Green IT Maturity: developing a framework based on practices and actions

In a society whose issues related to sustainability have become increasingly important, the IT area has been responsible for some of the environmental problems that society faces. In this context, Green IT appears as a way of combining available resources to sustainable and economic policies in organizations, generating benefits for the environment and business. The adoption of Green IT practices may create value for companies and society. This study aimed to develop and validate a tool which is able to assess the organizational maturity of Green IT, identifying the main practices adopted and the different components that influence the way organizations have addressed environmental sustainability in the IT field. The framework proposed in this study has suggested four constructs to assess the organizational maturity of Green IT: socio environmental awareness of the organization; sustainable actions applied to IT field; IT activities monitoring; and search and update of approaches regarding the use of IT. Results are expected to motivate not only students but also practitioners who study and implement different Green IT initiatives, so that organizations can become more efficient and effective and commit to the planet conservation, as well.