I haven’t talked about my work much. That’s partly because I really don’t know what I can and can’t say. I need to be careful with confidentiality, but I feel like I should at least say something about my experience. Most of Infosys’s data, policies and commitments are available online anyway–a demonstration of Infosys’s openness that I admire.
Someone told me that Infosys operates based on trust. It builds long, healthy partnerships with its customers and ensures that it provides the best for them. It’s interesting for an IT company (or a company in general really) to… have heart. It’s so refreshing to see. That Infosys cares about sustainability and its societal impact too is a plus in my book.
The big question when I came to the company was whether all this is a sham. Many companies’ Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) efforts are there just because it’s fashionable to do CSR, which defeats the purpose of CSR. As far as I can tell, Infosys seems to be an exception.
I work in the Green Initiatives Team at Infosys. The team is responsible for almost all things sustainability: energy efficiency, building planning, waste management, renewable energy, environmental mediation, etc. I’ve been here for almost a month, and I’m really blown away by the amount of work that this team does. I only have good things to say. The team comprises of so many different professionals specializing in different aspects of sustainability, united under a common goal. Each person is responsible for a piece of the puzzle, and they all come together at the end to make Infosys more sustainable. I’m just amazed by how diverse this work really is.
What’s really interesting too is how different this unit is from all the other ones at Infosys, who offers services in hardware/software/consulting/supply chain/etc. The Green Initiatives seems like a little red dot–a unique one–on the map of Infosys–kinda like how Singapore is the little red dot on the world’s map. Unfortunately, just being a little red dot also means that most of Infosys doesn’t know about this team. One of the big challenges this team has is how to communicate with the rest of the Infosys employees, and also how to present its vision and accomplishments to the world. It’s definitely a challenge to communicate something different to the IT world, but they’re trying hard.
Anyway, it’s been a huge learning journey working on my projects here. I’m getting a feel for the corporate system, the way companies choose their vendors, the self-motivation required to work well, and the rapid pace of technological change in the renewable energy industry. It’s been hectic to say the least. But I am really glad I got to be here, in a different environment than the one I’m used to, and to see the work that this company is doing. To see a company make a serious commitment to sustainability and follow up on it gives me hope that the world can be right.