I’m a TEDTalk addict I’m that guy the
one who sends random TED talk links to
unsuspecting family friends co-workers
they love it they tell me they love it
so why do I love TED Talks so much I’m
I’m fascinated by fascinating people I’m
a husband a father and a chief marketing
officer of a software company I have
three siblings one sibling my sister is
a nurse another sister is an accountant
and I have a brother who’s a priest much
to the dismay of my mother I was never
quite the one with the direction like
they had and I was sort of a spectator
in my own life just sort of taking
things as they came my wife and I got
married we have three wonderful
daughters a dog a house in the suburbs
and when you add in a busy work schedule
pretty much all the bandwidth that we
have is taken up we’re busy and that got
very disrupted recently this past New
Year’s Eve when I would normally be
preparing to celebrate with friends I
was preparing as was noted to go to the
South Pole and it still sounds
completely crazy when I say hell out it
started for me about 12 months ago when
I met this man Robert Swan the first man
to walk unassisted to both the North and
South Pole Robert was speaking at our
annual sales conference and we were
talking backstage and he was talking
about his upcoming expedition where
they’d be walking 600 nautical miles
which is crazy from the coast of
Antarctica to the South Pole it would be
the first expedition of its kind to rely
solely on renewable energy
if you meet Robert you quickly discover
that he’s incredibly passionate about
saving Antarctica and its natural
resources whether he’s talking to people
at the World Economic Forum in Davos or
to a group of schoolchildren in India
Roberts Channel
is for governments for companies and for
individuals to think differently about
the resources that were consuming on a
day to day basis so as we were backstage
we were talking about things and he was
talking about early in his career and
when he was working with jacques
cousteau
now if you’re my age Jacques justo
everybody I knew growing up wanted to be
jock Cousteau or spider-man and I wanted
to be both
so as Robert was sort of drawing me into
his kind of web he said you know we’re
thinking about having a couple of people
join us for the last ten percent of the
expedition to walk with us 60 nautical
miles to the South Pole do you think
you’d be interested in something like
that
he had me a jock so anybody who knows me
knows I’m pretty much willing to do
anything for a good story to tell and
anyone who knows Robert knows that he’s
sort of surrounded by this charisma
distortion field if you get too close
you get drawn in and you agree to
anything so after going back and working
out a way the combo would support and
protect all the data for the expedition
and after speaking to my wife I found
myself preparing to go to the South Pole
so how do you get to the South Pole so
for me I went from Philadelphia to Punta
Arenas Chile
once you’re there for a couple of days
preparing you board a large transport
plane like this one that looks like it’s
smiling at me that plane takes you
across into Antarctica where you land on
a giant blue ice runway you spend a
couple of days in base camp in
Antarctica and then you take a much
smaller plane to the 89th parallel to 60
nautical miles from the South Pole this
plane flying over the landscape and
landing on the ice is it’s an
undescribable feeling and when you get
out and you bring all the things around
you and you find yourself standing where
so few people in history have ever stood
it’s just incredible then that plane
takes off into the distance and actually
flies across and then
buzzes out overhead shakes its wings and
it’s gone and you find yourself standing
just surrounded by nothing but whiteness
it’s more than a little bit scary my
teammates and I between training the day
before at base camp and the next 10 days
we’re about to set off on a journey that
would be walking the distance equivalent
to three marathons on skis on ice
each dragging a 100-pound sled at an
altitude of 10,000 feet above sea level
and in wind chills approaching 40 below
zero some days it would be bright and
sunny like this where you could manage a
speedy 1.7 miles per hour and I looked
up you a turtle some turtles can walk 3
miles per hour so that’s how fast we
were going
and then other days would completely
turn the weather would change to
whiteout conditions and he’d be dropped
down to about 1 mile per hour truth be
told I loved these days it was crazy out
there it was really crazy so why did we
do this why did we go well to raise
awareness if we could survive in an area
like this the harshest place on the
planet with nothing but renewable energy
imagine what we could do back here in
our daily lives
another way that we raised awareness is
we answered questions while we were out
in this crazy place submitted from
school children from all over the world
from India from China from here in the
United States from New Zealand we were
able to communicate back using this
satellite Wi-Fi so from within our tents
at night we could send back voice
recordings low res photographs text
messages one of the questions that was
submitted that for some reason stuck
with me is do we ever think of stopping
and the real answer is yes like all the
time but when you’re out in this kind of
place and it’s hard and it’s cold but
you really don’t have any other option
but to keep on moving forward so a lot
of people since I’ve been back have said
how did this change you and before I
went a lot of folks said all this is
gonna change you a lot and I thought it
really gonna change me I knew it would
be a very good story to tell but I
didn’t think it would change me truth is
it changed me a lot when you’re out on
the ice you can’t help but think about
Robert swans challenge about resources
and when you’re preparing to go on an
expedition like this you need to make
sure that you have everything that you
need all the gear that you need and you
prepare all these things and you need to
ensure you have enough resources to
survive the journey but also you don’t
want to have too much because you’re
dragging it all on that sled behind you
so you start to be very cognizant of
resources things like gear very
sophisticated gear like socks I spent
more time staring at the sock section of
REI than I’d ever care to admit I had
people coming up trying to help me and
it was terrible then things like food
we’ve all heard of the South Beach Diet
I was sort of on a South Pole diet I was
consuming 6,000 calories a day which is
about 12 Big Macs in a lot of M&Ms and I
lost 15 pounds in ten days because I was
burning about 10,000 calories a day
things like water a lot of people don’t
think of it this way but Antarctica is
really just a frozen desert and like any
desert conditions dehydration is a real
concern
so each morning and each evening we had
to melt enough ice in order to provide
for three liters of water in the evening
and three liters in the morning for each
person this is a solar ice melter that
we were testing for NASA when I think
about my time out on the ice and the
expedition and I see all these pictures
I’m reminded that it was just such an
incredible opportunity to go to the
South Pole and when you have the
opportunity to go to the South Pole and
you leave the South Pole something I
learned is it just never really leaves
you and Robert swans challenge has been
just haunting me really the challenge of
how did we think differently working
with governments the companies we work
for and
individuals about the resources that we
consume so I sort of took this on as a
personal challenge in the four months
that I’ve been back I started looking at
ways that I can start to act on that
challenge so first with government I
reached out to my local environmental
advisory council and met with one of the
local leaders and she talked to me about
what they’re doing to protect the local
watershed and ways I can get involved
it’s amazing things happening that I
just wasn’t aware of then my company
combo CommVault works in data centers
with our customers all around the world
what many people don’t realize the data
centers consume enormous amounts of
energy in fact if you took all the data
centers around the world and you added
them together they consume more energy
than the entire airline industry if the
IT sector was a country it would be the
third largest consumer of energy after
China in the United States so calm bolts
bringing together experts from partners
from customers and from third parties to
look at ways that we can lower the
average data centers carbon footprint so
what about me as an individual what have
I done differently well I’m very happy
to say that I’ve just completed
officially today one month without this
single-use plastic it’s not as easy as
it sounds if it even sounds easy next
time you go to a grocery store look
around it’s everywhere we’re surrounded
by it even things we do in our daily
lives so we don’t necessarily think
about like brushing our teeth I’ve spent
the last month brushing my teeth with a
bamboo toothbrush that’s compostable I
started making my own toothpaste out of
but it doesn’t use plastic 80% of the
world’s plastic pollution is single-use
plastic in 2016 at the World Economic
Forum they announced research that was
showing that if plastic pollution
continues at the current rate by the
year 2050 they’ll be more plastic in the
oceans than fish so what’s my message
it’s simple you don’t have to go to the
South Pole to make a difference anybody
can make a difference if we choose to be
participants instead of spectators so
whatever your passion whether you find
it or like me it finds you if you’re
open to the opportunities and you jump
in we all benefit thank you [Applause]
one who sends random TED talk links to
unsuspecting family friends co-workers
they love it they tell me they love it
so why do I love TED Talks so much I’m
I’m fascinated by fascinating people I’m
a husband a father and a chief marketing
officer of a software company I have
three siblings one sibling my sister is
a nurse another sister is an accountant
and I have a brother who’s a priest much
to the dismay of my mother I was never
quite the one with the direction like
they had and I was sort of a spectator
in my own life just sort of taking
things as they came my wife and I got
married we have three wonderful
daughters a dog a house in the suburbs
and when you add in a busy work schedule
pretty much all the bandwidth that we
have is taken up we’re busy and that got
very disrupted recently this past New
Year’s Eve when I would normally be
preparing to celebrate with friends I
was preparing as was noted to go to the
South Pole and it still sounds
completely crazy when I say hell out it
started for me about 12 months ago when
I met this man Robert Swan the first man
to walk unassisted to both the North and
South Pole Robert was speaking at our
annual sales conference and we were
talking backstage and he was talking
about his upcoming expedition where
they’d be walking 600 nautical miles
which is crazy from the coast of
Antarctica to the South Pole it would be
the first expedition of its kind to rely
solely on renewable energy
if you meet Robert you quickly discover
that he’s incredibly passionate about
saving Antarctica and its natural
resources whether he’s talking to people
at the World Economic Forum in Davos or
to a group of schoolchildren in India
Roberts Channel
is for governments for companies and for
individuals to think differently about
the resources that were consuming on a
day to day basis so as we were backstage
we were talking about things and he was
talking about early in his career and
when he was working with jacques
cousteau
now if you’re my age Jacques justo
everybody I knew growing up wanted to be
jock Cousteau or spider-man and I wanted
to be both
so as Robert was sort of drawing me into
his kind of web he said you know we’re
thinking about having a couple of people
join us for the last ten percent of the
expedition to walk with us 60 nautical
miles to the South Pole do you think
you’d be interested in something like
that
he had me a jock so anybody who knows me
knows I’m pretty much willing to do
anything for a good story to tell and
anyone who knows Robert knows that he’s
sort of surrounded by this charisma
distortion field if you get too close
you get drawn in and you agree to
anything so after going back and working
out a way the combo would support and
protect all the data for the expedition
and after speaking to my wife I found
myself preparing to go to the South Pole
so how do you get to the South Pole so
for me I went from Philadelphia to Punta
Arenas Chile
once you’re there for a couple of days
preparing you board a large transport
plane like this one that looks like it’s
smiling at me that plane takes you
across into Antarctica where you land on
a giant blue ice runway you spend a
couple of days in base camp in
Antarctica and then you take a much
smaller plane to the 89th parallel to 60
nautical miles from the South Pole this
plane flying over the landscape and
landing on the ice is it’s an
undescribable feeling and when you get
out and you bring all the things around
you and you find yourself standing where
so few people in history have ever stood
it’s just incredible then that plane
takes off into the distance and actually
flies across and then
buzzes out overhead shakes its wings and
it’s gone and you find yourself standing
just surrounded by nothing but whiteness
it’s more than a little bit scary my
teammates and I between training the day
before at base camp and the next 10 days
we’re about to set off on a journey that
would be walking the distance equivalent
to three marathons on skis on ice
each dragging a 100-pound sled at an
altitude of 10,000 feet above sea level
and in wind chills approaching 40 below
zero some days it would be bright and
sunny like this where you could manage a
speedy 1.7 miles per hour and I looked
up you a turtle some turtles can walk 3
miles per hour so that’s how fast we
were going
and then other days would completely
turn the weather would change to
whiteout conditions and he’d be dropped
down to about 1 mile per hour truth be
told I loved these days it was crazy out
there it was really crazy so why did we
do this why did we go well to raise
awareness if we could survive in an area
like this the harshest place on the
planet with nothing but renewable energy
imagine what we could do back here in
our daily lives
another way that we raised awareness is
we answered questions while we were out
in this crazy place submitted from
school children from all over the world
from India from China from here in the
United States from New Zealand we were
able to communicate back using this
satellite Wi-Fi so from within our tents
at night we could send back voice
recordings low res photographs text
messages one of the questions that was
submitted that for some reason stuck
with me is do we ever think of stopping
and the real answer is yes like all the
time but when you’re out in this kind of
place and it’s hard and it’s cold but
you really don’t have any other option
but to keep on moving forward so a lot
of people since I’ve been back have said
how did this change you and before I
went a lot of folks said all this is
gonna change you a lot and I thought it
really gonna change me I knew it would
be a very good story to tell but I
didn’t think it would change me truth is
it changed me a lot when you’re out on
the ice you can’t help but think about
Robert swans challenge about resources
and when you’re preparing to go on an
expedition like this you need to make
sure that you have everything that you
need all the gear that you need and you
prepare all these things and you need to
ensure you have enough resources to
survive the journey but also you don’t
want to have too much because you’re
dragging it all on that sled behind you
so you start to be very cognizant of
resources things like gear very
sophisticated gear like socks I spent
more time staring at the sock section of
REI than I’d ever care to admit I had
people coming up trying to help me and
it was terrible then things like food
we’ve all heard of the South Beach Diet
I was sort of on a South Pole diet I was
consuming 6,000 calories a day which is
about 12 Big Macs in a lot of M&Ms and I
lost 15 pounds in ten days because I was
burning about 10,000 calories a day
things like water a lot of people don’t
think of it this way but Antarctica is
really just a frozen desert and like any
desert conditions dehydration is a real
concern
so each morning and each evening we had
to melt enough ice in order to provide
for three liters of water in the evening
and three liters in the morning for each
person this is a solar ice melter that
we were testing for NASA when I think
about my time out on the ice and the
expedition and I see all these pictures
I’m reminded that it was just such an
incredible opportunity to go to the
South Pole and when you have the
opportunity to go to the South Pole and
you leave the South Pole something I
learned is it just never really leaves
you and Robert swans challenge has been
just haunting me really the challenge of
how did we think differently working
with governments the companies we work
for and
individuals about the resources that we
consume so I sort of took this on as a
personal challenge in the four months
that I’ve been back I started looking at
ways that I can start to act on that
challenge so first with government I
reached out to my local environmental
advisory council and met with one of the
local leaders and she talked to me about
what they’re doing to protect the local
watershed and ways I can get involved
it’s amazing things happening that I
just wasn’t aware of then my company
combo CommVault works in data centers
with our customers all around the world
what many people don’t realize the data
centers consume enormous amounts of
energy in fact if you took all the data
centers around the world and you added
them together they consume more energy
than the entire airline industry if the
IT sector was a country it would be the
third largest consumer of energy after
China in the United States so calm bolts
bringing together experts from partners
from customers and from third parties to
look at ways that we can lower the
average data centers carbon footprint so
what about me as an individual what have
I done differently well I’m very happy
to say that I’ve just completed
officially today one month without this
single-use plastic it’s not as easy as
it sounds if it even sounds easy next
time you go to a grocery store look
around it’s everywhere we’re surrounded
by it even things we do in our daily
lives so we don’t necessarily think
about like brushing our teeth I’ve spent
the last month brushing my teeth with a
bamboo toothbrush that’s compostable I
started making my own toothpaste out of
but it doesn’t use plastic 80% of the
world’s plastic pollution is single-use
plastic in 2016 at the World Economic
Forum they announced research that was
showing that if plastic pollution
continues at the current rate by the
year 2050 they’ll be more plastic in the
oceans than fish so what’s my message
it’s simple you don’t have to go to the
South Pole to make a difference anybody
can make a difference if we choose to be
participants instead of spectators so
whatever your passion whether you find
it or like me it finds you if you’re
open to the opportunities and you jump
in we all benefit thank you [Applause]
Please follow and like us: