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Sustainability: The Hitachi Energy women factor

What does sustainability mean to women, and how do they contribute to this movement? Is there a women perspective to it?

Sustainability has become a major priority for governments and corporations across the world and the Middle East, with ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) indexing becoming a norm to measure growth rather than an exception these days. What does sustainability mean to women, and how do they contribute to this movement? Is there a women perspective to it?

Speaking in the context of the International Women’s Day, Dr. Mostafa AlGuezeri, Managing Director of Hitachi Energy for the UAE, Gulf, Near East and Pakistan, said, “I believe that we should all actively involve ourselves in the efforts to level up sustainable leadership for both women and men in the society. All of us should work towards identifying our own strength and capabilities and use that for the benefit of the humanity by enhancing the quality of people’s life.“

“At Hitachi Energy, we empowered our women leaders by creating higher visibility of their contribution. Their role has been massive in leading the sustainability practices and transforming Hitachi Energy into an environment-conscious company with a carbon-neutral energy strategy,“ he added.

The global energy leader is committed to advancing a sustainable energy future for al, with electricity as the backbone. Combined with this, the company is committed to a Diversity 360 mindset, which encompoasses not only gender equality but all areas of diversity & inclusion.

For Christina Avdou of Solution Line Sales (SLS) Grid Edge Solutions of Hitachi Energy, women take to sustainability naturally as strength and compassion blend in them. “With our strength today meshed with our underlying compassion and nurturing nature, we can play a selfless role and do out of the box thinking.“

From a professional point of view, Christina’s role in Hitachi Energy allows her to contribute to the cause. She works on their Grid Edge Solutions portfolio, which is highly linked to renewables and sustainability across all market segments, facilitating integration with a range of microgrids including wind, solar and hydro to electric mobility.

”Our collective actions influence our future. To me personally, sustainability means the act of sustaining. We possess finite resources, but we tend to treat it as if our resources were infinite,“ says Miriam Jarrouj, who is a Global marketing and sales specialist in Hitachi Energy.

She says that attention must be paid on how we handle the resources and influence time, energy, emotions and thoughts beyond talks about sustainable practices in the context of saving the planet and the environment.

”We can view sustainability as an approach to perpetually create value and growth without harming the planet and the lives of people around us. We are working on creating practices and processes that run automatically, and can be sustained with little effort and that ultimately create value for our customers. We still have a long journey ahead of us but we are intentionally making steps to apply sustainable practices,“ says Miriam.

Elaborating on the women‘s perspective, she points to behavioural and psychological studies which show that women possess high levels of emotional intelligence allowing them the ability to analyze complex problems. “For women to thrive and lead, we need to continue the journey to sustainably develop them and ensure they are placed in key decision making roles. A prosperous environment starts with a diverse and inclusive workplace where women as well as men are seen to be driving together from the front.“

For Sandrine Troeira, who works as the Head of Contract Manager Grid Integration in the MEA region, the core of sustainability, despite various defenitions, is the goal to build a better world for all and the future generations. “Building Sustainability on natural, economic and social resources, and including women’s place in the society, will develop a better world for everyone.“

For over 15 years, Sandrine has been working in the power business, typically seen as a men’s forte, but she vouches that there has been an amazing evolution in this vertical in welcoming women.

”I encourage women to take more responsibilities and coach them to reveal their leadership skills. Being a woman, I know how difficult it can be to find a good balance between career/family, and my role is to share my experience on this and develop their way of working to find the right balance,“ she says.

Specifically for women, Sandrine believes diversity at the workplace plays a key role. ”By having gender diversity, we can only benefit from a pluralism of thoughts. Women have the technical knowledge and are strong decision makers. By giving us more confidence and more visibility, we will build a sustainable world,” Sandrine avers. — business@khaleejtimes.com