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Speaking ahead of a report the software maker released
Wednesday, Smith said common instruction on issues like carbon
accounting was too piecemeal for the roughly 3,900 companies
that have vowed to cut their CO2 emissions.
"We have to move very quickly to start to bring our emissions
down, and the ultimate bottleneck is the supply of skilled
people," he said.
Microsoft sells software for organizations to track their
environmental impact. Still, companies need more than technology
to address global warming, said Smith, announcing plans to
develop green education materials including on LinkedIn, which
Microsoft owns.
Wednesday's study, by Microsoft and Boston Consulting Group,
found that many corporate environmental leaders - 68% - were
internal hires whose team members lacked sustainability-related
degrees more often than not. The findings primarily stemmed from
interviews and surveys with Microsoft and eight other large
companies in sectors such as finance and consumer goods.
It took one Microsoft employee, for instance, more than 30 years
at the company moving through customer-support, procurement and
other roles before a promotion to lead part of its
sustainability team - a time horizon the report contrasted with
an expected 11 years before humanity will have released a dire
amount of carbon dioxide.
While Microsoft itself has grown its sustainability headcount to
about 250 employees from only 30 largely in the past three
years, having the right workforce to deliver on its
carbon-reduction goals remains a challenge, Smith said.
"That is in part an issue for us because it's an issue for
everybody," he said. "Employers really need to step back and
take a broader look at their investment in employee learning and
training."
Companies should bring in instructors, pay for continuing
education and convene on carbon-reduction strategies, he said.
(Reporting By Jeffrey Dastin in Palo Alto, Calif.; Editing by
Lincoln Feast.)
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