It’s fairly accepted that the use of fossil fuels is damaging our environment. Moving away from those energy sources and transitioning to renewable, sustainable energy sources is humankind’s best chance at slowing or even reversing the damage already caused. This past year also saw an energy crisis unfold in much of Europe. Russia’s invasion of
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It’s fairly accepted that the use of fossil fuels is damaging our environment. Moving away from those energy sources and transitioning to renewable, sustainable energy sources is humankind’s best chance at slowing or even reversing the damage already caused.

This past year also saw an energy crisis unfold in much of Europe. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and their subsequent slowdown in oil delivery through the Nord Stream pipeline had European governments concerned. The shutdown intensified when the pipeline ruptured in September. November saw only 1.86 Bcm of oil delivered to Europe in 2022, far below the 10.09 Bcm delivered during the same period in 2021.

We still don’t know the extent of the European Union’s energy crisis. Reserves are depleting, prices are increasing, and according to the World Economic Forum, this is causing “significant harm to consumers.”

European leaders are talking about energy independence from Russia. On March 8, 2022, they released a plan that would make Europe independent of Russian fossil fuels by 2030. Called the REPowerEU concept, the plan seeks to diversify gas supplies, increase renewable gases, and boost energy savings.

The upshot of this crisis is world leaders are increasing their investment and reliance on sustainable energy sources. In 2021, we saw 173.5 GW in new solar capacity. That was expected to increase by another 260 GW in 2022.

Current State of Renewable Energy and Impact of Data

The renewable energy industry is growing by approximately 20% every year. This rapid acceleration combines wind energy, solar power, hydropower, and bioenergy sources. Interestingly, data is playing a major role in developing new energy sources.

Data is allowing solar and wind farms to increase efficiency. The insights offered by data sources allow these industrial complexes to make adjustments to their daily operations. Data is also helping these energy plants to get more out of every solar panel and wind turbine.

One key area where data helps is forecasting the weather. Artificial intelligence (AI) combined with weather satellites and predictive analytics help predict the amount of energy that will be generated. This estimation is essential in integrating solar energy into the power grid.

Big data is also being used to plan better wind and solar farm installations. It helps optimize the number of panels or turbines needed to generate the maximum output for a given facility. This helps reduce the cost of building these facilities by eliminating waste and unnecessary development expenses.

Optimizing Renewable Energy Resources in 2023

There are a few tools we are going to see more of in 2023 that will optimize performance and increase output. First, the AI technology connected to renewable energy sources is improving and becoming more accessible to the average energy farm.

Plant owners and managers are gaining increased access to reliable, relevant, and current information to make data-driven decisions. For example, an effective AI platform connected to a solar farm can help identify underperforming solar panels by analyzing the volume of energy being generated. From there, it can analyze whether the investment to fix the problem is cost-effective, and finally, it can explain how to fix the problem.

These sophisticated diagnostics are typically transparent. They are used to increase the daily energy harvest, reduce the cost of maintenance, and increase energy farm profit margins.

This year will also focus more on cleaning solar panels to generate more energy. Our research has shown that cleaning solar panels helps generate up to a 30% increase in energy yield. We expect to see robots being deployed for these cleaning missions, which will help increase capacity.

Renewable energy storage is another challenge that we believe will be addressed in the coming year. At this point, electricity companies limit the amount of energy that it receives. Any energy created above that capacity is lost.

This may result in a few different scenarios. The most obvious one would be some storage solution, either controlled by the electric company or the energy farm. As more energy is needed, the stored energy could be transferred to the electric company for reselling.

However, a more interesting solution might come via the Internet of Things (IoT) combined with the Internet of Energy. This could create a decentralized energy market, where industrial buildings or neighborhoods buy their energy directly from energy farms and store it until it’s needed. The technology layer controlling the energy can make real-time, data-driven decisions to drive energy efficiency and improve the customer experience.

Prioritizing Sustainable Energy Sources

According to the World Economic Forum, nearly 20% of the world’s carbon emissions come from manufacturing facilities. Even more astounding, they consume 54% of the world’s energy sources. This double blow to the earth’s environment needs to be significantly reduced.

As we move through 2023 and into 2024, developing sustainable, replenishable energy sources is one way that manufacturing plants can reduce their environmental impact. Manufacturing companies need to look into ways to invest in sustainable energy. For example, many plants have large roofs on their plants and large parking areas for their employees. Both these areas can be enhanced to support large sections of solar panels.

These facilities can produce electricity on their own, eliminating their need to use the world’s limited resources. The AI technology and automated cleaning tools discussed earlier can help these plants optimize their energy yield by up to 30%. While every plant has different energy needs, many manufacturing facilities would be capable of becoming energy self-sufficient.

The return on investment for these facilities will be paid back in three ways. First, by developing their own power sources, businesses will save significantly on their operating expenses. Second, as they move toward becoming a green manufacturing plant, they will have opportunities to work with new markets that prioritize green manufacturing. Finally, they can use their new green status as a marketing engine to reach new customers and grow sales.

How Governments Can Enhance their Energy Independence

While it takes large tracts of open space to create wind energy or powerful water currents to develop hydroelectricity, every home, building, and available space can be used to capture solar power.

Regional and national governments and municipalities should put solar energy generation high on their list of priorities for 2023 and beyond. They can offer tax credits, subsidies, and other incentives, as well as change zooming laws where required, to encourage the construction of solar panels on every residential home and apartment building.

Governments should also encourage commercial establishments, from office buildings to shopping centers, to invest in their own solar energy micro facilities.

These government-led efforts won’t change things immediately, but they can go a long way toward creating energy-independent homes, businesses, cities, regions, and countries. Massive coverage of rooftops will take some investment, but it will democratize energy, improve the environment, and reduce the hold international oil suppliers have on other countries.

Of course, this type of change requires a change in public policy. Research has shown that fiscal incentives help stimulate radical innovation in renewable energy. Germany created one of the first renewable energy tariff programs in Europe. The program helps the industry turn into a cost-effective program. When the state decided to drop its feed-in tariff levels, the market was large enough and stable enough that it wasn’t noticeably affected.

Building on Change for Renewable Energy

Globally, there were over 300 gigawatts of renewable energy created in 2022. This is a positive step forward, but unfortunately, it is just a small step.

In 2021, the world’s total energy supply was 14,500 gigawatts, which means that renewable energy makes up about 2% of the world’s energy supply. We need to see significant R&D and investment from the world’s governments if we will make a lasting dent in our reliance on fossil fuels.

There are several countries leading the way forward with renewable energy. Renewable energy provided Germany with 49% of its energy use in the first half of 2022. Costa Rica, Scotland, Norway, Uruguay, and Iceland’s energy use is nearly 100% renewable. These success stories are built on commitments from governments to get started and eventually are taken over by the private sector.

This past year showed positive signs toward the expansion of renewable energy. We need to continue to build on those successes as we move ahead into the future.

Featured Image Credit:  Provided by the Author; CEO of BladeRanger; Thank you!

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Instant messaging is changing how business gets done. If your organization uses an instant messaging program like Slack or Microsoft Teams or even consumer messaging platforms like WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal, etc., you can attest to the communication and productivity benefits. (Or maybe you can’t — more on that in a moment.) Studies show that approximately
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Instant messaging is changing how business gets done. If your organization uses an instant messaging program like Slack or Microsoft Teams or even consumer messaging platforms like WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal, etc., you can attest to the communication and productivity benefits. (Or maybe you can’t — more on that in a moment.)

Studies show that approximately 23 billion instant messages (IMs) get sent each day globally. That’s nearly 300,000 per second. Some of these qualify as personal, but many (perhaps most) occur during the regular course of business.

What many might not realize is that their business IM software could be putting their organization at risk. Traditional IM clients aren’t designed for truly compliant communication, a key vulnerability for businesses in highly regulated industries like healthcare, insurance and finance. They’re difficult, maybe impossible, to moderate. They have serious and perhaps insurmountable weaknesses around data auditing and retention. And even if we set all these issues aside, traditional business IM clients are only as secure as the devices they’re used on.

So, the natural solution is to return to “email-first” communication, right?

Probably not. But you may need a more secure business instant messaging solution, like SayHey Messenger®. Before we dive into how SayHey can help your organization address its data security challenges, let’s take a closer look at where traditional business IM solutions fall short.

The Issue with the Status Quo

Traditional business instant messaging solutions seem convenient and capable — and they are for the most part. But when it comes to data security, hidden vulnerabilities lurk just beneath the surface. Here are some of those common issues that can contribute to serious data security risk.

User Management Issues: How much control do you have over your IM app’s users? If you’re using Slack or Microsoft Teams, you can add, remove, and change user permissions, but you have limited control over the types of content your users can share and virtually no content moderation ability. To begin with, this is a potential regulatory nightmare, as untethered users are liable to say and share things that land them (and your organization) in legal hot water. It’s also a serious threat to your DEI program and could lower employee morale or increase attrition. If your company is using the previously listed “consumer style” messaging apps, you of course have absolutely no user management or safeguards.

Data Management Issues: Other IM apps have some data management controls, but determined end-users can circumvent them fairly easily. And if your team is using a consumer messaging app like WhatsApp, iMessage, or Signal, you have zero control over message content and metadata.

Additional Status Quo Issues:

Data Security Issues: Traditional business messaging tools are “secure” only in the sense that they’re password-protected and allow private groups or channels. They don’t encrypt message data. And, they store said data in ways and places that may or may not comply with applicable laws (e.g., GDPR). Meanwhile, consumer messaging apps that do use encryption can’t police end-user behavior or keep user devices from falling into the wrong hands. End-to-end encryption is only as good as the humans who use it.

Industry-Specific Compliance Issues: General-purpose business messaging apps aren’t built for industry-specific compliance regimes, such as HIPAA (healthcare) and PCI (finance). At least, not the off-the-shelf versions. Encrypted apps do a better job of protecting message data, but they’re inherently difficult to audit. This causes a different set of compliance challenges.

It’s Not 2013 Anymore

Can you get around these problems simply by choosing not to make a choice? In other words, can you pretend it’s 2013 again while trying to skate by with your email client, Zoom, in-person conversations, and old-fashioned voice phone calls?

Unfortunately, no. Remote work is far more prevalent than a decade ago, or even just a few years ago. Even in the in-person environments, workspaces are more fragmented than they used to be.

Email, even new-and-improved, all-in-one clients, isn’t powerful enough to support your far-flung team’s needs. Neither is Zoom or your preferred video conferencing solution. Both have the same compliance and risk management issues, anyway.

The Biggest Data Security Risk for Your Business is Sitting in Your Pocket

Your employees will work around the absence of an organization-wide IM solution, one way or another. They’ll adopt a “bring your own” approach to messaging, using personal iMessage, WhatsApp, or carrier SMS clients to achieve the same results. Needless to say, this is not a cybersecurity best practice, and in fact, it’s even worse than using a traditional business IM solution.

7T, the company behind SayHey Messenger know all this, and they’ve put a great deal of effort into building a messaging tool that addresses these issues. When used properly and deployed across your entire organization, SayHey Messenger’s mobile and Web messaging clients can mitigate the data security risks you face every day.

How SayHey Messenger® Mitigates Data Security Risk

SayHey Messenger’s core features and capabilities support stringent data security protocols and regulatory compliance regimes across diverse industries and legal jurisdictions:

Total Data Sovereignty: As a SayHey Messenger admin, you have total ownership and control over your organization’s data. Users can’t delete original messages, as with consumer messaging apps.

Comprehensive Audit Trail: SayHey encrypts and stores all messaging data in a secure, scalable AWS environment, where it’s available for auditing whenever. Super-granular auditing tools simplify the actual process. This allows you to sort and export real-time data. This also allows you to organize reports around topics, keywords, users, or specific message threads.

Complete Moderation Toolset: SayHey offers a keyword-based, automated moderation toolset. It’s an easy, low-maintenance way to flag and remove problematic messages and remain compliant with both external legal requirements (e.g., labor laws) and internal protocols (e.g., DEI frameworks). Users can also flag messages that may violate company policies, making your moderation job that much easier.

Scalable, Cross-Organization Communication With SayHey Spaces: SayHey Spaces enables company-wide communications and collaboration within smaller groups. It’s the sort of tool that can help fix persistent communication challenges within your organization, which isn’t necessarily a data security issue. But, it’s also useful for communicating key compliance messages or supporting general data hygiene initiatives as well.

Engagement and User Adoption: This is where Slack and to some extent Teams, have let their user base down. Their platforms are very complex and have consistently low user adoption rates to such a degree that quite often, employees skirt their use for familiar consumer platforms. In turn, this leaves the user back at square one. SayHey Messenger was designed with an intuitive, consumer style frontend for incredible adoption rates.

Who Is SayHey Messenger For?

SayHey Messenger is useful for virtually any organization with real-time communication needs and data security challenges that — in their experience — neither consumer nor enterprise instant messaging solutions can adequately address. This includes firms that:

Need to more effectively manage a hybrid or remote workforce that’s currently working with a hodgepodge of “bring your own” communications tools and enterprise-grade IM solution(s) without adequate data protections
Operate in highly regulated industries with strict regulatory compliance obligations and intense internal data auditing needs
Want to maintain full control of their data, including message content and history
Have intensive message moderation needs, whether due to regulatory compliance requirements or internal policies (e.g., DEI frameworks)
Have high internal collaboration needs built around messaging software
Have struggled to drive user adoption of other messaging clients or data security tools

SayHey Messenger can be deployed in one of two ways that best fit your organization:

SayHey Messenger Business is an independent mobile app and web app. This way, you and your colleagues can communicate from anywhere. Complete with what makes your company unique. This includes branding, logos, colors, and any other designs that will make it your own. Within days, it rapidly deploys through a secure cloud environment which allows for a quick launch.

SayHey Messenger Enterprise is a messaging platform specifically for businesses that integrates into the software system you likely already use, be it as CRM, ERP, or any other platform–including mobile– that your company uses. You can deploy it from your own secure private cloud environment. By doing so, you’ll have the customizations to suit your company’s unique workflows and processes. These include SSO and Active Directory integrations.

This exciting, emerging IM tool can’t work miracles. Like all business software, it’s only as effective as its users (and admins) allow it to be.

Yet, SayHey Messenger’s data security capabilities represent a clear improvement on the status quo. If that status quo isn’t working for your organization right now, perhaps it’s time for a change.

Featured Image Credit: Christina Morillo; Pexels; Thanks!

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It can be challenging to keep track of time zones. Even though we’ve tried to reinvent time zones, we still can’t agree on a universal system. However, it’s usually not a problem since everyone knows their region’s time zone. For example, the difference between East and West is three hours in the United States. Easy, right?
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It can be challenging to keep track of time zones. Even though we’ve tried to reinvent time zones, we still can’t agree on a universal system.

However, it’s usually not a problem since everyone knows their region’s time zone. For example, the difference between East and West is three hours in the United States. Easy, right?

But what if you’re working with a remote team that’s spread all over the world?

When you have a colleague in Portugal and another in India, it’s harder to keep track of time. Additionally, team members can find it harder to collaborate in an asynchronous environment, and it can take a while for them to adjust. Moreover, scheduling meetings can be difficult, inconveniencing those who have to attend, especially early in the morning or late in the evening.

Suffice it to say, when working with teammates in different time zones, finding a good time for a meeting is a constant battle full of compromises.

However, from a business standpoint, it is hard to argue against operating across multiple time zones. In spite of the challenges, the upsides far outweigh the drawbacks. One advantage is that you can draw on a broader and more diverse pool of talent and skills. In addition, you can essentially operate round-the-clock.

You can, however, overcome these challenges with the right tools and approaches.

1. Immediately notify third parties of your location.

You should immediately let people know what time zone you live in. When introducing yourself, let your colleagues know your schedule and preferred communication channels. You can also use this opportunity to set boundaries. Give an example of a situation when you’re able to be contacted — even though you’re off-the-clock.

Having trouble communicating your schedule? Consider sharing your online calendar with your peers,

Or, you could drop your calendar link into your online profiles. Why? You can avoid misunderstandings by making your office hours visible in your email signature, work chat profile, LinkedIn account, and Google profile.

Also, don’t forget to update them whenever necessary. You are responsible for sharing any changes in your schedule, whether you are switching shifts or clocking out early.

2. Clearly communicate time zone boundaries.

You need to help your people communicate clearly their preferred work hours and set boundaries with the teams they work with, regardless of whether they’re located outside of your main office or working on a hybrid team. A shared team calendar might be helpful as everyone can see each other’s availability.

It is equally important for managers to schedule meetings within their teams’ working hours. Be sure that your entire team is able to find times that work for all of them. Make sure you don’t let your dispersed team members hop on a call at 7 am just because it’s convenient for you.

For improved transparency and better coordination, use a tool that lets team members share their work calendars. The best way to close any cultural communication gaps is to facilitate an open discussion about working hours and expectations. Encourage your employees to block off time for lunch breaks and refrain from checking work emails or Slack messages outside of business hours.

3. Decide on a fair time for meetings.

When working across time zones, it is important to set fair meeting times. After all, no one wants to get up at 5 a.m. for a check-in or stay up late for a meeting at 10 p.m. if it’s outside of their normal working hours.

In short, make sure you take everyone’s time zone into account when setting meeting times. What if there isn’t a way to make meeting times fair for everyone? In order to avoid inconveniencing the same people repeatedly, you may want to rotate the start time.

4. Understanding the difference between synchronous and asynchronous communication.

Sync and async communication are important to understand when working with a distributed team.

The process of synchronized communication (“sync”) allows colleagues to respond and provide feedback in real-time. You can do this via phone calls, video chats, or even using an instant messaging platform like Slack or Microsoft Teams.

Async communication, on the other hand, refers to sending information at different times and delaying the delivery. Examples would be sending an email or leaving a voice message for them to respond to whenever it’s convenient for them.

Take advantage of async whenever possible.

Whenever possible, it’s important to develop the ability to communicate asynchronously when working remotely. No matter where your whole team is located and what time zone or geography separates you, effective async communication allows you to stay connected effectively.

Tips for async communication:

Every request should begin with what you need and why you need it. By being upfront, others will know what type of commitment you expect.
Send a Loom video instead of a meeting to discuss information and solicit feedback. When responding, people can send it in text format or by uploading their own Loom video.
Invite people to comment and collaborate on documents such as Google Docs.
You can schedule in-person meetings using meeting scheduling software or something like Doodle to find the best time for everyone.

5. Consider split shifts or workdays that accommodate different time zones.

Suppose you work in one country but half your team is located in another. Consider working a half-day at the office and then working remotely one or more days a week at night or early in the morning. Often called split shifts, this involves working part of the day during your time zone, then working part of the day during the time zone of another team.

With a split schedule, you can be more available for meetings with colleagues in different time zones without ignoring your local team. Furthermore, you will be able to stay in touch with your international department without staying up all night.

What if you work in two time zones that don’t intersect much? Rather than working the same number of hours consecutively, split your shift into two.

As an alternative, you may decide to work on another international team’s schedule for a few days each week. For example, you could work on days that are convenient for European, Middle Eastern, and African regions (EMEA). As such, you begin work at 6 a.m. However, you would be done by 3 p.m. Simply book a full-day event with the title “EMEA hours: 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. EST” in order to avoid being booked by people in your time zone.

6. Specify dates and times clearly.

If there are different time zones represented within the discussion, try to be as precise as possible regarding times and dates. When referring to a specific time, everyone reading your message needs to be aware of it.

As an example, asking, “can we meet next Wednesday at 11 a.m. your time?” is not as good as asking, “can we meet next Wednesday at 11 a.m. EST time?”

For everyone to understand the different times, use a simple timezone converter tool.

Make sure not to mix up AM and PM times or use roman numerals when writing in a foreign language. Despite sounding like a small detail, this can cause confusion and unnecessary stress.

Bonus tip: Decide which time zone to use.

Even though you should still be aware of the time zones of others, setting one official time zone for your company can help reduce misunderstandings.

Meetings can be set up according to each manager’s personal time zone, leaving everyone scrambling to come up with their own time zone. Having an official time zone means everyone will set and communicate deadlines and meetings using the same time zone, regardless of their location. By doing this, employees can quickly determine the time difference between their location and their office.

7. Set up internal wikis.

Real-time information and context shouldn’t be limited to one-off videos and screen captures. Notion, Confluence, and even Google Drive can all be used to document best practices and processes on an internal wiki.

Documentation isn’t the only thing you can do with wikis. Using them is also an effective way to share meeting notes, create consensus and gather feedback. As a result of creating a wiki, you’ll be able to create transparency and stimulate a continuous flow of ideas and feedback.

8. Use an online calendar.

It is common to waste a lot of time waiting for confirmation when booking appointments or meetings with remote team members..A time zone difference makes it even more difficult to get a real-time response. You will likely not hear from the other parties until the next business day if they live on the other side of the world. An email exchange might even take a week to nail down an appointment.

Thankfully, tools like Google Calendar and Calendar solve this problem.

Take Calendar, for example.

Calendar searches the open time slots in your connected calendars when you need to schedule a meeting. Adding or removing times and selecting meeting length are customizable options. It is also possible to include meeting location options like a physical address, phone number, or Zoom link.

Your availability can be emailed to meeting attendees once you’ve made your preferences. By clicking on a time, they can reserve it, and Calendar will add it to your calendar and email the meeting attendees.

9. Avoid micromanagement and set appropriate expectations.

Reconfiguring expectations around work means working across time zones as well. Your employees may not be able to get immediate responses to their requests due to the time difference. To help remote colleagues feel respected, they should determine the urgency of a task before sending instant messages or emails. By doing that, they will feel more appreciated at work, less stressed, and more satisfied.

Another great way for people to stay in touch with colleagues is to schedule emails or instant messages to arrive during work hours. Messages can be scheduled in advance on many communication platforms if they need to be sent before or after work hours.

Provide these tools to your employees so they can use them effectively. As a result, you’ll be able to close any cultural communication gaps, which will lead to a more respectful and productive work environment.

10. Be aware of cultural norms.

It’s important to understand the cultural norms and traditions of the countries in which your company has remote workers. They may work different hours, celebrate different holidays, or communicate differently due to these cultural differences.

In order to create a cohesive team, it is important to demonstrate an understanding of cultural differences.

11. Be patient if you need to send an unscheduled message.

Emails and messages shouldn’t be sent right when colleagues are waking up or going to bed in different time zones. As a result, many global employees will snooze their instant message notifications when they have finished working or turn off their work devices when they are done working.

Requiring that your teammates are always available does not create a good company culture and might hurt morale. You can avoid this by minimizing your messaging after hours and being patient if you don’t get an immediate answer. It is likely that a truly great teammate will contact you when they start to work the next day.

12. Have fun with face time.

Coordinating across time zones can be challenging. However, it is well worth taking the time to have fun as well as talk about work.

Relationships foster trust, increase collaboration and boost productivity in any work environment. For remote teams, though, this is especially important. Having a social relationship with colleagues does more than just combat isolation. Furthermore, it reduces barriers to asking questions, getting help, and taking risks.

Take time to grab virtual coffees with your teammates one-on-one or in small groups, and schedule online game nights for the entire team. Consider providing a dial-in option for events like a holiday party or quarterly social if your team is partially remote. It’s even possible to take your Meeting Owl to happy hour if you wish.

In either case, make sure your remote employees receive a special treat, such as cookies. You can also give them a budget to buy their own refreshments, so they feel like they’re a part of the party.

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Featured Image Credit: Cottonbro Studio; Pexels; Thank you!

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