posted by Michael Jacobson on February 01, 2010
Last fall I finally got around to reading David McCullough’s book on John Adams, the second President of the United States. If you were like me and having trouble finding time to read the book, I would suggest making the time. It is really a good read. But I am not writing a book review, so let me get to the point. Abigail Adams, the second First Lady and a remarkable woman, was not happy with her daughter’s choice of a suitor. In a letter to her daughter she said that there are two things that you should require from a potential husband. First, you should require that they are good and second, that they do good.
That advice really resonated with me. As the Director of Intel’s Corporate Responsibility Office, I seem to spend a lot of time trying to define for family, friends and co-workers just what Corporate Social Responsibility is. Of course, as practitioners, we don’t make it any easier by using a whole host of terms to describe the same thing, like environmental, social and governance (ESG) or corporate citizenship or too many other terms to list.
Maybe that is why Abigail’s advice to her daughter resonated with me. What a simple way to describe what it means to be a responsible corporate citizen. It really is about being good and doing good.
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posted by Wendy Hawkins on January 27, 2010
This evening I watched President Obama’s State of the Union address. Sitting in the balcony with the First Lady were Li Boynton - a winner of the 2009 Intel International Science & Engineering Fair - and Gabriela Farfan - a Finalist in the 2009 Intel Science Talent Search.
I got to meet both of these young women last year, along with hundreds of other talented students like them from across the US and around the world.
Identifying and recognizing their talent. Providing the means - with more than $5 million in scholarships - for them to pursue their studies. Inspiring and encouraging them to stick with their dreams of scientific research and technical innovation… There can be no better investment in our future; in their future.
Which is why I had such a GREAT time with yesterday afternoon. Forty phone calls.
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posted by Will Swope on January 25, 2010
Does today’s announcement about increasing our solar capacity by nearly 25 times really matter?
If every company in the world, over the next five years, did as much to offset their energy consumption as Intel does between solar investments and RECs (renewable energy credits), it would matter a “ton”. But looking at the total energy consumption of America, or even Arizona or New Mexico, no, the investment will not materially drive the total energy demands of carbon-based power generation.
So why do we do it? Because influencing the short-term consumption is NOT the metric that matters; what matters is the first (longer-term) perspective of being a responsible global leader. Intel was the company that stated it would be investing seven billion dollars in the U.S. over the next few years at a time that most every other company was retrenching. Intel has been the company that has repeatedly driven for longer term investments in education, infrastructure, and basic (fundamental) R&D that is the very basis of the next generation of technological advances. We all know that companies need to reduce expenses during recessions. We do that too, but we don’t stop our longer term R&D commitments.
So, yes, this investment and decision matters. We want companies to emulate our success by taking the long view. We want companies to invest in carbon reduction efforts. We want to lead by example, to lead by our industry, and to create proof points of success for those who take this path.
Learn more about our environmental commitment by visiting our environment website.
posted by Martina Roth on January 19, 2010
What kind of education and skills do today’s students need to be successful as a global citizen, a thriving employee or an innovator of tomorrow? That was one of the key questions being discussed at last week’s Learning and Technology World Forum (LaTWF) in London, a gathering of education ministers and thought leaders from around the world. Over 800 ministers, education experts, academic leaders from 100 plus countries participated in this year’s event to discuss and find solutions to the educational challenges we need to address today in order to give every kid a chance to become a successful 21st century citizen.
I continue to be amazed at the fact that top jobs of today did not even exist 8 -10 years ago - things are changing at such an extremely fast pace. So how can we make sure that what the students learn today is going to help them succeed through their mid careers all the way to retirement? What are the skills that they need to gain and how do we assess them? To address these issues, last year at LaTWF we announced an initiative in partnership with Cisco and Microsoft, as well as other global assessment partners such as the OECD and the IEA. Called the Assessment and Teaching of 21st Century Skills (ATC21S), the project aims to research and develop new approaches, methods and technologies for measuring the success of 21st century teaching and learning in classrooms around the world
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posted by Wendy Hawkins on January 15, 2010
Haiti was the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere - among the poorest in the world. And then catastrophe struck. Tens of thousands are dead. Hundreds of thousands are injured. Millions are homeless.
Sitting, as I do, where corporate America and disaster relief intersect, is immensely gratifying. To watch our employees rally immediately in response to events in Haiti, asking, “What can I do to help?” “Can my skills be put to use there?” “What is Intel doing?” “What do the people of Haiti need?” is beyond heart-warming. All the way to inspiring.
Within 24 hours, over 700 employees had made donations to relief efforts. Just to give you a sense of where this is likely headed, some history: Over 8,000 employees gave $1.4 million for the South Asia Tsunami relief effort, 8,500 gave $1,700,000 after Katrina, and 7,000 gave nearly $800,000 for the China earthquake. All of this then matched by the Intel Foundation. Our employees are pretty amazing.
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posted by Shelly Esque on January 07, 2010
Yesterday I had the honor of representing Intel in a small meeting with President Obama, the Vice President and Dr. Biden (a professor of English) prior to the public announcement around the “Educate to Innovate” campaign. The President met with just three technology companies and two University representatives to thank us for our continued commitment to STEM education in the U.S. All of us in the room recognize the importance of public/private alignment and cooperation if we are truly going to turn the tide on science and math education in our country. U.S. 15 years olds rank 21st among nations in Science and 25th in Math achievement and we all recognize that our future - the future of U.S. competitiveness, our standard of living and the health of our companies depends on improvement. The President and Secretary of Education Arnie Duncan plans on continuing to shine a light on this issue and the administration is taking bold steps to turn the situation around. “…our future depends on reaffirming America’s role as the world’s engine of scientific discovery and technological innovation.” This meeting was specifically about Teachers and their preparedness to spark young people to engage with science and math subjects and careers. Intel’s long standing commitment to teacher training and educational improvement is a perfect fit with the administration’s vision of increasing the quality and quantity of qualified Math and Science teachers and to making “rock stars” out of young people who demonstrate excellence in science and math.
We affirmed our commitment to teacher training, science competitions, and our other work to engage, inspire and recognize the next generation of innovators. I was proud to be part of the celebration and I’m proud to know the President recognizes our work and supports private sector collaborative efforts.
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posted by Suzanne Fallender on January 05, 2010
Interest in water disclosure among investors and companies is on the rise, as noted in this recent CDP report. Intel has been publicly reporting on our water conservation practices for more than a decade - from how we design our operations and our products to how we partner with others on conservation projects. Our conservation actions and investments over the past decade have helped us to save about 3 billion gallons of water each year.
But even I know (and I read and write CSR and sustainability reports for a living) that pictures can often be easier to digest than a long report and multiple performance graphs. That’s why I’m proud of this new video on our newly redesigned environmental web site, which shows step-by-step the different methods we use to save water in our manufacturing facilities.
Do you have best practices or innovative approaches to share on responsible water management? Please share them here along with any feedback on Intel’s water management approach or our water disclosure.
posted by Susan Faulkner on January 04, 2010
Egypt is a place where everything seems possible. Too much traffic on the road? Create your own lane in between the cars! No way to put the windows in the car up or down? The driver has a spare handle in the glove compartment! The train isn’t scheduled to stop in the city you’re going to? The conductor will make a special stop just for you! And when all you want to do is say NO to offers to buy pyramids, sphinxes, and other Egyptian trinkets, the common refrain from relentless peddlers is, “Try to say yes!”
I got to know the positive spirit of Egyptians working as part of a team of five Intel Education Service Corps volunteers. We have completed the field work phase in Egypt of a two-month service program. Max Alt, Dina Ghobashy, Ali Rabbani, Leroy Tripette and I worked with our partner NGO (non-governmental organization), CARE Egypt, for a little over two weeks in rural villages deploying 500 Intel-powered Classmate PCs in 20 schools. The Intel-powered classmate PCs had been donated to Egypt’s Ministry of Education, and the Ministry generously allocated them to CARE for this program. These classmate PCs (CMPCs) will benefit 13,000 students, over 56% of whom are girls. CARE places special emphasis on investing in girls because their empowerment benefits whole communities.
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posted by Lorie Wigle on December 19, 2009
While the negotiations are generating the headlines at the UN’s Climate Change Conference, there’s also a good deal of discussion on the role of technology in providing the means of achieving whatever targets are set. I had the opportunity to participate in a couple of events that were enlightening in content and set in a remarkable context.
The Nordic representatives of seven major IT industry companies came to the realization several weeks ago that COP-15 would be the catalyst to bring together the environmental leads from all of their companies. And an idea was born to bring us all together for a debate on the role of technology in mitigating climate change. The event was kicked off by Danish Minister for Climate and Energy Lykke Friis and moderated by Professor Jacqueline McGlade, the Executive Director of the European Environment Agency. Professor McGlade was quite a departure from the normal industry discussion leader with very engaging questions and a great rapport with the audience. In addition to the usual discussion about smart grids, employee engagement and 2% (ICT’s carbon emissions) vs. 98% (other industries emissions that could be mitigated by use of technology) there were excellent discussions about how we can enable visualization of energy use and how capabilities such as telework could ultimately move system boundaries - i.e., if enough people work from home, ultimately we might need fewer roads, different communications infrastructure and evolved social networking tools. It was great company to be in - with leaders from Cisco, Dell, Fujitsu, HP, Konica-Minolta and Microsoft - but the best part of the experience was the setting. Check out the “Old Stock Exchange” where the debate was held. We HAD to think big thoughts in such an environment!
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posted by Susan Faulkner on December 14, 2009
Our teacher training day in Minya was terrific. We had already worked closely with all of the teachers when they helped us set up the Classmate PCs in their schools, so everyone was very friendly, comfortable and engaged. Ali and Dina led the training in Arabic until the class was broken into small groups and Max, Leroy and I helped those who spoke the most English. Taking and writing quizzes was a big hit as well as drawing and controlling Classmates from the teacher laptop. It was a lot of information and when I checked-in with one small group who had created large Arabic words on their screens they told me it said, “Khalasna” or “We have finished.” They were done for the day. When I asked Ehab, a computer teacher, how he was enjoying the class he said, “It is a very good class. Very good information. But the teachers are CRAZY!”
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