processes to make improvements that will truly disrupt the traditional model. And by doing that, sustainability will shift from a “goal we’re trying to achieve” to “the way we do things.”
