Mike Watson, senior manager of sustainability at Intuit shared five lessons his company learned when it rolled out its enterprise carbon accounting (ECA) software to better track, report and reduce carbon emissions.
Here are the highlights from his conversation with Paul Baier, VP sustainability consulting at Groom Energy Solutions, in a blog written for Practical Sustainability.
Watson says the ECA software has improved productivity, reduced risk and helped Intuit identify focus areas for reduction of energy in it facilities and data centers. "It also has helped paint a clear picture for our executives on how we are progressing against our emissions reduction goals."
The five tips he passes along to other companies looking to install ECA and carbon management software are the following.
1. Decide on your hierarchy and organizational structure before you begin. Watson says this is critical because it determines how your data will roll up and the flexibility needs of your reports.
2. Know your specific goals whether its for reporting emissions, progress against goals, or initiative tracking. He says to write these goals down and ensure management alignment on them before implementation. This will help in the selection of configuration options and tradeoffs as well as reduce the need for rework.
3. Understand who is going to use the tool (departments, teams, individuals) and what are they going to use it for. You will also have to determine their skill sets and which implementations they need for access, he says.
4. Engage with stakeholders up front. Watson says to review the data sets, reports, and capture inconsistencies before you load the data from your existing spreadsheet into the ECA software. Once the data is in, it is more difficult to fix errors, he adds.
5. Identify the sources of data. This includes determining the process and data ownership, which will drive collaboration, engagement and ownership.