Velkommen til Lørn.Tech. En læringsdugnad om teknologi og samfunn med Silvija Seres og venner.

Silvija Seres: Hello and welcome to Lørn. My name is Silvija Serer. This podcast is done in collaboration with Telenor and our topic today is sustainability. My guest Ola Jo Tandre a member of the group sustainability at Telenor, welcome! 

Ola Jo Tandre: Thank you.

Silvija: I'm not even sure if I should call you Ola or Ola Jo?

Ola: Ola Jo is fine. 

Silvija: Telenor is one of the most international companies we have in Norway. And you have a really global mindset. You can see in practice that sustainability means very different things, in different parts of the world. And so, you have wonderful concrete projects and it's those concrete projects I'm hoping that we can talk a little bit about today. 

Ola: I should be happy to. 

Silvija: Before we do that. Would you mind telling us just a few words about who you are and what drives you?

Ola: So, I've been part of the sustainability team at Telenor for quite a few years. I've had the privilege to be working closely with our Asian companies and seeing firsthand what sort of revolution the arrival of mobile has caused in those countries, and to see how not least young people and children are able to be really good at getting another dimension to their lives, because they have access to technology. All of that vast library, which is found online is suddenly made available to people who had very few resources to play with before the arrival of mobiles. That's been a fantastic inspiration for me in my career.

Silvija: What's your background? 

Ola: So, I've done English, I've done law, and I've done history. So, I'm sort of here and there with respect to my studies. And I worked a little bit further with media and journalism. And then I did communications at Telenor before I went to sustainability.

Silvija: A little bit Da Vinci sounds like? 

Ola: Oh, that's a very nice way of putting that. 

Silvija: And then I actually very much believe in the kind of professional and cultural Nomads. Because I think it's by actually going and exploring different things that you get to challenge your established roots, and I think you also develop both professional, and personal empathy. Because you get to learn new languages and understand how other people think. 

Ola: I can agree with that. I think it's good to get some of those perspectives you have from studying literature, and to bring those into the tech sector. It gives you some other sort of views that can also be combined. 

Silvija: But even more importantly, Silicon Valley is really missing people with arts background.

And people like you, you know, especially combining law, and international experience, and literature and history of thought, art, whatever. These kinds of things are what they're lacking now when they need to start thinking in a very serious way about the social consequences of the technology they create. And so, this very deep diversity in our background is something that we will like to talk about, but very rarely do we actually encourage by giving people really incentives to stop doing what they've been educated for, and actually combine it with something that challenges them in new ways. And you've done that. And I think that requires quite a lot of personal courage, and it's important to talk about it because that's how we are going to inspire the next generation to do more of the same. 

Ola: I think you're onto something. I think it's important for people to feel that they're not necessarily locked into the kind of career that they've chosen, just because they've made some educational choices. And I think it's also important that we sort of keep an open mind when we do meet people from other sectors and other walks of life. Because there's always something to learn and there's also something to inspire us to also perhaps take a slightly different route. Maybe from what we were planning, say a year or two back. 

Silvija: Exactly. And I think you don't care about something you don't know. So, you need to know it. And then later you need to decide that you care also about all the changes that are happening there. 

And I think it's by being very concrete, very active and very hands-on that we actually make sustainability that matters. We are doing an impromptu interview, so I haven't really told you what we're going to talk about very much. but I just now decided I would really like to ask you very briefly about women and technology. So, you're doing a project where you're trying to find out what really works. How do we inspire more women to like and do technology? My theory is that women actually like technology; they don't know it well enough. I think that the way we talk about technology in a very, hardware mechanical way doesn't appeal. Well, if we talked about technology with its effects on people and societies that super relevant. And then I think we need role models. What do you think?

Ola: No, I think you're onto something. What we're doing is a bit of a sort of research program with plan International. What we're trying to look at very concretely is when young girls make their choices with their sort of education, why aren't more of them feeling confident about taking the route of doing mathematics or physics or engineering. And trying to look at what sort of incentives, and what sort of encouragement is actually effective in making more women take those choices. And I think one of the things that you actually alluded to in what you said, is that if we only have men or majority of man. What will happen is that the services, and the products that are developed by those people will sort of have a male perspective throughout. And that's going to be a problem at the end of the day, because women aren't going to feel at home with those services unless they've also been part of crafting and developing themselves. So that's something we need to change.

Silvija: I think you are right at a very deep level as well. Because I think one of the problems we see with society going forward is the growing polarization where there's more knowledge capital and power aggregated in the hands of those who have the data. And first of all, we need to teach as many as we can, both men and women, to work with data and digital models. But I think that the way that things are optimized through these digital models, everything we try to do with AI etc. Is based on, you know, the male testosterone competition focus. That's how markets work, and we are all going to compete to be the most efficient in everything. Then they're going to be a little too many losers related to what our culture and our history has taught us is efficient for societies. And recently I read a book from a lady called Shoshana Zubov, a very interesting woman who talks very knowledgeable about philosophy, economy, psychology applied to the big mega monopolies in digital world.

And she calls the book “Surveillance Capitalism” and it’s very powerful book. It's slightly too negative, and I was thinking I'm sure that many of these leaders of the mega monopolies that she is aiming at are thinking she is a very hysterical lady. And there's something very female about her voice, versus the very kind of rational male competitive voice of these business leaders. And I think it's by getting those voices heard in the right way that we are going to

create a really sustainable future. So, what you are doing by trying to attract as many women as possible to Telenor as well. It's a super relevant policy for the future.

Ola: I'm glad you look at it that way, because I think there is no choice when we do confront that. We need to confront those business leaders as you talked about. And these huge monoliths that are currently sort of dominating in the social media sphere or whatever. But I think it's also important that we try to build some bridges as well. And I think by not necessarily, painting the others as “the other side”. You don't want to be part of that. Let's try to create some bridges whereby you can say, you can feel at home in that sector or you can create your sort of own space where you're comfortable with your background and what you would like to work with. And you can be very successful at that. And not necessarily have to be on that aggressive male dominated turf. 

Silvija: As a woman in technology. I've actually always been treated extra well. Because you know people would still like to have a few women around and you know, I don't need to be a part of absolutely everything in a social way etcetera, because I have to hurry home with the kids in the evenings, but you can do the most relevant job nevertheless. And you have several women with extremely high positions in technology in Telenor like Rouge Shabanawhich and Ingeborg Øfsthus, Camila Amundsen, Astrid Unheim and others. And I really look forward to

asking them what makes them want to work in a technology company. 

Ola: Yeah, and let's hope they can come up with some surprising answers to me why they've made their choices. But we are fortunate in that respect in Telenor, because we've got those excellent ladies. And they will contribute to the success of the company going forward, and that's important. And they bring their own perspective, and it's important that perspective is given a chance to develop as well. Just like the male candidates in the male executives that we have in the company.

Silvija: Exactly. So, sustainability. It's one of these elephant concepts, you know, the 16 blind man trying to explain what an elephant is. And one says it's a rope because he's touching the tail, and the other one says it's a pipe because it's touching the trunk Etc. So, you know, the easy answer is saying well, you know, you have the 17 sustainable goals by the United Nations and we just have to go at them. But that's a little too broad and a little too automatic. I think. What does sustainability mean to Telenor and how do you work with it? 

Ola: So we used to have what was called corporate social responsibility. And then it's slightly evolved into becoming sustainability. And I think you mentioned the sustainable development goals who have given us important direction to what we do. And I think where we have to start is to try to see what sort of impact we have in society, for bad and for good. And obviously try to define where are the risks that we might contribute to a sort of development that we would not like to see, and what can we do to mitigate those kinds of impacts. So being a responsible business is one very important part of the way we do sustainability at Telenor. So that means throughout our supply chains. What can we do to say that health and safety is looked after? That we don't have children working within those supply chains, that there's not a negative environmental impact that's caused by the demand that we create by being a big purchaser in those countries that we operate in. So those things need to be dealt with in a systematic way. You also have issues relating to how the technology is used, potentially abused perhaps by governments who are over broad in, you said surveillance earlier on. Or in sort of extracting data. So, it's important that we do what we can to make sure that we mitigate the negatives. But on the other hand, we have a fantastic opportunity with mobile technology to contribute to improve the quality of people's lives in a lot of ways. And interestingly our industry organization the GSM association have produced a fantastic report which demonstrates that the mobile phone and mobile technology can positively influence every one of those 17 goals. So, we have a massive opportunity. And we have to try to look hard at those goals and say where can we have the greatest impact, and then make some priorities based on that. So that's basically along those lines that were currently working, and we've got some exciting partners. We've got some global partners. We planned internationally and we got one with UNICEF. So, they will know where the pressure points are in countries that we operate. And when they say “okay, how can we apply the technology to perhaps help you address those issues?” 

Silvija: So, two questions here. What is that ethics, and cultural opportunities? Problems are always local. There is no global attitude to this. Telenor has a great advantage here, because first of all your origin is from Norway. And it is a very socially responsible country. Maybe if there is one thing that we have a kind of a world championship title to then that's it. And how does this affect the way that you work with many of the other countries that you are based in. And how do you interpret what this means locally versus globally? 

Ola: Yeah. That's an interesting question. I'm not sure I entirely agree with you. Well, we've got an advantage in some respects, Yes. I don't think we should get on the arrogant side and say you know because we are Norwegian, or Scandinavian, we are more credible than anyone else. There's lots of work and there's lots that we can learn from other good companies. And some of the large international organizations have a lot of admiration for the work that Boda does for us for instance. But yes, we do have stakeholders in Norway who will take an interest in how we run our business in Bangladesh and in Myanmar and so on. And that's a positive thing, because we need to be held accountable to the public at large if you like. So it's important that we have a good and productive dialogue with our stakeholders, that we understand their concerns. And they have of course a lot of expertise in sight that we can learn from, in the sense that what steps you will be taking for instance to protect our consumers or to say, within those value chains that I mentioned, what sort of abuse might happen somewhere down the line. 

And then if we were made aware of that, we can together go forward and take steps to address those issues. So, it's important and its great help to have those stakeholders in your home country. And, of course it's a balancing act, because your stakeholders in Bangladesh might be asking you very different questions. And to try to build a bridge between those stakeholder groups is sometimes a challenge. And of course, you know, we're obviously worried about the huge global issues such as climate change, in Norway, definitely. But if you are in Bangladesh and you've got some very sort of issues which are right in your face. Then to take a step back and say, well there's a global issue here that I also need to be mindful of.

Silvija: So, I want to go back to this. Because I think actively interpreting what sustainability means to Telenor and maybe to the different geographical areas in Telenor is the really key attitude here, in my mind. Telenor had problems before with India and with many other areas. Which I think people underestimate how incredibly demanding it is to do international business. And with this globalization comes a lot of risk, and it comes a lot of learnings. And to that I think it's really important to work proactively with solving problems, and then learning for them from them for the future. What are some of the most important lessons we have in Telenor, how do we think about Global expansion, risk and sustainability. 

Ola: There's no denying that given the kind of footprint that we have. There's going to be a lot of risks. We will encounter it, we know that.

Silvija: May I just quote. I'm sorry to interrupt. What is going around in my head at the moment is the quote from the great philosopher Spider-Man, or maybe his uncle. “With great power, comes great responsibility”. And I think you're really feeling that. The demands on Telenor are extremely high, and how do you live with those demands?

Ola: Yeah. I think it's a fair question. And I think what we have to do obviously, when you enter a new market, is to do your homework beforehand. To say what sort of risks are we likely to encounter? What's highest on the radar? There's always something that you can do.

You might not get all the answers. So, before going into a country such as Myanmar, you know, here's a country that's been wracked by conflict. They've been held back. They haven't had access to a lot of those things that the rest of us take for granted. Even in neighboring countries. They've had exposure to things that these guys were sort of sheltered from. And you know, we had to sort of speak to the people who had been on the ground to try to understand. How did they see the picture, and from that try to build our own mechanisms, to make sure that we didn't make the wrong kind of moves in that country. And that can only take you so far. I think it's also fair to say that you need to be prepared for things that you weren't able to think about before entering a country and then to make sure that you have the mechanisms in place to try to sort of be agile and respond to issues when they come along. and one of the best things that we can do is to try to be transparent about what we see. And open up for a discussion where we can have those stakeholders come in and sort of give us their suggestions or criticize us. And also be a bit humble, not say that, you know, we have done our homework, we've put these things in place now, you know, it's going to work reasonably well. Things aren't always working out the way you think they will, even if we think we're on a good track. And then it's important to say “well, we are struggling with this one” for instance. And then perhaps invite the kind of people who you think might be able to assist you in a helpful dialogue to see if we can move forward together. Rather than to take the confrontational line where we are very stingy with what we tell the outside world. And the outside world are very, you know, keen on criticizing big business beause we're not sort of opening up. 

Silvija: Yeah, I think openness the way you're doing is now super important. You mentioned a couple of concrete projects, very briefly. Could we go a couple of minutes into two of your favorite sustainability projects. 

Ola: Yeah, of course, one of the things we are very excited about at the moment is a piece we're doing together with UNICEF in Pakistan, which has to do with birth registration. What we know is that in Pakistan, and this is a country that's been struggling with this for a number of years. Approximately 60 percent of the population are unregistered. So, it's a huge issue. 

So, Pakistan is around 190 million. One of the largest countries in the world obviously. So, it's a huge population. And what you see is that young children who aren't registered at birth will be vulnerable. They're vulnerable with respect to trafficking, with respect to child marriage, because they aren't able to put forward a document says here's how old I am. And in some cases, it might negatively impact their chances of having an education. Owning property. There are various kinds of things. So, a number of issues that would be set right, if they were able to put that document on the table. And Pakistan has been doing work obviously to try to address the situation. But because the ways they've been doing it have been the traditional style, they've had problems. And people who haven't to be fair as well. Not necessarily seen the value of registering their children. It's not been demonstrated to them. So, we're trying to use technology to put phones with an app that is not a very costly handset. It, kind of a basic app, which will allow healthcare workers and marriage registers to do those registrations out in the field. And even if they're in an area where there's no coverage, you know, if they do the registrations fill it into the handset once they are within that will be sent to the district headquarters and the data will be processed. So, they were able to register say 30% of the population before, we started using technology and during our pilot phase we got up to more than 90%. So, there was good reason to think that this is the right way of doing it in the future. And interestingly too because you're thinking that mobile phones are costly. There are all those components which will make this value chain much more expensive than it was in the past, but that's definitely not the case. You're actually able to do this in a more cost-effective way. So, arguably what we're doing here is also creating a better understanding for what the government can do in the future 

Silvija: And also, I mean applied at a business level as well, eventually this will help a lot with fighting corruption.

Ola: Indeed. We get a more transparent system, greater accountability and also, if documents go get lost. You will have a way that you can store it as well.

Silvija: Things like taxation are completely dependent on people having an ID. Yes. 

Ola: So, if you look at for instance the way that money travels across the country such as Pakistan. Because this is where we have one of our very successful financial solutions setups with Easypaisa. Means you get a lot more transparency about money and how that travels around the country. 

Silvija: Would you say very briefly something about Easypaisa. I like that project very much. 

Ola: It's a tremendous success, obviously.  It's building, of course, on the informal system that existed in the past. 

Silvija: Is it a payment system on the mobile phone?

Ola: Well, it's actually developed. Or delivered by a range of societies. You can have your mobile wallet as well. Even though sort of people sending money back and forth is really what where the biggest numbers are. But what you saw in the past was that people would be sending money, for instance with the bus driver, across the country, or they would have to be forced to sort of borrow money from their landlord or other people around them. And what very often triggers that need, is to say if you have for instance what we call a help shock. You will need health treatment. That's costly. You Haven't got the cash. What you typically do is go to your family. Your family might be in a different part of the country. They need to send that money. It's going to take time. There's going to be a risk of that money getting lost along the way. So, here's a way for them to actually send money in the safe way. Mediately you can go collect it at the agents, because you get on your mobile phone the confirmation that money has arrived. So, it's making that system very much more effective and also safer. And I think what we also need to recognize is that when you have this physical money traveling around the country. There will be lots of opportunities for some of it to go missing, if not all. So, it's also a way of getting money out there quickly, which is also important. And then I think, again, that it was built on a bit of the old system where you have, you know, the way that money traveled. But introduced the electronic component of the mobile phone in such a way that people would say that yes, I can recognize the mechanism, but it's just done slightly differently. So, the trust in it was there. And also, because people were used to buying their services, and in Pakistan, obviously, it's something that they do all the time in very small amounts of money. And they have to do it very frequently. So, they were accustomed to working with these agents who were then sort of the small Bank branches all over the country. 

Silvija: So, you're basically try to kick-start almost a financial system or a banking system for a non-banks part of the society? 

Ola: Yeah, and that's a huge group of the society. Because the traditional banks in Pakistan will typically develop services for maybe twenty percent of the population.

These were people who had an economy, who would bring you interesting customers. All the rest. Well, you know, can we really make money from these guys? But once you have the mobile phone as the means of delivery, you can have an automated process in lots of ways. Then that picture changes. Everybody's basically an interesting customer. 

Silvija: And most of us who have lived in the bank live all of our lives. Do not understand how important an inclusion project this is for the rest of the society.

Ola: And if you are someone who wants to create a business for yourself, but you have no credit history. No one will be giving you a loan. So, one of the things you can cleverly do with the mobile phone is to see if that person is regularly at a certain location every day. That's a strong indication that that person has a job. Or if that person talks on their mobile phone at a very regular interval, it means that they're likely to have a source of income, you know. So, in a sense out of not necessarily someone having a bank account. You can still create a credit history which will open up many doors. So, trying to think cleverly about how you can use data sets, is also a way to sort of allow people the first step into business life where they can grow successful. 

Silvija: So Financial Services is an important thing. And we talked about mobile services like Easypaisa. Your ID service was more digital service, not so dependent on mobile phone but more on a platform. And now you're also moving into AI driven Services applied to things like education and health. Can you say very briefly something about the Health Service?

Ola: We've got a very interesting concept going in Bangladesh, which is called Tonic. You know, obviously Grameen phone has a huge customer base. And if you sign up to Tonic, you will have an opportunity to get Hospital cash. So, make you get through the time you need to spend in the hospital. So, there's some support for that. There's also a health line so that you've got the kind of, well, first of all, I think in Norway we have numbers of doctors available to you, obviously a much better situation. And if you stay in the countryside in the Rural areas of Bangladesh and you're in need of medical assistance, the kind of distance you have to travel means it is a big barrier for people. So very often they don't seek out a doctor when they really should. So, here's an opportunity to call qualified doctors who are manning the boards of telephone lines, and to get a first assessment over the phone. You can describe your symptoms, and then you get some guidance from that doctor. So that's helping people to make some good choices. And also, of course the other way around. If they do describe symptoms that will give you indication that you really need to seek out a doctor, then that is a very clear indication to make the trip. 

Silvija: Yeah, and again a great example of too late to catch up. Because building those roads, and building those hospitals etc. Is going to be super demanding. But providing these shortcuts to a better service level is what really needs to be done. 

Ola: And I think what's at the heart of this, is that we're not necessarily thinking enough about this, but the mobile phone and the technology and the fact that you're able to reach so many people. Means that a lot of services can be delivered in a very different way from what it is. And that is a fantastic opportunity to improve the quality of life of people, in some of the countries facing the biggest challenges at work today. 

Silvija: We are approaching the end of our conversation. If you help me very briefly understand the sort of a tagline that Telenor has, related to sustainability. 

Ola: So one of the things that we've talked a lot about in a long time is empowering societies. Meaning that we are giving people new opportunities to pull themselves out of the situation there and take the steps into a better kind of life. And I think the examples I tried to give you today illustrate how we can do that. Put people on the better footing in that cost-effective manner, to use this fantastic infrastructure. And this reach that we have through the mobile phone. And this enormously powerful computer that people carry in their hands, and to say, “here's a way that we can give you the kind of chances that we've had in our world from the outset”. There are people looking after us. And then if you are in Pakistan or Bangladesh in the rural areas, you need people to be able to deliver those services in a better way than they have been able to so far. And the mobile phone is the best instrument out there to do exactly that.

Silvija: Very cool. You also say something like connecting people to what matters most. What does that mean? 

Ola: So, I mean. Again, people will have a range of needs. So, health is critical. If you don't have health, you don't have anything. So, the barriers to give you the opportunity to live life at the fullest, and the mobile phone can actually help you overcome them. Those kinds of barriers, because it connects you with the services that you desperately rely on as a human being. So, I think the most essential thing in our lives is the mobile phone.

Silvija: Including the people. Ola Jo Tandre, member of the group sustainability at Telenor. Thank you so much for coming here and helping us understand a little bit better what sustainability means for Telenor.

Ola: It was a pleasure. Thank you. 

Silvija: Thank you for listening.

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