Nebula Global Services launches road to 'NebZero'

Nebula CMO Richard Eglon gave CRN the scoop on the services firm’s rejuvenated sustainability strategy

New year, new look for Nebula Global Services which has debuted its brand new website equipped with its roadmap to net zero.

Launched today, the services firm is proudly highlighting its sustainability strategy, aptly named ‘NebZero', to help the wider channel community be greener.

Nebula has spent the last six months building this from the ground up, aligning with the UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

There are 17 SDGs in total, and following a materiality assessment shared with its leadership team, staff, partners and customers, Nebula aligned with the three that are relevant to its community - Decent Work and Economic Growth, Responsible Consumption and Production, and Climate Action.

These questionnaires and surveys allow the Wokingham-based company to serve not just itself but its people.

"What it's enabled us to do is have a very clearly defined conversation with that channel community asking, ‘what are your SDGs? What's important to you?'", Nebula CMO Richard Eglon explains to CRN.

Tackling scope 3

One of Nebula's core sustainability commitments centres around tracking the travel of its 7,400 global technical experts from home or the office to the customer site, and how they travel.

This falls under the Responsible Consumption and Production SDG and also helps Nebula tackle its scope 3 emissions.

"The point there is, if we can start tracking scope 3 as one example, when we get that fully operational, we can say to an MSP, reseller or GSI, ‘what would it mean to you if we can give you this information as part of the service we deliver to feed that into your customer, helping you to differentiate?

"So, collectively, we all start tracking and becoming responsible for the CO2 impact of the service."

Eglon tells CRN some of Nebula's sustainability goals for this year include adding more ISOs to its best practice around governance, as well as looking into programmes such as EcoVadis.

"However, our main focus is tracking our engineers carbon footprint on a global scale," he says.

"Once we can get a mechanism in place, that comprehensively tracks their impact from a CO2 perspective, and we understand that baseline, we can then start adding value to the value chain for our customers and their end user customers, respectively."

The key to being local

Nebula's new six-step approach to sustainability includes a piece that has been integral to the group since day one, local services.

"This is about understanding local communities in-country because we're using resources that are local to those communities," Eglon explains.

"By using in-country resource, especially in less developed areas, you rely less on flying in expensive, overseas engineers who don't understand local nuances.

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"It's about doing the right thing for the environment, alongside retaining investment in-territory."

"You want talented, local people to be benefitting from the investment and making a difference to their communities.

"That's one of the six steps, for example."

What is lacking in sustainability?

One thing Eglon wants to see more of in the tech world for sustainability is increased governance to help propel other companies forward.

"The one thing that is lacking at the moment is governance.

"What I mean by that is there's no consistent framework to track. There's a framework to get your latest ISO, for example.

"But around sustainability at the moment, it's very siloed. It's very disconnected. And I don't think there's a collective strategy in the channel.

"I think we need some government legislation and some other help in the tech industry to really drive this area forward."

‘We're stronger together'

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Nebula CMO, Richard Eglon

Eglon urges firms who want to follow suit to "start small" and "set achievable goals."

"That's important because it's the only way you'll get people to adopt and embrace sustainability within the business and the community that you serve.

"And celebrate success when you get it and share that with people to help them on that journey."

He sounds off by reminding the industry that this isn't an individual effort.

"We've got to do it as a collective.

"The value chain, which is the channel, is only as strong as the weakest link.

"This is about transparency. It's about building a sustainable community. It's about sharing best practice. It's not about holding onto your crown jewels, because if people are naive enough to think they can do it on their own, they're kidding themselves.

"We've got to get into the mindset of we're stronger together."