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Digital transformation and UN sustainability goals linked in new whitepaper by IIC and IoT Alliance Australia

June 23, 2020

Posted by: Anasia D'mello

The Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) and IoT Alliance Australia (IoTAA), have jointly published the How Digital Transformation and IoT Can Contribute to the UN Sustainable Development Goals White Paper.

The whitepaper illustrates how digital transformation can support relevant United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDG) by including them in the strategic planning and execution of digital transformation activities. The white paper also advocates using a model-driven approach to define and execute a digital transformation strategy.

Formed in July 2016, the IoT Alliance Australia (IoTAA) is an industry body representing IoT in Australia with more than 420 participating organisations and 800 individual participants working to accelerate the adoption of IoT across the Australian economic and societal benefit.

The Industrial Internet Consortium is a global membership programme transforming business and society by accelerating the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). The IIC delivers a trustworthy IIoT in which the world’s systems and devices are securely connected and controlled to deliver transformational outcomes. The Industrial Internet Consortium is a program of the Object Management Group (OMG).

“UN Sustainable Development Goals provide a framework for an organisation to improve their environmental impact, health and social justice, but the framework doesn’t provide guidance on how to build the goals into corporate strategy or demonstrate how digital transformation can help in achieving those goals,” says Peter Klement, IIC Member, associate partner, DXC Technology, and one of the authors of the white paper. “This white paper provides a high-level approach to embed UN SDGs into the strategic digital transformation initiatives of every organisation.”

UN SDGs include 17 interconnected goals to achieve a better and more sustainable future to protect the planet, ensure public health and help economies prosper by 2030. An organisation can impact the outcome of its digital transformation initiative by using UN SDGs to shape the business strategy and goals.

Strategy tools, such as Object Management Group Business Motivation Model (BMM) and the Balanced Score Card (BSC), can help an organisation incorporate UN SDGs into their existing strategy planning and execution frameworks. A Digital Architecture Model helps an organisation document its current and future business operating models and its technology landscape, and the associated strategic architecture roadmap.

“By using modelling tools and UN SDGs to strategise and refine their business practices, an organisation can then answer such questions as, “How will my service or operation benefit sustainability or how can I engineer the best sustainability outcome of my design or implementation?” comments Frank Zeichner, CEO, IoTAA & Knowledge Economy Institute, and one of the authors of the white paper. “This combination has already proven successful in industrial operations, protecting the health and safety of operators and reducing the carbon footprint of diesel generators, to name a few examples.”

The How Digital Transformation and IoT Can Contribute to the UN Sustainable Development Goals White Paper is publicly available.

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