Halos, the Matrix and HP's strategy for greening IT

Three O'Clock UK time and as scheduled the Halo video conferencing screen at HP's City offices springs into life.

Sitting opposite, or at least on the high def screen creating the illusion that he is opposite rather than in a building on HP's Houston campus, is John Frey, director of corporate environmental strategies for the IT giant. He's fresh from his breakfast and looks surprisingly comfortable with the whole arrangement, which is more than can be said for myself.

I've just jogged from St Paul's tube having left the office far too late. I've only just made it in time and am a little flustered. I'd already been warned when arranging the interview that one of the downsides of Halo (and there aren't many to be honest) is that because the video suites are almost always booked up you have to be punctual and make your slot or risk the meeting not happening at all.

As I gather my thoughts, Frey confirms he is completely at ease with the Halo meeting. "I use it all the time," he confirms, gesticulating as talks in the manner of one of those execs who spend a lot of time delivering presentations. "Half my team is in California and half in Houston so we use it a lot for team meetings. I also talk to some clients using it and often brief the press. I'm definitely flying less as a result."

He is also keen to tackle the problem posed by those attendees, like myself, who can't be relied upon to turn up on time. "We've got one suite in Houston and it is always booked up so we are looking to build some more," he explains. Later, Paul Bradbury, who joins the conference from the somewhat less exotic surrounds of Bristol and is in charge of Halo in Europe for HP, confirms that by "some more" Frey means the company is planning to treble the number of video suites it has dotted around the world from 32 to about 100 over the next year.

Frey's career is in many ways a microcosm of the CSR and environmental function over the past fifteen years. He was global director of health and safety at HP before taking up the environmental role and had held similar environmental, health and safety roles at ARCO, Boeing, and NASA.

They were experiences that initially stood him in good stead for managing HP's environmental strategies. "The approach for many companies used to be that regulations would come along and the environmental team would work out how the business should comply, much like with health and safety," he observes. "But over the past four years the role has changed completely, now everything is far more proactive and I spend half my time talking to customers."

Of course promoting green credentials to customers is only effective if a company has a worthwhile story to tell and it is here that Frey spends the other half of his time, working to ensure that the environmental commitments, which were made to much fanfare by HP chief executive Mark Hurd last year, are turned into a reality.

Frey admits to initially being a touch daunted by the targets, which included commitments to cut emissions from HP's operations by 15 per cent by 2010 based on 2005 levels and reduce the carbon footprint of both operations and the entire product portfolio by 20 per cent by 2010. "When we set those targets we knew we could get about halfway to achieving them based on the product roadmap," he says. "But the other half of the savings were a real stretch goal. We had to set those goals though, because once you do it you challenge the design teams and they begin to find solutions."

Since then, Frey claims, the solutions have come thick and fast: work is underway to cut the company's 85 datacentres down to just three facilities with three back up locations; it has released new more energy efficient cooling and automated management systems; smaller laptop and PC designs have cut the energy used in the manufacturing process; intelligent power supplies have been introduced that cut power use "down to trickle" once a laptop is fully charged; and, perhaps most significantly, suppliers have been lent on heavily to cut their own emissions.

"You need to drive them really hard," replies Frey when asked how a firm ensures that its managers turn well meaning carbon targets into a reality. "You also need to talk to people and show them the business benefit. If you only talk about the environmental perspective you will have a tough time getting people on board, but if you point to the return on investment and the customer demand then it becomes a straightforward business decision."

Of course, driving such wide-ranging changes amidst the Byzantine organisational structures of a typical multinational is easier said than done and often requires an overhaul of management structures alongside the shift in managerial priorities.

Frey argues HP was lucky in this respect as the managerial structure the company is using to drive its green improvements was first introduced back in 1992 through its Design for Environment programme. The programme operates using what Frey refers to as a "matrix structure", which is management speak for disseminating individuals with environmental responsibilities throughout every part of the business. The net result is that the company has about 200 green advocates spread throughout the business, many of whom may not have specific environmental roles but all of which have responsibility for improving the environmental performance of both HP's products and operations.

Frey insists this approach is far more effective than simply having the board demand from on high that departments instigate environmental improvements. " Many of the folks in the design teams are part of the matrix," he said. "It is much better than trying to drive things solely through a central environmental department. Engineering design teams are often together for 15 years or more, so it is better to have people involved in these teams managing the changes."

The focus of the Design for Environment programme is often upon tackling what Frey refers to as "IT's problems", looking to improve energy efficiency and remove hazardous substances. But he is also adamant that IT firms have a major role to play in improving the green performance of the entire economy and suggests that in the wake of revelations that the sector accounts for two per cent of global carbon emissions manufacturers have been a little too quick to go on the offensive.

"We have to look at fixing our problems, but we can also help fix everybody elses," he says. "When you look at IT holistically you start to realise what a big part it plays in making other industries efficient. We have a major role to play in tackling the other 98 per cent of emissions."

With that the meeting draws to a close. I resist the temptation to try and shake Frey's hand as I say goodbye, something he claims not all people using the video suite for the first time are able to do, and as Frey takes the short journey back to his desk in Houston I head back to the office at a somewhat more sedate pace than I left it.