Today, 28-November, is the kickoff of the Durban (South Africa) UN Climate Change Conference – COP17.
Does COP17 matter? Is it relevant?
Not one, but two EarthPM connections to this conference made us curious.
First, we were lucky enough to be the keynote speaker at PMSA’s Good in Green conference there back in late Septenber. Second, the GreenBiz author of a recent post, Heather King, sat down with us last summer to discuss all sorts of green business issues as they pertain to project management. Heather posted this article which provides 4 compelling reasons why COP17 does matter.
We’d like to draw our readers’ attention to reason number 4:
4. Business leaders are increasingly involved — across sectors and continents.
Industry leaders are increasingly involved in the COP talks. As clean energy deployments in over 80 countries have skyrocketed, clean energy suppliers and adopters need assurance that governments will support this market.
In addition, COP 17 will work to establish a technology center that will serve as a hub for leveraging and deploying climate monitoring, management and adaptation solutions in different countries. This will require significant collaboration with technology and information industry leaders.
Two significant business events in Durban that are concurrent with COP 17 intend to elevate the voice and influence of industry at the talks:
• The World Climate Summit. This organization will host its second event on December 3 — 4th with leaders from Ernst and Young, PWC, Coca Cola, Phillips.
• Business for the Environment (B4E). B4E is gathering leaders from Tata Steel, Bank of America, HP and others on December 6 to discuss a clean industrial revolution.
So…that’s reason number 4. If you’re interested in Heather’s other three reasons, click here. We assert that reason number 4 alone is enough to get the Project Managers of the world interested. We’re talking about “skyrocketing” clean energy deployments. Translation: projects. So at a minimum, become conversant in this practice area, improving your ability to be gainfully employed as a productive project manager!
Working together – saving tomorrow today. That’s the theme of COP17. If you want to find out more about the conference, here is the link to COP17.
Exposure Self
Despite the image and the play on words, this is actually a very serious and urgent posting regarding exposure.
It has nothing to do with being too “revealing” or getting too cold.
Rather it has to do with an “Exposure Draft” which the Project Management Institute (PMI) has made available for comment, and it’s only open for comment until 14-January.
The document is The Standard for Portfolio Management. And it’s only open as an Exposure Draft until 14-January-2012
Here is a link to the page that explains how you can make comments and suggestions on the Exposure Draft of the Standard for Portfolio Management.
http://www.pmi.org/PMBOK-Guide-and-Standards/Standards-Current-PMI-Standards-Projects.aspx
We are urging our readers to go there and to review the document for how well (or poorly) it integrates sustainability thinking. Already in our initial review we notice some problems. For example, when it discusses ‘Organizational Value’, it says that
“Organizational Value … also includes other forms of value such as employee or customer satisfaction, contribution to the community, enhancement or protection of the environment…”
” Also?”
Like it’s a “throw-in” gimme?
It’s good that the environment is mentioned, and that social and community aspects are mentioned, but not good enough. These items – these sustainability, long-term items, must be integrated.
Help us, won’t you, by spending some time with this document and adding your comments and insight. We feel it’s very important because it’s at the Portfolio level that business make fundamental decisions about what types of projects and programs to undertake.
Thanks.