Innovation in a Reinvented World: 10 Essential Elements to Succeed in the New World of Business

EMC: Kathrin R. Winkler, VP of Corporate Sustainability

Sustainability seems like a natural progression for someone with a long-held interest in systems.

“I came in through project management and did quite a bit of self-study,” Kathrin Winkler says. “You can't approach sustainability without understanding a company's business.”

Winkler's career has evolved as quickly as the clean tech and green industries, where today she heads up EMC's Office of Sustainability, providing the vision and leadership in the development and implementation of the company's strategy for environmental and social sustainability.

“Sustainability is a worldview and not a single person's role, whether that role is finance or managing the supply chain. The question becomes how we evolve these individual functions in order to move to a sustainable world,” says Winkler.

Appearing before the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, and the Internet in 2010, Winkler provided an overview of how information technology is contributing to energy efficiency and where information and communication technology (ICT) finds itself competing on three levels:

1. Energy efficiency of EMC products.
2. Reducing the carbon footprint of company operations and EMC's supply chains.
3. EMC products and services that make ICT operations more efficient.

“Although not a lot came out of my talk, we are now seeing the federal government supporting clean technology, and within the government itself, there are ...