Corporate Culture Can Lead to IT Waste

Ted Samson at Infoworld raises an interesting question - why do organizations continue to purchase more computers whenever there's a perceived need for more processing power? Furthermore, according to a report from Gartner (a well respected IT research and advisory company), why are these machines only used at 10% of their capability? Samson argues that this is because computers are inexpensive, and organizations, much like people, seem to be creatures of habits. And habits can be bad.

It's easy to relate this to the environmental movement as a whole; besides the obvious implication for IT shops, it's almost a given that it's easier to do the environmentally wrong thing out of habit, then to do the right thing that might take a little work. Sampson correctly observes that this kind of short-sightedness is now forcing companies into a mad scramble for space in their increasingly cramped data centers, as well as coming up with more dough to pay for increasingly growing energy bills.

Unless companies are willing to tolerate this kind of costly wastefulness, the Gartner report is a real wake-up call. Someone at your company needs to take charge - maybe (as I have suggested) by hiring a chief sustainability officer. Business as usual just isn't an option.