Ross Estela: Discussing Poetry and Social Change

Who are you? 

My name is Rosakebia (Ross) Estela. I am a carer for my 67-year-old mother, and I identify as a transgender Peruvian poet. In addition to my poetic pursuits, I have a background in biology, creative industries, and education. I consider myself an entrepreneur at heart and a passionate advocate for human rights. I was born in Chiclayo, a city in the northern region of Peru.

How did you get into the Sustainability sector? 
I entered the sustainability sector driven by a deep sense of social justice.   I believe that as professionals, we have the power to go beyond mere data storytelling and instead, truly understand and communicate the real needs and aspirations of people and be empathetic with the planet.

Since 2017, I have joined high impact projects and worked with multicultural and interdisciplinary teams. My work is at the intersection of social innovation, social change work and activism.                

I was the only Latin American and second Peruvian since 2006 to join the European Parliament's Sakharov Fellowship (June, 2022) where I had the opportunity to raise social and environmental challenges from Latin America to the European Parliament including the lack of drinkable water in the North of Peru.  I was selected as ECA Professional Fellow of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Exchange and Cultural Affairs & International Center for Journalists (Fall cohort, 2021); European Parliament's Sakharov Fellow, Unit of Human Rights Actions (2022). Selected as Youth Delegate in the round table for Digital Transformation organized by the OAS in the First Youth Meeting of the Americas held on October 3rd and 4th 2022 in Lima, Peru. Selected participant to join the closed roundtable about Digital Inclusion for the Americas in the Cities Summit of the Americas 2023 in Denver, Colorado. Guest speaker at Just Transformation Forum organized by EU-LAC Foundation. May 16-17th 2023.

You are also a poet and storyteller and a biologist. Why is poetry important when it comes to social change? 

As an artivist - an artist and activist - I deeply understand the importance of poetry in driving social change. Poetry possesses unique qualities that make it a powerful tool in the pursuit of a more just and equitable society.

Poetry, as an art form, is an essential tool for social change. Through critical reflection, anticipation of consequences, cultural critique, imagination, empathy, and motivation, poetry inspires us to challenge the status quo, envision a better future, and take meaningful action.  

Where can we find your poetry? 

I have been published my poetry in social media. Instagram: @rosakebiaestelamendoza, Facebook: Rosakebia Estela Mendoza.

The bird keeper or Life’s harsh art has been published in “I Sing, Therefore I Am vol.3”. First published as an e-book in 2023 by Oxford Brookes Poetry Centre, Oxford Brookes University OX3 0BP.   This poetry collection reflects about the invisible social care work.

https://carerspoetry.org

What issues are you most concerned about in sustainability? 

I am personally interested in social equity and justice, as I believe they are vital components of sustainability. In order to create a future that benefits everyone in society, it is imperative to address issues such as poverty, inequality, gender disparities, and social exclusion. By actively working towards resolving these challenges, we can establish a sustainable society that is inclusive and fair.

Furthermore, I am intrigued by the interconnectedness of sustainability and digital transformation. These two concepts have the potential to synergize and mutually reinforce each other. While digital transformation offers numerous opportunities for promoting sustainability, it is essential to approach it with caution and consideration. Potential challenges and risks, such as e-waste, energy consumption associated with digital infrastructure, and the digital divide, must be taken into account.

To ensure responsible and inclusive digital solutions, it is crucial to make the benefits of digital transformation accessible to all members of society while minimizing negative environmental impacts. This requires implementing strategies that prioritize equity, sustainability, and equal distribution of resources. By doing so, we can harness the power of digital transformation to drive positive change and create a more sustainable and just world.

What is your advice for people who want to get into the sustainability sector? / What advice would you give to your younger self? 

For those interested in entering the sustainability sector, my advice is to envision future possibilities and keep a notebook to capture ideas. Throughout my own journey, it took over eleven years of hard work to prepare myself for this field. I embraced every career shift, learning new skills along the way. Despite facing challenges, such as limited resources and the difficulty of holistic thinking in developing countries like Peru, I have always navigated paths that combine the creative power of science, arts, and technology since childhood. To succeed in the sustainability sector, it's important to cultivate a holistic mindset, expand knowledge, develop a diverse skill set, gain practical experience, network and collaborate, embrace innovation and technology, and be proactive in making a positive impact. If I could offer advice to my younger self, I would emphasize embracing my unique path, being resourceful, documenting ideas and visions, embracing lifelong learning, fostering resilience, seeking mentors and collaborators, and staying optimistic and inspired. The journey toward sustainability is a continuous process of growth and learning, and by staying true to our values and remaining open to new opportunities, we can contribute to creating a more sustainable future.

Are there any quotes/philosophies that you try to live your life by? 

Embrace your uniqueness and diversity, and uphold strong values and ethics as guiding principles in your personal and professional life.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future? 

My view of the future embraces both optimism and pessimism, acknowledging the complexities of our world while remaining open to the possibilities of positive change.

Meet our Communications Intern: Elizabeth Gonzalez

Who are you?

Hi! My name is Elizabeth Gonzalez, and I am the communications intern this summer at Diversity in Sustainability. I am entering my fourth year of Political Studies at Queen’s. 

I am currently in Oakville, but grew up in Brampton, and have spent a large portion of my life exploring Toronto. I am grateful for my fruitful experience having been raised in the GTA; from a young age, I was exposed to a variety of cultures and heritages that made me acutely aware of the beauty in diversity in multiculturalism. As someone of Latinx heritage, I am constantly seeking ways to reconnect with my culture, which has made me incredibly aware of the importance of representation. 

I have always been drawn to the arts; whether this be visually, through the written word, or media. I have found creative spaces and work to be an incredible way to achieve representation, and through my work at MUSE Magazine at Queen’s, I have worked to uplift the voices and creativity of BIPOC students. I am incredibly grateful to be privy to these stories, and it has only further cemented my love for storytelling, diversity, and inclusion. 

You’re studying politics and you’re heavily involved with writing on arts and culture – how do these topics intersect and what interests you most about them?

I strongly believe that the personal is political—while politics may seem to focus on people far away in old buildings drafting legislation, the truth is that our everyday lives and interactions are shaped by institutional forces and political decisions. As a result, I am always more fascinated by the way people respond to politics; how we form communities, speak out against injustice, promote peace, and question the norm. Historically, writing and the arts have been the platform to do so.  

I feel as though I have learned the most about historical moments in politics through the arts. Whether it was through reading the cultural criticism of Joan Didion, learning about the powerful retelling of injustices by musicians like Billie Holiday, or exploring the artwork of Frida Kahlo and its examination of postcolonialism. The visual, the lyrical, the essay— throughout the years individuals have been questioning power and documenting political change through art and cultural commentary. This has always enthralled me, and growing up I consumed any and every documentary, album, or book I could find that marked a definitive change in history. Writing and creative work that transport you in time; and when wanting to analyze how politics affected the daily lives of individuals, they act as the most raw and honest proof. 

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

Sustainability is such a significant topic in current discourse; as individuals and communities become more and more aware of the genuine threat to the planet and the ways that we can tackle the climate crisis, the conversation that people have been trying to have for years is slowly being legitimized. But as most spaces do, the environments in which these conversations are happening are not open to all. The barriers to entry in the sustainability field make it difficult for all individuals to have a say in these crucially important discussions, which is especially disheartening as minorities are the ones who are most impacted by the climate crisis. There must be a collective effort to break down these barriers so that everyone who is impacted by climate change can discuss the path toward a sustainable future. I am a strong believer that diversity of thought is the most important value in achieving a just society; all voices need to be heard, especially in spaces that have not been historically accessible to BIPOC and BAME individuals. 

What do you hope to get out of your internship with DiS?

I am thrilled to be working with such a passionate team and exposing myself to their work on EDII—while I hold these values incredibly close to my heart, I am excited to see how we can work as a community to implement these values in industries that require change. I am also, of course, excited to continue to build my communication skills. But what first drew me to DiS was their genuine commitment to creating safer spaces and dialogues for BIPOC and BAME individuals, and I am looking forward to seeing the progression of my communication projects as I help their mission! I cannot wait to learn more about the individuals we connect with and be exposed to these great minds and new ways of thinking in terms of EDII. 

What issues in sustainability are you most concerned about?

In general, I find that a lot of my interest in sustainability stems from tackling what has now been perceived as the “norms” in our capitalist society; extensive pollution, water contamination, greenhouse gas emission, etc. These are all factors of life that many who are not concerned about climate change perceive to be a normal part of reality, which reveals concerning truths about how society is so easily discouraged to tackle the larger political beliefs and so unwilling to change (despite the facts that lie in front of us). However, more specifically, I have become incredibly intrigued by food waste; both in terms of how damaging it can be, but also (from a more optimistic perspective) the ways that we can make changes in our own daily lives to tackle the issue of food waste. I first became aware of this issue in my first-year global development class, when we began to learn about the sustainable ways local communities farm in the global south and compare these practices to the factory farming and commercial industry (as well as our practices of food waste). Seeing local restaurants work towards zero waste and implement sustainability within their business plans gives me hope, and I am curious to continue to learn about food waste and how we can address this issue!

Is there a quote or mantra that you live by, and why?

 While I am a lifelong bookworm, I surprisingly cannot think of just one quote I live by. I can, however, think of a general mantra that comes from my father, who has always told me to “dream big” in some phrase or another. While I spent much of my childhood thinking it was a cliche, I recognize now it is a mantra I have held close to my heart. My father is an immigrant, having left his native country of Ecuador at 18. He has always encouraged me to dream big and not settle—words that inherently are powerful to young women of color who are often told to be small and silent. Growing up, I heard my father echo these words to fellow family members and friends. I live my life with large aspirations and big dreams, having learned after many years of dinner table conversations with my father that the prospect of having big dreams is the best form of encouragement and motivation. 

What would you like to do next?

As I enter my final year of university, I am incredibly excited to act as the Editor-in-Chief of MUSE Magazine and help uplift the brand to new heights. Following graduation, I currently strive to get a Master's in Communications and begin forging my career in communications. While I am excited about the endless possibilities for the field in which I end up, I know that I hope to work in the communications and PR sectors of brands and organizations that hold inclusion and diversity as important values. I believe words and the visual work of communication to be incredibly powerful tools and would love to work alongside colleagues who want to use these tools to leave a positive lasting impact on the world.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future and why?

As a Gen Z, I believe that it can be hard to remain optimistic; much of my life has been defined by devastating headlines and widely accessible social media exposure of tragedy. However, I have always tried to remain optimistic in my approach to social justice, politics, and the climate. I believe in the good of people, and more importantly, in the power of community. While being a student of politics has taught me about the complexities of our social reality, the historical tragedies, and the closed doors that refuse to let many of us get involved in the important conversation—history has also shown us that change is possible. I like to think that the harsh realities that my generation has been exposed to only empower us to craft the world we would like to live in. 

Meet our Advisory Panel: Carissa Wong

Who are you? 

I am an environmental lawyer, mother, and community-level land-use planning decision-maker at an appeal body in Toronto. 

What do you see as the most important aspect of being part of the Diversity in Sustainability Advisory Panel?

I am motivated to be part of Diversity in Sustainability’s Advisory Panel because sustainability is only possible through inclusion, diversity, and pluralism.  It is essential that we learn how to have better conversations as well as build community and trust in the face of shared problems. As a member of the Advisory Panel, I am thrilled to connect with and support people who are eager to make positive change at the intersection of environmental and social justice.  

What drew you to sustainability? And how did you decide to overlap with law?

I have always loved nature, from growing up spending summer days at my Grandparents’ cottage on Georgian Bay, to now spending time with my daughter at my family’s cottage in Muskoka, Ontario.  When I was working in China and Russia on water resource management for the World Wildlife Fund over a decade ago, I became very aware of the complex legal, political, and social forces that affect environmental outcomes.  I wanted to support more equitable, socio-economically sensitive, and culturally appropriate governance of natural resources and biodiversity. 

I am interested in promoting the right to a healthy environment by applying the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child to support inclusion and Indigenous children’s rights in sustainable development, and using alternative dispute resolution in land use planning and environmental matters.  

What was your first job in sustainability and how did you go about finding a job in the field?  

My first job in sustainability was a summer job as a Science Camp counselor at Upper Canada College in Toronto.  I heard about this job through my personal network.  I pursued the opportunity because of my early passion for education, science, and environmental studies.  Since then, I have learned that sustainability can also be achieved through a deep understanding and respect for nature based on kinship and family, as many Indigenous worldviews prescribe.  

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important? What has your experience been?

The field of sustainability needs human diversity because sustainability goals are premised on ensuring the diversity of life on the planet – which includes human and non-human life.  In addition, I care deeply about the natural environment in my ancestral homeland, China, as well as in Canada.  This leads itself to caring about diversity in sustainability.

“As well, the forces that challenge sustainability – including colonialism, xenophobia, and the externalization of the costs in economic production – also challenge access to justice, equity, and inclusion.”

In my own life, I have experienced situations where some people with greater privilege have appeared uncomfortable with and tended to minimize my “value proposition” and "commitment to the issues” in the environmental field. Employed to work on politically sensitive issues during this time and since, I have become even more aware of the trauma-informed nature of environmental work and the need to develop trust among diverse stakeholders to achieve environmental outcomes.  

What is trauma-informed work?

Trauma-informed work is grounded in recognizing the importance of physical, psychological, and emotional safety to build a sense of control and empowerment for those affected by an emotionally overwhelming and distressing event(s).  

“People who work in the environmental field, including lawyers, can be affected by secondary and vicarious trauma as well.  Environmental traumas can affect people regardless of one’s privilege.  ”

Do you have a mentor?  How have they helped you in your personal growth?

Throughout my career I have had, and continue to have, formal and informal mentors – including academic peers, coaches, and colleagues who help me to see opportunities, recognize my strengths, and provide guidance on how to show up best.  For example, Gary Yee, former Chair of numerous Tribunals, most recently the Toronto Licensing Tribunal, and current Advisor to Tribunals and Regulators, helped me understand how to get into the Tribunal system, and where my values, skills and experience aligned with its public interest mission. 

What has been your proudest moment to date? 

I am proudest of the work I have done across borders, ethnicities, and cultures to raise awareness and understanding on integrated water resources management and how to protect people and biodiversity. Most recently, I travelled to one of the rivers that I wrote about in WWF’s 2007 World’s Top Ten Rivers at Risk report, the Salween or Nu River, in China.  This river is at risk of infrastructure and hydropower dam development, and I video-recorded industrial development along its shores.  I am working to produce a short documentary that looks at rivers as a metaphor for environmentalism. 

My other proudest moments are watching my nearly three-year-old daughter amaze me and my husband with her strength, intelligence, and kindness, almost daily.  I love spending time with her in nature. 

What advice/quote do you most live by and why? 

“Dreams are made if only people try” by Terry Fox.   Thinking about his story always makes me teary with inspiration.  If Terry Fox can run halfway across Canada with cancer and one leg, I can do what I need to do right now.  

I also like “impatience with actions, patience with results” by Naval Ravikant.  It reminds me that success is generally non-linear and that results do not follow a directly proportional relationship to effort. 

What issues in sustainability are you most concerned about?

I am most concerned about biodiversity loss and climate change. I am especially passionate about the preservation of free-flowing rivers and freshwater biodiversity around the world.  

What development(s) have excited you most in the field? 

I am excited by the work that Diversity in Sustainability has done and is doing to push the envelope forward on this critical intersection of environment and equity and inclusion.  It is fantastic how the organization is bringing together so many people that may have felt alone with these issues to create more dialogue, curiosity and momentum in the environmental space.   

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why? 

I am an optimist – for pessimistic reasons!   The oldest, most passionate environmentalists are optimists out of necessity.  

“Ultimately, the universe will continue without humans.  The is question what quality of life we want and how long our species wants to be around on this planet.  ”

What’s next for you? 

I am working to increase awareness and dialogue around key issues of environmental protection and sustainability by producing podcasts and a short documentary that sheds light on the critical role of inclusion, forgiveness, and healing in environmental action.  Down the road, I’d like to live at our cottage or a country property near a beach, with nature, for months at a time. 

Meet our Team: Julieta Mulangu

Who are you?

My name is Julieta Mulangu! I graduated from high school in June 2021 and have spent the past year as a student at Ambrose University, taking introductory courses and exploring different subjects. This coming Fall, I will be transferring to the University of Calgary to major in Global Development Studies.

Being born and raised in Calgary, I grew up taking weekend adventures to the Rockies with my family. The outdoors continues to be a big part of my life: I spent many summers working as a Cabin Leader at a summer camp, and hiking is one of my favourite pastimes. Additionally, I enjoy reading, learning new things, and spending quality time with friends and family.

One of the core pieces of my identity is my biraciality. My mom was born in the Philippines, and my dad in the Democratic Republic of Congo. As a young child, I would explain my ethnic background to curious individuals by telling them, “Mom is like peanut butter, Dad is like chocolate, me and my siblings are Reese’s Pieces!” As I grew older, I discovered better ways to articulate my racial identity, but it remained difficult to find my place in society. While externally I present to the world Black, my upbringing was infused with vibrant Filipino culture and food, along with my wonderfully large extended family. I’ve learned that my identity does not need to conform to the way in which others perceive me; I am both wholly Black and wholly Filipino. My experience as a biracial woman is unique and I am proud of who I am.

You’re interested in international development – why?

To me, the field of international development is compelling. It pursues the improvement of every individual’s quality of life. Through the elimination of poverty, injustice and discrimination, international development seeks to make the world a better place for all who live here. I believe that it is not enough for “advanced” countries to treat developing countries as charity cases. Through the implementation of things like education and proper healthcare, developing countries gain crucial resources to become independent, autonomous and self-sustaining. I want to see a world where each individual is equipped with the resources to positively impact the planet with their unique skills and strengths. I am not yet entirely sure what a future career in international development looks like for me, but I am passionate about issues concerning human rights and hope to build a profession in that field.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

 I think that diversity is a fundamental aspect of every field of work. There is no single way to understand a situation or issue; every individual has different life experiences that play a role in their specific interpretations of both the world and their professions. The same applies to sustainability: there is no exclusive way to interpret issues within the field of sustainability. As a predominately white field, it can be difficult for BIPOC individuals to share their perspectives and be heard by those in positions of power. I believe that through the inclusion of diverse perspectives in the field of sustainability, all professionals can gain a more robust understanding of issues within the sector by considering them through the lens of their peers. While plenty of companies have initiated the process of creating more inclusive environments, many have not applied these concepts in a perceptible way. Organizations must be held accountable to their pledges of diversity, equity, and inclusion by tangibly applying these values to their institutions.

What do you hope to get out of your internship with DiS?

I am excited to begin my journey in sustainability, meet new people, and learn from professionals in the field. Sustainability is something that has intrigued me for years. There is an abundance of pressing sustainability issues that occupy our world today, and it’s easy to feel powerless while trying to tackle these problems. As a young person, making a difference can feel impossible, especially when the ability to do so seems far beyond my sphere of influence. After all, the action of posting on social media to spread awareness or discussing issues with my friends can only go so far. I think that my internship with DiS is a practical way in which I can contribute to creating a more sustainable future for our planet. I look forward to completing research, reading, writing, and absorbing new information. 

Additionally, I am a strong advocate for creating spaces in which BIPOC can be seen, heard, and considered seriously.  It is an honor to work with an organization which holds these same values. Many issues in sustainability disproportionately affect minority groups, so it is crucial for BIPOC individuals to have an active role in the conversation.

What issues in sustainability are you most concerned about?

As a kid who spent a lot of time outdoors, I had a passion for protecting the nature that I so loved to explore. I thought I would do this by becoming a wildlife conservationist! It is interesting to see how my desire to take care of the planet we live in has adapted as I’ve grown older. Nowadays, the issues that I’m most concerned about are climate change and the relation between human rights and sustainable development.

Is there a quote or mantra that you most live by, and why?

“If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” -Maya Angelou

 While it is quite simple, this quote came as a revelation to me. For issues that I can control, I have the ability to influence the situation. For issues that are beyond my control, the only thing I can adjust is my outlook. I’m the only one in charge of my feelings and how I let a given circumstance affect my mental state.

What would you like to do next?

I am thrilled to continue my post-secondary journey by transferring to the University of Calgary! I’m eager to learn new things, find my niche, and gain a deeper understanding of what interests me. Along with my development studies courses, I am excited to learn a third language (Spanish), as well as take classes in African Studies, Anthropology, Geography, and Sustainability. One of my personal goals is to be a lifelong learner. I want to experience different cultures and continue to develop a global perspective. I hope to accomplish this through travel, reading more diverse books, and engaging in conversations with unique individuals.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

While many of today’s media presents a disheartening view of the state of our world, I choose to remain hopeful. I believe that humans are creative and more than capable of finding solutions. As a species, we have been resilient in the midst of trials across time. It is true that there’s a lot going wrong in our world, but that means that there is so much room for individuals to take action. As long as there are people who continue to care about the state of the planet and who want to make a difference, I think we will be okay.

Jane Mantey: Bringing Environmental Justice to the Forefront

Who are you? 

I am Jane Mantey, Ph.D., a Black queer woman [biomedical] scientist turned environmental and climate policy professional based in Texas with an expressed focus on eliminating health and economic inequities created or perpetuated by public policy or business practices.

What do you do at Ceres? 

Currently, I am the Senior Manager, Environmental Justice (EJ) Policy, where I serve as an expert and resource to my Ceres colleagues and member companies (mostly consumer brands) on environmental and climate justice issues and potential policy efforts at the state and federal levels. Through my engagement with companies and policymakers, I strive to 1) harmonize corporate sustainability with environmental justice, 2) center and promote the perspectives and solutions coming forth from the EJ movement in Ceres’ strategies to set and impact public policy positions and outcomes, and 3) encourage companies to consider and incorporate the needs of and benefits to other stakeholders – in particular fenceline communities, frontline workers, and consumers – in their policy advocacy. 

You’ve worked in government, in non-profit and now with companies. What have you picked up working within all these groups? 



“That it is a lot easier to say you support social – e.g. racial, gender, disability, etc. – justice than to actually reorient your organization or institution to do so. Social justice requires making difficult, risky decisions, formally acknowledging and rectifying past wrongs, dismantling systems and shifting/sharing power, “checking” yourself and your peers, reallocating deep resources (money, staffing, etc.) to workplace equity and justice initiatives, and transforming organizational culture and practices. Social justice is not impossible to achieve, but it is hard, and you will face a lot of resistance whether you’re working in government, nonprofit, or corporate sector. It’s still a worthy organizational goal, though, and integral to achieving environmental sustainability.”

What issues are you most concerned about in sustainability? 

Really our overall approach to energy, climate, and the environment. Sustainability has largely disregarded the lived experiences and needs of people of color and other marginalized populations globally, who bear the brunt of pollution and climate disasters. Interpersonal and systemic racism paved the way for climate change to happen, and our unwillingness to deal with that as a field is why we’re unable to stop or mitigate climate change effectively.

As a field, sustainability has been led predominantly by white professionals, who believed working with historically white-led companies and institutions to embrace the economic benefits of being green and conserving would be the route(s) of least resistance. But, it has only been the route of least resistance because continuous – unsustainable – economic growth and profiteering often come at the expense of people of color, whether through their displacement, subpar or lack of compensation, the decimation or poisoning of their homelands, natural resources and other spaces they rely on, etc.

Social injustice remains lucrative, even when hidden in supply/value chains, but sustainability fails to contend with that reality. We fail to contend with how social injustice allows for and drives toxic exposures and pollution, ecological destruction, and climate disasters.  

Rather than address directly what we, as a society, were willing to allow to happen to certain demographics of people for the sake of economic growth, sustainability professionals and organizations chose to be race neutral/colorblind, which only allows environmental racism to fester. Instead, our field focused on counting carbon, getting companies and institutions to make carbon pledges and plans, promoting new markets and new technology that still support and extend the life of heavy polluting industries (e.g. fossil fuels, mining, industrial agriculture, etc.), advocating for market-based mechanisms and government incentives for companies and institutions that do not really change those entities’ behaviors and have spurred many allegations of greenwashing, etc. We're afraid of addressing the elephant in the room...

But, it doesn’t have to be this way. Sustainability professionals and organizations could be vocal advocates for more stringent and competitive environmental checks & balances on companies and institutions, whether thru public policy (direct regulations, mandated standards, enforcement, and penalties), robust standards and best practices from trade organizations, and pressure and divestment from peer institutions, investors, and consumers alike. 

Jane at the March for Science.

“We also could be yielding and listening to environmental, energy, climate justice grassroots organizers (and racial justice-focused advocates, researchers, and scholars), learning from their lessons, prioritizing and amplifying the solutions that they have been demanding for the last 30+ years to safeguard their health, their communities and their livelihoods. But, as a field, we aren’t, which continues to leave many Black, Latino, Native, and Asian American/Arab/Pacific Islander communities at unnecessary yet grave risk and prevents all nations from achieving our proclaimed national/international climate & sustainability goals.”

What is your advice for people who want to get into this sector? 

Sustainability is not an island. It is interconnected to matters aside from energy and resource conservation; it’s very much tied to day-to-day violence and exploitation against people of color and other marginalized populations. So, I foresee the sustainability sector needing a lot more professionals and experts, who have a strong grasp of how racism, sexism, ableism, classism manifest in the context of water, food, energy, waste, air, mobility, buildings, other resource management, etc. and can offer direct and blunt remedies. Having a background in (or taking classes in) Ethnic Studies, Disability Studies, or Gender/Sexuality Studies would not hurt at all.

Are there any quotes/philosophies that you try to live your life by? 

Don’t panic, organize! (I find that this quote, which is a remix on "don't mourn, organize!" can be applied to many problems in life.)

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future? 

Both. I’m pessimistic in my belief that certain societal systems and business ideologies and practices can remain as they are if we just decouple production/growth from emissions. I’m optimistic about the fact that we can come up with new ways of being and do better by one another, by other living creatures, and by the planet if we’re going to realize a just, sustainable, and equitable future. (I highly recommend the TED talk from Colette Pichon Battle for an example of what makes me optimistic about the future.) 

Meet our Advisory Panel: Shefaly Gunjal

Who are you?

I am a Canadian, Muslim, South Asian, Woman of Colour. I am a convert to Islam, a researcher, a student, an advocate, a storyteller, an advisor, a friend, a sister, a wife.  

Tell us more about your journey - what drew you to diversity and sustainability work, and why do you think it’s important?

When I first started my undergraduate degree at the University of Toronto, I was pursuing Economics and happened to take an elective course in Environmental Management. Thanks to the wonderful professors and the content of that course, I fell in love with the subject matter and changed my major. Throughout my studies, I began to focus on the intersection of environmental issues and social issues, first focusing on environmental justice and in particular Indigenous Communities in Canada, to a more broader lens of the intersection of the three pillars of sustainability - society, environment and economy. My focus in diversity, equity and inclusion really began in my first year of graduate school. I attended Accelerate Her Future’s summit - a summit for BIWOC in the STEM field to network and build professional skills. Attending the summit opened my eyes to the power of and need for DEI, particularly in sustainability education and in the sustainability field as a whole. 

It’s important because diversity in sustainability is the fabric of our being, it is how we survive. Without including the voices of those who often go unheard, as decision makers, we will always be leaving someone out of the change we strive to create in the sustainability field, whether its environmental, social or economic. 

Touring the geothermal heating system at the University of Toronto Mississauga LEED Certified Instructional Building.

Do you have a mentor?  How have they helped you in your personal growth?

I have been lucky to have a few mentors throughout my career who understand the unique challenges I face being a woman of color. These mentors collectively have supported my personal and professional growth not only by setting an example of women of color who overcome the barriers we face, but also in giving me the confidence to believe in myself, my vision for my work, and to not let fear or insecurity hold me back. 

What has been your proudest moment to date?

My proudest moment to date is likely graduating from grad school. Had you asked me if I would have a Masters degree while I was in my first years of undergrad, I would have told you that’s impossible! A close second is the work I have had the chance to do in my current position at Citizen Relations. The communications and PR industry has a long way to go and I truly believe that Citizen Relations under the guidance of its current leadership is leading the way in making an impact while also calling clients to this impact too.

What advice/quote do you most live by and why?

“There is a verse in the Qur’an that goes “indeed, with hardship there is ease” and I’d have to say that’s what I live by the most whether I am going through hardship or through ease. Thinking about this verse reminds me that there is always hope at the end of the tunnel, and that if we all work together, we truly can create an inclusive society where all voices are celebrated. ”

What development(s) have excited you most in the field?

I’m most excited to see more and more organizations starting to draw linkages between DEI, social impact and sustainability work! We have a long way to go but some of the work being done is truly inspirational! Another thing is that companies are learning to leverage their skills and expertise to make a difference. For example, Citizen Relations has been using the power of communications to social impact and DEI work which creates real change.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

I’m optimistic! From my faith-based perspective, there is always a reason for hope and positivity. Without being optimistic we give way to the anxieties that prevent us from taking action. There are so many people doing amazing work and bringing positivity to the world that I have to believe it will make a difference. 

What’s next for you?

I’m going to keep doing the thing! Having recently started my position at Citizen Relations, I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know the organization, its culture and the change that I can bring as its DEI manager. Internally, we have been making strides moving our conversations to action and I am excited to see the pieces coming together in the new year!

Meet our Advisory Panel: Kevin D’Souza

Who are you?

My name is Kevin D’Souza. I am a very proud and fortunate Husband, Father and Grandfather. My amazing parents were hard-working immigrants who came to England in the 60s and I was born in London, many decades ago.  I went to the local public primary and Catholic secondary school in Harrow where I grew up - and much of the accepted blatant racism that I faced, as a first-generation kid, is what I now reflect on today in the hope that we can really make a change.  Because of my parents’ many sacrifices and hard work I was fortunate to be able to go to University where I studied Mining Engineering at the famous Royal School of Mines which is part of Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine.

What drew you to sustainability?

I would like to give you an enchanting story, but the truth is it was a complete and utter accident.  I enjoyed maths and science at school and hence studied to be an Engineer. But during my very first real experience on a mine site in Ghana, I became intrigued by the local Ashanti culture and history.  I would love to hang out in the local communities and just observe, listen and chat, so I was subsequently asked to “help” with community engagement and environmental management, and it became a career-changing moment. But it was not really recognized as a real “skill”, and it certainly was not called ESG or sustainability in those bygone days. It was simply a means to achieve a business need. Anyway, nearly three decades later I am still working in all forms of environmental management, sustainability, social performance, community, and Indigenous peoples engagement.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

“Diversity is essential in sustainability.  Firstly, we must acknowledge the legacy of systemic racism that has pervaded environmentalism including embedded longstanding prejudices against local communities and a focus on protecting pristine wildernesses. The fact is one cannot truly understand and empathize with all the issues that today come under the umbrella of sustainability from a position of privilege. Even today the dominant narrative pays minimal thought to Indigenous and other poor people who rely on these lands, even when they are its most effective stewards.  Of course, education, intent, and passion are vital, but actual lived experiences allow you to have even closer empathy.”

That is where diversity in all forms really can bring a tremendous advantage to any group, company, or institution trying to approach sustainability holistically and authentically.  Diversity will help advance social equity and innovation and help towards solving the complex and numerous interrelated social-ecological crises we face today. Without diversity in sustainability, at best groupthink quickly becomes the default, and at worse it becomes paternalistic and patronizing. As Professor Einstein reflected “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them” – likewise we cannot identify and address the myriad of sustainability challenges we face today with just the usual same faces in the room monopolizing the conversation based on their own world views. If real solutions are to be discovered, we all need to create psychologically safe spaces so that everyone can be heard.

Kevin in Nigeria.

 You’ve spent much of your career working on sustainability and diversity issues in the mining sector. Why is it particularly challenging in this sector?

Yes, as I said I have been blessed to work for nearly three decades in sustainability in over fifty countries. Over these years there have been many challenging areas and all that has really happened is the jargon has changed, and its importance has risen exponentially. Today the mining sector faces increased scrutiny for climate change adaption and resilience; tailings storage management; natural capital management including biodiversity, deforestation, and water stewardship; addressing diversity beyond gender; and human rights especially with respect to Indigenous peoples’ relations and cultural heritage management, to name just a few.

The undeniable reality is that the mining sector is currently experiencing an unprecedented surge of sophistication and emphasis on sustainability issues. Many, like me, believe the industry is in midst of a true transformation with the sustainability (or ESG) performance bar being continuously raised, coupled with a proliferation of standards and reporting requirements. Countless research studies from leading business schools have now unequivocally demonstrated that strong sustainability performance is increasingly being viewed as a proxy for well-managed mining companies. And sustainability performance is considered a significant risk for the mining sector as it has many implications including reputation, credibility, access to capital, and the also the cost of capital. This is all combined with heightened lender and investor expectations. There are also strengthening regulatory requirements and I suspect many of currently voluntary standards and disclosure requirements will be enacted into legislation especially for issues like climate change and human rights.

Do you have a mentor?  How have they helped you in your personal growth?

I really wish I could say I have, and I regret not investing more time trying to find a mentor to help me.  Instead, I have looked to some of my personal heroes for inspiration and guidance from my Father to Bob Marley, Nelson Mandela, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, and Mahatma Gandhi.  I would strongly recommend anyone, at any point in their career, to try to find a mentor.

What has been your proudest moment to date?

In life, it is without a doubt being married to my beautiful and incredible wife, Melanie, who has really been my real inspiration through her unbelievable humanity, genuine kindness, and unwavering support. In my career, I have been fortunate to have many absolutely wonderful moments. My wife often laments why I did not keep a journal to capture all my adventures.  Some hilarious, some surreal, some scary, some bewildering, and some very emotional times. Being stuck in the desert, escaping from a coup d’état, swimming with piranhas, being arrested, walking through minefields or opium poppy fields, negotiating with drug cartels and diamond smugglers, the list goes on.  One moment that immediately comes to mind is working for the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and trying to eliminate child labour in artisanal mining in the Sahel.  This involved working in Burkina Faso and Niger and in some of the most remote areas where extreme famine had driven families from their homes and fields to mine for gold with children working underground in unbelievably harsh conditions. Over time we did manage to have an impact over time helping the families and simultaneously stopping the children from working underground.  Another moment was working for an international NGO focused on gorilla conversation in DR Congo.  Years of conflict had driven local communities in the remote forests in search of lucrative minerals and they then all hunted for bushmeat.  Again, seeing unhabituated lowland Gorillas whilst working was just unbelievable for me another proud moment just being able to combine my specific set of skills with incredibly important wildlife conversation and also critical humanitarian efforts.

A lowland gorilla in the DRC.

What advice/quote do you most live by and why?

I am a bit of quodophile so I am not sure as I have too many that I often misquote.

Perhaps it is Dr. King’s “The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."

Maybe Confucius’s “Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance”

Perhaps the Dalai Lama’s “When you talk, you are only repeating what you already know. But when you listen, you may learn something new.

Or even Theodore Roosevelt’s rather long but very poignant quote “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.”

Or it could be simply “Illegitimi non carborundum” which is actually a marvelous mock-Latin aphorism that is so apt far too often.

What development(s) have excited you most in the field?

Although many now claim that the whole concept of Milton Friedman`s edict from the 70’s “the business of business is business” is increasingly being challenged, there is a worrying misperception that sustainability issues are only long-term concerns and simply do not need to be part of current corporate strategic imperatives (coupled with a lack of clarity about Board and Executive oversight). But investors, lenders, stakeholders, and the general public are demanding better performance, transparency, and sustainability disclosure on so many issues.

I believe to thrive in this new era of accelerating transformation - and stakeholder capitalism companies need to embrace sustainability as a business imperative. And suffice to say sustainability approaches cannot be about short-term thinking, hoping to do the right thing, just maintaining a “social license” to secure permits, window dressing, or simply ticking boxes. Rather it should be about creating and protecting value through the systematic application of sustainability disciplines throughout the business. I believe it is about strengthening company-wide operational preparedness and building resilience. It is about attracting and retaining the best talent and being a true company of choice.

This is what makes it exciting for me, and is forcing the sustainability (or ESG) field to move rapidly from the `soft` non-core stuff relegated to the back office with a few tree hugger-type folks, to becoming a strategic imperative for many companies and institutions. This means that there will be huge opportunities for sustainability practitioners and courageous leaders to really make a difference in all sectors. In terms of careers, the future is bright for the next generation of sustainability practitioners.

Kevin with local communities in Papua New Guinea.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

Fully optimistic. We are at a historic tipping point for many sectors especially in industries like mining.  Today we need to avoid what some call “defensive sustainability” that is primarily motivated by value-protection and driven by risk management.  This outdated “CSR-type” approach focused too narrowly on monitoring negative impacts on the environment and a few communities and less on value creation. Enter the new sustainability (or ESG) approach that I believe is fundamentally about creating a sustainable culture and is focused on creating maximum value, and importantly not just financial.

The new approach is about embedding systematic sustainability governance and discipline in the very core of the business. However, there is a dearth of genuine talent to achieve this.  In addition, there is the increasing danger with the parallel overnight growth in sustainability “experts” who lack the foundational experience empathy. Regrettably, there are a great many charlatans both individuals and companies who are very good at talking about sustainability and producing amazing websites and glossy reports with all the latest jargon on “what to do”, but who lack the authenticity and fundamental knowledge to act and implement with empathy. There is always unquestionable intent, but I am afraid there is no shortcut to sustainability experience and success. Both are earned through the difficult journey of building self-awareness and self-management; having to choose courage over comfort; gaining humility through making mistakes, experiencing failures and disappointment; and good old-fashioned perseverance.

What’s next for you?

A timely question.  I have just left my last job as Vice President of a mining company after eight years and I am exploring options for the next chapter in my life, and I guess somewhat open to offers. What is essential is for me is finding a place where I can truly belong and there is a genuine commitment to authentic sustainability performance to future-proof the business, combined with real equity, diversity, and inclusivity.

Meet our Advisory Panel: Andrew Gonzales

Who are you?

I have defined myself as many things over the course of my life. Environmentalist, Latino, Estadounidense ("United State-ian" in English), Farmer, Human Rights Professional, Traveler, Spicy Food Enthusiast.  What seems most salient at this point in my life is a husband. Marriage, has brought a different new lens to myself and my work. Much of who I am is defined by my father's half of the family, 12 generations of New Mexican ranchers and farmers. You don't live in the same 50 mile radius for 500 years without developing deep family and cultural roots, and marriage has brought a new found appreciation for the power and importance of the family unit. So who am I? All of what I listed, but a husband first.

What drew you to sustainability?

I practiced sustainability as a child before I even knew of the concept. As I mentioned, my family has lived in the same area alongside indigenous communities for generations. While there is the sad realities of what my ancestors did to the landscape and original people of that land, one silver lining was that the cultural exchange wasn't only one sided. You will find a lot of indigenous folklore and beliefs sprinkled in the culture and Catholicism of Chicanos in the Southwest. I recommend reading “Bless me Ultima” if you want a peek at what I am alluding to. All of this is a long winded way of saying that I had values of caring for the earth and environment instilled into me by a family that had learned to steward the land for the next 1, 2, 7 generations, not just for tomorrow.

 Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

All you have to look at is nature's example to see why diversity is important in any arena. When an ecosystem is biodiverse, it is more resilient, it has multiple "solutions" (i.e. species) to respond to changes in the ecosystem, and generally has a better chance at maintaining an advantage against future changes. The same is true when talking about any professional realm. Diversity brings multiple worldviews and perspectives into the conversation that enable problems to be approached from different vantage points. A quick example, the Iroquois worldview that humans are "brother and sisters" to animals fundamentally changes the solutions they might bring to the table vs the Judeo-Christian view that humans are "stewards" over the land/animals.

Andrew defines himself first and foremost as a husband.

You’ve spent much of your career working at the intersection of international development, sustainability and diversity issues, taking a human-centred approach to all of them. Why is this important to you and why is it effective?

My fundamental belief is that communities themselves already hold the seeds of the best solutions for their challenges. International development has long been plagued by academic "experts" in Western countries drawing up economic and environmental solutions for other countries only to see them fail in local contexts. One of my favorite stories is of a government policy in Côte d'Ivoire where all timber related trees are technically owned by the government. From what I remember, the intention was to regulate, help reduce, and more sustainably manage the deforestation crisis in country. The result? Farmers in the area cut down these trees because they worry government timber officials will damage their cocoa orchards when trying to harvest them. I wonder what would've happened had we asked the farmers themselves what solution would've had them protect the trees?

Do you have a mentor? 

How have they helped you in your personal growth? Yes and no. I don't think I have ever had the "I bring 10 questions to X person every 2 weeks" type of mentor. But I have had different guides in different seasons of my life. In high school, there was a teacher who really helped kindle my human rights embers and nudged me in that direction when I left my small town for university. In college, I had an economics professor that worked for the World Bank that really helped me map out what it takes to get into international development. In my first "real job", it was my boss's boss who took an interest in me, and put me on some growth projects that gave me some confidence in my "teeth cutting" years. Currently I have a wider network and lean on several people for thoughts and mentorship in their areas of expertise.

A photo of Andrew’s grandmother’s field, looking out to Taos mountain, in New Mexico.

What has been your proudest moment to date?

This one is always a little hard for me to name, as what I am most proud of never had a watershed "moment." To answer the question though, I would say that my previous work in the sugar sector brought me a lot of pride. The fact that I knew the work I was doing was literally saving lives through bringing better working conditions to field workers was inspiring.

What advice/quote do you most live by and why?

Currently there is a quote by James Clear, Author of Atomic Habits, that I work hard to live by right now: "“When choosing a new habit many people seem to ask themselves, “What can I do on my best days?” The trick is to ask, “What can I stick to even on my worst days?” I think people fall off the bandwagon of -or burn out on- good habits, progress, sustainability, climate change, health, because they bite off more than they can chew. They get enthusiastic and try to sprint the marathon. Major changes in the social justice and sustainability sectors will require patience and diligence.

What development(s) have excited you most in the field?

From a totally unbiased place, the newer emphasis on diversity and human centered design. People are realizing we need minority and underrepresented voices at the leadership tables of these international conversations we are having. People are also recognizing that top-down sustainability doesn't lead to integrated and long term solutions. I am excited to see what the landscape looks like in 5 and 10 years.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

Optimistic! The human capacity to adapt, evolve, and change is incredible. I understand that that same drive has gotten us into a lot of the problems that we face. I also believe we are probably going to have to pay a higher price than we need to before we turn the corner. But will we recover and find ways to restore? Absolutely.

What’s next for you?

I think I am currently living "what's next" for me. Which has been leaning into social justice aspects of my career and getting more involved in the diversity space. Going from non-profit international development to corporate DEI work has been a shift, but I have learn so much in the last 9 months.

Meet our Team: Patience Tram

Who are you?

I am Patience! I am a friend, a daughter, an older sister, a scientist, and a feminist. In addition, I am half Cree and half Vietnamese (Creenamese, if you will). While my family is originally from a Cree nation, an Ojibwe reservation located in Ontario is home. However, I haven’t always lived on reserve and while most of my life has been spent living in the city, my community is where my parents and younger siblings currently live and is a place that has and continues to be an influential part of my journey in becoming the person I am today.

I am currently a fourth-year student at Mount Royal University, studying General Science with a minor in both Biology and Women and Gender studies. Throughout my degree, my own values and passion in social issues have led me to focus my scientific path in specific areas such as environmental and animal conservation. It is this passion that has also led my interest in exploring the dynamic experiences and concerns of marginalized populations based on a variety of identities including my own as an Asian and Indigenous woman.

How has living on reserve and in the city informed your views on sustainability?

Living both in Calgary and on reserve has offered me the unique insight of understanding two drastically different worlds within Canada. Within my own community, the collection of resources and food sources from the surrounding environment is as natural as going to the grocery store for those in the city, however, I feel that the most significant difference exhibited within the city is that there is a stronger disconnect between resources and consumption. On reserve, the uptake of resources is personal, physical, and requires time spent in the surrounding environment which I believe has provided me and my community members with a greater sense of how our actions affect not only the environment, but the animals and each other.

Ultimately, having observed how community needs are met while also considering environmental health, animal welfare, social relations, and other factors, I have a greater understanding of how sustainability encompasses a myriad of different elements and how they all interplay.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

Through my minor in Women and Gender Studies, I have learnt that while people around the world may have a shared and universal experience, such as gender, each gendered experience is unique due to varying factors such as geography, culture, and religion; I think the same notion applies to sustainability. While we are all facing the question of how to be more sustainable, elements such as geography, race, and economic standing are all things to consider within our efforts to address the issue of sustainability as a global issue which affects a variety of people rather than a localized and homogenized issue based on Western ideologies.

“I think defining the field of sustainability based on a single ideology undermines the voices and experiences of others who are facing the same challenges and ultimately disadvantages the movement. ”

Sustainability is important because the lack of representation not only affects the hegemonic group within predominantly white fields, but also the POC in those fields who are aiding in creating diversity rather than experiencing it.

Who do you look up to?

My mother! There are a lot of misconceptions and stereotypes surrounding Indigenous people, all of which have played a major role in how I chose to Identify myself growing up.

“I often felt ashamed about being Indigenous and struggled with internalized racism and while I admire my mother for a multitude of reasons, what I appreciate about her most is that she pushed me to have a relationship with both my Vietnamese and Indigenous side. This is significant because while she was growing up, she herself didn’t have much understanding of her relationship with her Indigenous identity other than it made up her physical appearance and how people treated her because of it. Despite the status and misconceptions of Indigenous people in Canada, my mother made the effort to understand and love our culture and as a result, I have perspective and love for who I am and for that I am grateful.”

Is there a quote or mantra that you most live by, and why?

“We cannot become what we want by remaining what we are” - Max De Pree

Many, including myself, fear change because it's uncomfortable. However, I’ve grown to understand that growth and moving towards becoming who you want is uncomfortable because you’ve never been there before. I love this quote because it reminds me not to fear the uncomfortable and to always push myself to meet new people and embrace new experiences.

What issues in sustainability are you most concerned about?

Right now, one of my biggest concerns is not only the exploitation of the natural environment but how this in turn can result in the exploitation of people. Countries including Canada, have developed from imperialism and benefit from the use of resources and labour of people, which not only harms the environment but also the cultural and social relations of those native to that region.

You’re just about to graduate from university. What would you like to do next?

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, travelling was one of my favourite things to do. To me, travelling and exploring new places, people, and cultures is a form of learning that cannot be taught in a classroom and while I have plans to further my education, I would like to take some time to explore the world. In fact, I have considered prolonging my graduation so that I can participate in a field school program in Peru as well as study abroad. However, with the uncertainty presented with the pandemic, only time will tell if that will be possible; either way, my goals of exploring the world remain.

Besides traveling, I would like to further my education and pursue my master's in Women and Gender Studies and hopefully go on to pursue my Ph.D. What inspires me about this field is its intersectional approach and how it can be applied to our understanding of life, whether scientific or social. I feel that pursuing Women and Gender studies is a good foundation for my future endeavors which could eventually include teaching or research, both of which I’m extremely interested in. 

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

I think more than anything I am excited to see the progress of the world and our journey towards a more sustainable future. One of the most intriguing shifts that I have observed is the fall of fast fashion. Fast fashion has been a significant issue facing us today, however, with growing understanding of its effects on environmental and social sustainability and significant shifts within generations to shop second-hand have grown as more sustainable options. With options such as these, I feel optimistic because I can contribute in my own way. However, while I categorize myself as an optimist, I think that both pessimism and optimism are key in evaluating challenges in both a realistic and meaningful way.

Meet our Advisory Panel: Christine Bader

Christine Bader speaking at TEDxMcMinnville about The Life I Want, Jan 2020. Photo credit: Liam Pickhardt.

Who are you?

I am a half-Filipina, half-white native New Yorker, currently living in Oregon wine country with my husband and young twins; proud author of The Evolution of a Corporate Idealist: When Girl Meets Oil; and the grateful product of more organizations and experiences than I can reasonably list here (but a few: City Year, Amherst College, the Yale School of Management, Hunter College High School, The OpEd Project, and TED and multiple TEDx events).

What drew you to sustainability?

I’ve always been driven by a desire to understand how the world works and how different parts of systems fit together; so going into the corporate world wasn’t really about being in the corporate world—it was about understanding how business interacts with and impacts everyone else. Sustainability is at the heart of that interaction.

Specifically? After earning my MBA in 2000, I joined BP as a commercial analyst in Indonesia. I was crunching data related to BP’s purchase of ARCO, helping figure out how the new assets fit into the company’s portfolio. One liquified natural gas project was straightforward from a technical standpoint, but had some gnarly human rights challenges. Back then there wasn’t an army of corporate responsibility professionals to deploy; I put my hand up and expressed an interest in working on those issues, and the rest is history.
Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

The work of corporate sustainability practitioners is building bridges between our companies and the rest of the world. We can’t do that effectively if we’re not representative of that world. But it’s not just about our own effectiveness: It’s about equity. There are more than enough talented people who are not white and/or cisgender and/or heterosexual and/or economically-privileged and/or male to fill every sustainability leadership role there is; but the paths to leadership have not been paved for everyone.

What do you hope to contribute to the Diversity in Sustainability Advisory Panel?

On the “Sustainability” part: I’ve worked in the field for twenty-plus years and from every possible angle, including in corporate headquarters, as a consultant, supporting multi-lateral processes, on the ground in the field, as a writer, commentator, teacher, and more. 

On the “Diversity” part: I am half-Filipina but pass as white, so have been privy to conversations where others assume that no people of color are in the room, and have spent a lifetime navigating my biracial identity. 

So I hope to contribute my experience, as well as my training in coaching and motivational interviewing to help people in the DiS community find the right opportunities with the right organizations.

You’ve spent time in the corporate sector in sustainability and human rights, and are now focused on building a future of work that works for all. What is broken about the world of work right now, and from all your discussions – what needs to change?

“The demands of the modern workplace and the lack of supportive infrastructure (healthcare, value of caregiving), are such that even people like those in the DiS community, who care deeply about the world, have little time or energy to give to anything beyond the day-to-day demands of their jobs. This leaves our families and our mental health short of the time and energy they warrant, and precludes the sort of community and civic involvement that our world really needs right now.”

Eva Dienel is a fellow sustainability writer and twin mom who also left full-time work to build a freelance life that builds work around life rather than vice versa. We launched The Life I Want (thelifeiwant.co) together in 2019 to share stories showing how work can enable the lives we want.

Do you have a mentor? How have they helped you in your personal growth?

I have had great mentors over the years!

“The interactions that have helped me the most have been when a mentor shared stories rather than advice. When people dispense advice, they’re usually drawing a conclusion for you based on their experiences, expectations, and biases—some of which they might not even be aware of. I strongly encourage people to look out for when someone gives you advice that begins with “You should”; thank them and ask them to turn it into “I did.”

(I expanded on this in a LinkedIn post.)

What has been your proudest moment to date?

Every time my kids use some incredible new vocabulary word! On the work front: I’m still so proud of my book, which came out in 2014; I still receive emails out of the blue saying what an impact it had on someone’s life, either by providing a perspective or laying out a career path that they didn’t know existed, or by spelling out the tensions and challenges of their work that they hadn’t quite articulated.

What advice/quote do you most live by and why?

I didn’t choose to live by this E.B. White quote, but I find myself thinking about it a LOT: “I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve (or save) the world and a desire to enjoy (or savor) the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.”

What development(s) have excited you most in the field?

The racial reckoning of 2020 has been painful and hasn’t by any means solved what ails us. But we are seeing companies commit resources to figuring out specific, concrete, impactful actions to address longstanding inequities. Most exciting to me is how the tools that the sustainability field has embraced for a long time, such as impact assessments and reporting, are starting to be applied towards social justice.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

My book is called The Evolution of a Corporate Idealist—of course I’m an optimist! I’m being a little bit glib: I am deeply concerned about the loud voices in our society that demonize and polarize and make collective collaborative conversations really, really hard. But the more I look for solutions, the more I find: Braver Angels, Citizen University, and Hollaback! are just a few of the organizations that have inspired me recently, with super practical and specific offerings that speak to what is most needed right now.

What’s next for you?

I’m chairing my city’s new Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Advisory Committee, which is enabling me to connect with my relatively new hometown while doing anti-racism work, exercising my facilitation and leadership muscles, and geeking out on local government stuff (which I haven’t done since working for New York City government over twenty years ago). I’m continuing to prioritize time with my kids while they still want to hang out with me, and enjoying the slower pace of small-town living, which is allowing me to listen carefully for where my interests and skills overlap with what is needed.

More details on Christine at her website.

Meet our Team: Hiwot Belai

Who are you? 

I was born and raised in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and I moved to Canada at the age of 11 with my mother and my sister. For a while, my mother worked two jobs to support us, work that did not even utilise her two degrees. No, instead, she travelled an hour and a half each morning to get to job one, working some arbitrary job before clocking out and travelling a further hour and half to get to the next. In all this time, she never shirked a single one of her responsibilities; she took financial care of both my family here and back home, did her work very well and, most importantly, she was a great mom. She taught me about hard work, responsibility and humility, the core values that guide my life.

Now, I am a third-year student at the University of Toronto, studying Health and Disease with a focus on Anthropology and Immunology. I love what I am learning, and I am eager to see how my education will shape my professional career. Outside of school, I am an engaged grassroots leader in my community. My pride and joy is a youth organization aptly named the Association of Committed and Engaged Youth (ACEY), which I co-founded in the 10th grade and currently co-chair. In this capacity, I find that I can work to bring targeted and effective resolutions to community-level issues. However, I am growing older and may not fit into the descriptor ‘youth’ for much longer so I look forward to taking on larger challenges on both the national and global scale.

Other than that, I have various, sometimes fleeting, interests. I particularly like learning about niche topics and am currently studying the work of Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí. 

You’re studying both health and disease and anthropology. What is it about these two topics that appeals to you?

My love for biology, in general, is quite an unremarkable story. As I imagine most life science enthusiasts feel, my first science lesson about the miracle of life was transformative. I was fascinated by the complex machine that is the human body and inspired by the sheer amount of knowledge humanity had collected on the topic in even pre-industrial times. Thus, when I was applying to my university program, there wasn’t much to mull over.

My love for anthropology, on the other hand, is a little more grim. I gravitated toward discipline after watching the TV show ‘Bones’ and, although I had deemed it impossible, I became even more obsessed with our life form. I was amazed by how the body could retain such distinctive traces of one’s lifestyle even after death. For a brief moment, I even wanted to become a forensic anthropologist and unfortunately, I let myself be talked out of what could have been a promising career. However, I secretly took Anthropology classes in my first year and found that the applications of the study were more expansive and interesting than I had ever imagined. I stuck with it and it helped me to evolve my vision of my future career. Rather than the obvious path to medical doctor-hood that I planned, I realized that I could combine my passion for science and my aptitude in social relations and policy reform to pursue a fulfilling career in global healthcare provision and research.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

Diversity seems like an intuitive concept to me - if everyone is included and given a seat at the table, then everyone can contribute. Individuals from all walks of life can share their unique lived experiences and perspectives to achieve holistic approaches to problem-solving. Thus, if one can understand that racial inequities exist, then one must be dedicated to actions promoting inclusion in order to have 'all hands on deck'. It's almost ironic that the lack of diversity in the sustainability sector is a source of waste and inefficiency. That's why I work on promoting diversity and inclusion in civic engagement projects within my community - it is not just a moral compass that pushes me to do this work, but a dedication to pragmatism.

Hiwot is recognized for her service to the community.

You created a group called the Association of Committed and Engaged Youth. Tell us more about that.

My journey to becoming a grassroots leader did not stem from any particular passion. All I remember was wanting to get a headstart on my high school volunteer hours the summer before Grade 9 and checking in with the Volunteer Toronto website weekly to find out how I could get involved. Then, by some chance, I found myself organizing a youth camp conference and spent a weekend talking to students from my area about the problems they struggled with on a daily basis. While some could not afford to take public transit to school everyday, others had a troubled relationship with the local police and would forgo using community centres for fear of being profiled. While the list of problems was extensive and varied, the reason for the persistence of these issues in the community was largely singular: the exclusion of the affected populations in informing policy. Youth were not consulted about the implementation of community programs and understandably, they were either inaccessible or failed at addressing the concerns they were designed to solve. That is when my friends and I decided to create the Association of Committed and Engaged Youth (ACEY). While our name is a mouthful, our mandate is simple: to put youth at the forefront of sustainable policy and community changes that directly affect them. This necessitated a thorough understanding of and dedication to diversity in all its forms to ensure that no one was left out and it is this diversity that is instrumental to our success. This opportunity has encouraged me to push inclusion in both my educational journey and professional career because understanding the importance of diversity is the first step to being a globally-minded citizen.

You mentioned eventually going back to Ethiopia to apply some of your knowledge back home. What do you envision your role being?

Although I do not have all the technical details planned out, my mission is very clear: to take the knowledge and professional experience I have accumulated as a student in North America and use it to improve the living conditions and prospects of Ethiopians and Eritreans. I anticipate that my work will look something like bringing access to healthcare, treatments, contraceptive programs and family planning to the countryside.

I am especially motivated when I recall my jarring transition to Canadian life. I vividly remember being positively shocked at the number of books that were in my sixth-grade classroom, and how they easily shamed the inventory in my school’s library back home. I think of all the opportunities that are afforded to me by living where I do and growing up how I did and I think that it is only fair that I take some of those blessings and use them for the advancement of my home nation.

Do you have a mentor? How have they helped you in your career or personal growth?

Not at the moment, although I am always looking. I have, however, had many mentors in the past. One person that has helped me tremendously is Lisa, an alumnus from the University of Toronto. Like me, she started out studying the life sciences and somewhere along the way, she had a crisis about what her future looks like, as I do quite frequently. In her search for answers, she shared with me the truth that she discovered, which is that our paths, whether they be professional, educational or personal, are non-linear. There is no clear-cut prescription on what to do and when to become successful. In fact, our journeys may not even be consistently directional, as obstacles make us reconsider our priorities, our abilities and our current goals. This revelation helps me stay grounded when I fixate on setbacks or feel overwhelmed and directionless. Now, I find that I can pursue work opportunities that are not strictly healthcare-related because, while they may not be contributing to work experience for my degree, I am doing work I am passionate about and that freedom is exhilarating. 

Is there a quote or mantra that you most live by, and why?

“A lo hecho, pecho.” - Unknown

I happened upon this Spanish idiom not too long ago, but we have all heard some iteration of this at some point in our lives. It directly translates to ‘Concerning what is done, chest’, basically meaning ‘What’s done is done’. It encourages me to understand that the past is beyond my control and all I can do at any point in time is use the present to my advantage. It centres me when I dwell on a moment missed or an opportunity wasted and helps me refocus on what’s important: the future.

What issues in sustainability are you most concerned about?

Although I cannot identify why I have become so radicalized, I am very concerned about the strain of overpopulation on our planet’s welfare. I think of the fact that, despite our overconsumption and overtaxation of Earth’s resources, we still cannot manage to feed every person. With a global population that is fast-approaching our planet’s limits, we must act expeditiously. It is especially upsetting because the ramifications of this unsustainable growth, like many other things, are not distributed evenly across the globe and are especially harmful to poorer nations.

I recently watched a documentary called ‘Mother’ that concisely explains a potential solution to many of the existential issues facing our planet: the education of women all over the world. Although the main evil the film discussed was climate change, the education of women can have massive effects on population management; the opportunity costs of motherhood for an educated woman are much higher than those of a woman who does not have formal education. To me, this seems like a clear-cut solution to this sustainability issue that has no drawbacks, and one that I advocate for wherever I can.

What would you like to do next?

My goal right now is to do some coursework abroad and work with global organizations like UNICEF on policies that promote equitable access to healthcare and medication in countries stricken by natural disasters. More generally, however, I am just focused on building up a base of international knowledge through travel and exchanges to foster a global perspective.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

Although it reads to others as optimism, I have a very realistic approach to expectations about the future. The expansion of knowledge and technology, coupled with globalization, means that our globe will be better off than most people predict. What’s more is that global attitudes about education are shifting; information, while still a prized commodity, is becoming more and more available to the masses, giving way to two major outcomes. First, people become impassioned and empowered to act on the issues that really matter. For some people, seeing is believing and videos on the internet, research from leading experts as well as testimonials from people living through these experiences give us the incontrovertible proof we need to know that change is necessary.

Secondly, we are given the opportunity to arm ourselves with knowledge, with community and purpose. Going back to the interconnectedness of the world, it is clear that it has never been easier to relate to a person that is completely removed from your situation. For example, I can understand the context of someone living in British Columbia, although I have never been there before. From news and other media, I can imagine the horror of having your home burn down and as the unfolding scene pushes me to action, I can subsequently look online for ways to help. I can join environmental groups to create change, donate time or money to help the cause or even do the bare minimum of consciously altering my lifestyle to do my part in preventing such disasters.

I see this passion and proactivity in most people, but especially within my generation. So, realistically, our planet is in good hands.

Mamadou Abou-Sarr: Bringing Intentionality to ESG

Who are you?

My name is Mamadou-Abou Sarr. First and foremost, I am the son of parents from Benin and Senegal who migrated to France in the seventies who gave my siblings and I an amazing education. I am a husband and father to four lovely children who were born around the world. By trade, I am an international financier who co-founded V-Square Quantitative Management (V-Square) in 2020 after an accomplished career in asset management working for global financial services company across the U.S., Europe, Middle East, and Africa.

What made you decide to start V-Square Quantitative?

The common thread in my 18+ year professional journey is a fundamental belief that profit maximization should work hand in hand with sustainable investing. I still have the same interest, passion and drive for sustainability sparked in my youth; my interest in social responsibility can be traced back to my childhood devotion to ecology. I would accompany my father, a Doctor of Science specialized in genome and plant evolution, to the French National Centre for Scientific Research to learn about the importance of biodiversity. Nature conservation was therefore part of my life growing up.

My own random walk down Wall Street, starting my career as a foreign exchange (FX) trader to becoming the global head of sustainability and product innovation at a large asset management firm, taught me a lot. When I co-founded V-Square in early 2020, I had an informed view and a global expertise on sustainability issues gained through my thousands of engagements with investors, academia, and regulators around the world, discussing Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) integration across asset classes. As an investment practitioner, I have seen the ESG industry move in an uncoordinated fashion, as if in a Brownian motion, leading to more complexity. Nowadays, it is a daunting task to address the lack of consensus in industry standards, untangle the plethora of ESG data, navigate a range of scoring methodologies, and assess the relevancy of ESG signals. I developed a Global Positioning System (GPS) approach to sustainable investing, one that focuses on materiality and profitability.

“I wanted to build an investment firm that has the power to understand quantitative data but also has the ESG expertise to decipher, harmonise and standardise this data leading to better informed investment decisions. For many, the Newton’s cradle brings back memories of physics classes, yet for me, this image crystalizes so well this stage of the ESG industry and why V-Square is focusing on intentionality. With the surge of scoring methodologies, this could create false positives, therefore I strongly believe that integration of material sustainability factors into investment portfolios needs to be intentional and not accidental to achieve targeted impacts. ”

How did you find your way into sustainable investing?

Erol Ozan eloquently stated that “Some beautiful paths can’t be discovered without getting lost”. I have trained and apprenticed at large and small financial services companies around the world including HSBC Global Asset Management, Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Amundi Alternative Investments and Citi through FX trading, strategy, and business development roles. My passion for the field can be traced back to childhood and in adulthood I was able to spearhead the development of a global ESG platform at a large US asset manager to finally reconcile my true passion with my investment acumen.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability/sustainable investing is important?

With over $35 trillion of global sustainable assets around the world, sustainable investing has become one of the fastest-growing segments in the asset management industry. With such a sustained growth over the years and positive forecasts on asset growth, sustainable investing is now finding its way into many investors’ strategic asset allocations. I believe that value created at the expense of non-investor stakeholders can be short-lived. Over long periods of time, stakeholder and shareholder interests become increasingly aligned and we take these factors into consideration when making informed investment decisions. 

Diversity and inclusion have been much talked about in the last few years. More than mere buzz words, they increasingly became a focus for companies and fund boards. Indubitably, diversity in the workplace can be hard to implement, especially if firms fail to recognize its value or the obvious challenges. For instance, we all have biases that tend to be confirmed within our own social circles. This situation can make us think of Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of habitus, which states that a system of dispositions, acquired schemes of perception, thought and action is developed through an individual’s engagement in society. Interestingly, drawing a parallel with portfolio diversification can help us understand that diversity adds value when implemented properly.

Most people positively see value in diversifying the firms’ outputs, e.g., the strategies, the products, the revenue streams. With human capital being a key input for companies and fund boards, it may be fair to assume that there is value in diversifying that input. Diversity and diversification find more in common from their Latin roots; they both carry value. I would argue that the avoidance of group thinking and “My Buddy-Says-So” phenomena would be to bring more diversity in boards, fund boards, etc.

What advice would you give to students, young professionals or mid-career professionals that want to get into this sector?

I have the honor of mentoring students, young professionals, and mid-career professionals across many sectors. Reflecting on own my path and experiences, I developed a set of visuals to support career pathing. I called it the Random Walk vs GPS career path.  My main advice to students and professionals is to develop their own GPS approach and lead with passion, empathy, and humility.

Mamadou’s approach to career pathing.

What has your proudest moment been as you have made your way through the sector?

My proudest moment was to be recognized in 2017 in Top 50 Individuals who have contributed the most to sustainable & responsible investment industry in the world (IRRI). More than the recognition itself, I was humbled by the fact that my approach to teamwork and innovation were acknowledged by peers and investors.

What issues in sustainable finance are you most concerned about?

The global pandemic, social injustice, and natural disasters impacted the lives of many people and took a significant toll on the global economy in 2020. For the economy to build better value for longer, I believe that governments, companies, and individuals must embrace many of the core tenets of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) investing. The issues I am the most concerned about pertain to:

• Climate Risk,

• No S without G (No Social justice without a Governance framework),

• Green washing and Green wishing.

What quote do you most live by and why?

More than a quote, I live by a Fulani expression Dowe Tan which can be translated to Altius (higher) in Latin.

Everyday before going to school, my father would raise my right hand in the air and pronounce these two words in a divine way: “Dowe Tan!” It was our rally cry, a way to galvanize me to stay focused, try my best and never give up. I believe in having a clear sense of identity, I was raised to believe that to go somewhere, you need to know where you came from.

To find out more about Mamadou and V-Square Quantitative Management, click here.

Tiffany Wong: Closing the Loop

Tell us about yourself.

I’m a Hong Kong-born Canadian and I immigrated to Calgary when I was 7 years old. At that time, my mom stayed back to hold a steady income for the family while my dad took my brother and I to start a new life in Canada. We didn’t have much and I remember vividly how tough it was for my dad. His English wasn’t great, and he was actively job seeking while figuring out how to be a parent. The three of us stayed in a one-bedroom apartment, and with the limited space, we had to be creative with our sleeping arrangements. We ended up putting two twin size beds side by side – my dad would sleep in the middle (between my brother and I), stuffing the crack with a blanket to make it a little more comfortable. When my parents bought their first house in Canada, one of those twin-size beds came with me, and it’s the same bed that I slept in all throughout university. I’ve watched my parents work hard and show that with a lot of determination and grit, anything, even the most ambitious and seemingly impossible goal, is always possible. It’s this same mentality that I’ve taken on in both my career and my life.

Today, I’m an Engineer working as a Lead Consultant for a Canadian sustainability firm. At AFARA, we specialize in the math, science, and economics of sustainability and I empower leaders to make decisions with data and models. For the past few years, I’ve been focused on pathways to decarbonization and plastics circularity. I’ve built marginal abatement cost (MAC) curves to prioritize emission reduction opportunities for heavy emitters in Canada, recognizing the evolving landscape for carbon price and the electrical grid. I’ve helped clients explore different possible futures using climate scenarios to understand risks and opportunities of different actions (or inactions). Beyond the energy sector, working on plastics circularity has given me an opportunity to engage with 75+ chemical recycling technology providers globally who are innovating on new recycling solutions to bring post-consumer plastics back into the supply chain. I’ve studied how plastics are produced, used, and recycled around the world and built economic models to understand how new advanced recycling solutions can compete with virgin plastics made from petrochemical feedstocks (such as natural gas and crude oil) today.

Outside of work, I am a fashion and make up enthusiast, a recreational boxer, and an avid traveller. On my last trip, I spent a month backpacking in Morocco, Malta, and Sicily.

How did you get into the field of sustainability?

I’ve always been subconsciously drawn to sustainability. When I was little, I had a catchphrase – “I don’t want it, do you want it?” I would use it in every context possible, but mostly with food. In response, I often got eye rolls from others as though I was giving them my garbage. Looking back, that catchphrase innocently stemmed from my desire to minimize waste and be resourceful.

As I got older, I was able to start putting this subconscious into words and it led me to the word ‘sustainability’. I had an internship with ConocoPhillips and it became very clear to me that I was not passionate about what I was doing there: modelling oil reservoirs and making well spacing recommendations to plan for future drillings. At the time, I was too afraid to leave the industry, and I figured it would be best to pivot into environmental stewardship and energy efficiency teams within the oil and gas industry. I spent countless hours networking during my 16 months with the company and I managed to meet a slew of interesting people – air emissions specialists, water resource experts, and environmental stewardship managers, just to name a few.

Things didn’t turn out the way I planned and surprisingly, the economic downturn in Calgary was a blessing in disguise for me. With no Engineer-In-Training (EIT) position lined up, it forced me out of my comfort zone and made me evaluate where I wanted to take my career. After half a year on a research placement in Germany and another half working at Hollister (the clothing company), I landed my first post-grad engineering job at AFARA, which was called Oil & Gas Sustainability at the time. It felt like the perfect transition, given the name of the company. I also felt like a pioneer among my peers, given that no one else from my class was working in a similar position, and sustainability was still relatively nascent in 2017 across Canada, especially in the energy industry.

There were many moments where I would feel like I “wasted” my education – I wasn’t practicing technical skills I learned in engineering, like heat transfer or fluid dynamics. What I’ve come to realize is that my education is the very reason I’m on the sustainability journey. In fact, one of the reasons I’ve been able to become an expert in plastics circularity is because of my background with petroleum. Petrochemicals are the building blocks for virgin plastics and being able to understand the techno-economic data gave me a baseline for what mechanically and chemically recycled plastics are up against. My education in chemical and petroleum engineering was a crucial stepping stone, and in hindsight, there hasn’t been a straighter path in my sustainability career.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

There won’t be a silver bullet solution to a sustainable and prosperous future. What we need to do in North America is going to be very different from what we need to do in Asia. To paraphrase the director of IEA: “first, different countries start this race from different starting points, there is a difference between the rich countries and the emerging countries; second, the race is not between the countries, but against time; and third, unless all the governments finish the race, nobody can win.” Although he’s speaking specifically about the pathway to net zero emissions, it’s a philosophy that carries through to all sustainability issues.

Sustainability can only be achieved if we are all in on it. Part of this means being inclusive and equitable in our conversations. In my 4+ years at AFARA, it’s been disappointing to see the decision makers in the room, often Steering Committees formed with my clients, are predominantly white males. I was often the only female, and most of the time, the only Asian. We need to change this and make sure there is diversity and equal representation as we tackle the world’s biggest challenges together.

What sustainability issues are you most concerned about and why?

I’m most concerned by the pace of change, particularly on the topic of waste. When I hear stories and see the data related to our consumption and production behaviour, I am shaken to the core thinking about the scale of this problem. And it’s not just plastics – it’s textiles, food, electronics, and so much more. In first-world countries, we have taken abundance for granted and we’ve become desensitized to how wasteful we are. I challenge everyone to do a little experiment and collect their waste for a week – I bet you’ll be surprised, both by the volume and by how little could actually be recycled or upcycled. In Canada, we recycle less than 10% of our plastics. Interestingly, even if we ramp up efforts to collect more plastics for recycling, Canada’s infrastructure is only capable of recycling ~17% of the plastic waste we generate annually. We simply do not have the capacity in our infrastructure to manage our plastic waste today beyond landfilling and incineration. In Toronto, the largest city in Canada, compostable and biodegradable items belong in the garbage bin because the infrastructure for The Green Bin program can’t handle these types of materials. Toronto’s infrastructure uses anaerobic digestion technology rather than traditional composting methods which means the infrastructure was designed primarily to handle food waste and some fibre/paper products. Despite all our efforts with upstream innovation to design new ecofriendly packaging, we cannot achieve a true circular economy until we expand our recycling infrastructure and retrofit our existing facilities.  

“Even though there’s a lot of momentum for sustainability right now, I worry that we’re not acting quickly enough and as aggressively as we need to. It’s an uphill battle and we are fighting the effects that have accumulated over the last hundred years. We pat ourselves on the back every time we make an investment towards new recycling efforts, not recognizing the problem continues to grow at a faster pace. The harsh reality is that every year that we do not achieve circularity, we are falling behind.”

It’s no secret that we are trending towards more plastic than fish in the world's oceans by 2050. This means our work has been cut out for us: we need to go beyond collecting and recycling 100% of the plastics we produce and simultaneously tackle the plastics that have already leaked into the environment. Collecting and recycling 100% of our plastics will only be possible when consumers recycle correctly, and we have built out our recycling infrastructure to manage 100% of the plastics we produce. Tackling plastics that have leaked into the environment will require new technology and innovation to mine oceans and landfills to collect plastic waste for recycling. My hope is to see chemical recycling technologies scale, both plastics-to-plastics and plastics-to-fuels, so that plastic waste can be viewed as a feedstock and we can reduce our reliance on oil and gas resources to produce plastics and fuels.

Do you have a mentor? How has your mentor helped you in your career or personal growth?

Surprisingly, no – or at least, not formally. Although I don’t have a mentor now, I’ve never found that my personal and professional growth was held back. I think what’s worked well for me is networking and being exposed to different people from all walks of life and experiences. By observing their career trajectories, their values, their lifestyles, etc., I’ve discovered what I like and what I don’t like. It’s the multitude of people I connect with that allow me to pull inspiration and paint a picture of who I want to become. Of course, this is a dynamic and evergreen process. I’m constantly fine tuning the vision for my future and making sure I’m spending my time on the things that matter. 

What quote do you most live by and why?

“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” — Maya Angelou.

 I love this quote because we’re always working with partial, incomplete information. It’s a quote that keeps me moving forward and the reminder I need to be bold and actionable even when I don’t have all the answers. The trick is to be open-minded and be genuinely open to change when it is time to pivot or do something differently.  

What advice would you give to youth or young professionals that are interested in pursuing a career in sustainability? 

I’ll keep this short and sweet. Don’t wait to land the perfect job – take a good job and pave your own path. Create and discover your own opportunities. Every industry in the next few years will start taking a hard look at embedding sustainability into their business. If you understand the industry, you’ll already be ahead of everyone else. 

Elder Dave Courchene: Starting with the spirit

Elder Dr. Dave Courchene – Nii Gaani Aki Innini (Leading Earth Man) – is a respected Elder and Knowledge Keeper of the Anishinaabe Nation who has committed his life to environmental stewardship. After receiving a vision, he founded the Turtle Lodge International Centre for Indigenous Education and Wellness, a sacred lodge recognized internationally as a place of learning, healing, and sharing for all people, and by the Assembly of First Nations and the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, as one of the most important gathering places for Indigenous Peoples in Canada. In 2018, Knowledge Keepers across the Americas named Turtle Lodge their Central House of Knowledge.

Study after study shows that Indigenous Peoples are true stewards of the land and achieve far better outcomes in preserving the land and biodiversity. Why do you think that is?

Indigenous peoples have lived on and been sustained by the land for tens of thousands of years. In more recent times, we entered a very dark period where we had to endure the genocide that brought many negative impacts in our communities. In spite of all the broad attempts to destroy us, they were not successful, because there was always those amongst our Nations that found a way to be faithful to the ancestral way of living and a way of life that was sustainable.

When we talk about sustainability, you cannot talk only about it from an intellectual, scientific or an academic sense. When you listen to the Knowledge Keepers of our Nations, they will never go into conversation until the spirit is acknowledged. We are spiritual beings, and our challenge is to try and share our understanding of what spirit is, what it means, and how it influences our lives, because spirit is not something you can intellectualize. You cannot take science and prove that it exists. It is beyond the realm of man’s limitations, physical, mental, and intellectual understanding.

With spirit, it is about having a relationship with the Great Mystery. We as people do not have the intellectual capacity to be able to understand the fullness of this great power. The best chance or hope that we can have to get to know this Great Spirit or energy is to be able to feel it. And this is where Indigenous People, in their way of life, have always had ways to be able to make that journey to the heart, because the heart is the spirit, and the spirit is the essence of life. It is this spirit that defines our identity and who we are as human beings, and it also carries the memory of our own beginning in our own creation. As long as we continue down this path of self-destruction, believing that we can control and dominate the Earth, this is very short-term, simple minded thinking.

The phrase “sustainability” has gotten away from its true meaning. What does it actually mean to you?

Everybody is using it, but nobody understands the root of how we sustain ourselves as human beings in the world that we are destroying. There’s mitigation, but it doesn’t do anything. We can keep playing around with legislation, programs, and other things – but they are just tweaking around the edges. People are hesitant to reconcile what they have done to the land – and we are all co-participants in that.

“We need to get to the root of the problem, which is our attitude and values, and we are going to have to find a way to let go of these things that are not sustainable to life itself. This is the challenge in front of us today.”

Nature seems to be sending us a message – with the pandemic, with some of the more severe weather events that have been more commonplace over the past few years. What is Mother Nature telling us?

I think this is what the COVID viruses have been about – it’s this little virus screaming – “Wake up! Wake up! What you guys are doing is wrong and if you do not get it the first time, we’re coming again.” We have a saying - be careful what you do to the land, because what you do to the land, you do to yourself. We were given a prophecy that here on Turtle Island, that Mother Earth would give birth to a new life and that she would remove all that was destroying the balance of life. She would restore it to its natural balance.

Because of what we have done to the land itself, because there is a consequence for every act that we do in life. It goes back to the universal law of the circle - what you put into that circle will be multiplied and will come back to you. That is why the Grandmothers of our Nations always influence and lead the community, and they lead the community through kindness. It was kindness that prevailed in keeping the community together, keeping the family strong, and ensuring that you treated the land in the way that you would treat your own mother. No one can lay claim and say, “I can control and own my mother.” These are words of insanity. Who in their right mind would ever think that they could have dominion over their own mother?

I cannot understand how these attitudes continue to prevail, that people think they can do whatever they want to the Earth to reap the benefits. The problem with this is that it is only a few that benefit. It is not the majority of the human population that is benefiting from the extraction of all those resources in order to support a money economy that is held by an elite that control and dominate all these other institutions, be it politics or education. If they control these institutions and continue to educate our children to support this philosophy or ideology, then our children are denied the opportunity to learn from the land itself.

What does land-based education look like to you?

One thing that I have really been promoting, is the need for Indigenous Peoples to set up our own infrastructure to help create higher places of learning. We have been working with some universities to try to develop a training program. What is important for me in my engagements with anyone is that I will not relinquish my leadership in terms of the vision that I have, or what our people have in terms of developing a proper support system and educational support for young people to be able to learn the laws of the land, to be able to feel the land and learn those laws and teachings.

We are now getting into an area where it is about survival – how to survive with what is here and what is coming up. It must be led by the Indigenous Knowledge Keepers of our People that have designed this model of education. And also knowing that we will extend an invitation to other cultures.

“We know young people are going to be and are in the forefront. They shouldn’t worry about trying to change the system – people in power are not going to budge. So, attention needs to be focused on re-building, knowing the truth of your own identity, and having the full purpose of why you have been given the light to be able to take care of the world so that future generations can enjoy the beauty of the land. ”

We need to bring young people in and create that experience of land-based education for them. I think Indigenous People are guiding us in the right direction, because my ancestors left us a footprint, and that is what I am following with Turtle Lodge. It is a way of life that has to be lived every day and not just one day a week. And you live that way of life, practicing these values in these teachings that reflect kindness for each other, showing love to the land, showing love for each other, and appreciating diversity and welcoming it within our Circle. This brings more richness and more knowledge and more understanding. What a beautiful way of life it would be if we could reach this level.

In the position paper you wrote with your fellow Knowledge Keepers at Turtle Lodge, Wahbunung, you provide insight into the path forward for the resurgence of Indigenous peoples and the path for your future. One of the many interesting points you mention is to “take great care not to cross the line to step into protest, aggression or violence, as these acts only serve to empower the colonizer, as they reflect an acceptance of one’s role as a victim, and internalization of one’s oppression and victimization, along with being ineffective tools in the long-term.” Right now, there seems to be a lot of anger in society, and we have a lot of protests about any number of topics. How do you recommend people channel their anger into something positive?

I can speak from my own personal experience in my younger days. I did a lot of protest which was motivated from my anger and frustration. It wasn’t until I was able to find myself within the environment of the Grandmothers, and the Elders of my people, that my whole attitude started to change. It all came down to the simple truth of what was continually expressed to me. You cannot live your life in anger, you cannot work in anger. You cannot protest in a way that is from frustration and anger. Over the years, I began to realize that what had to be done was not so much waste all this energy to protest against people that are not going to change or are too seduced by power or money. They’ve designed their laws and structures to protect their ideological concept of domination, and they’ll throw you in jail. So, I’ve come to understand, through the Knowledge Keepers of my People, that we need to rebuild, to start at the beginning. They said that the beginning is your spirit, and your spirit is within your own being. Go back within yourself, because ultimately the answers you are looking for are within you.

Why is diversity in sustainability important?

Our ancestors left us a footprint, and that is what I am following. That was the reason why I set up Turtle Lodge. It is a model of life, practicing these values in these teachings that reflect kindness for each other, to show love for the land, to show love for each other and to appreciate that diversity and welcome it within our Circle. This, in turn, brings more richness and more knowledge, more understanding.

“When I think of who we are as a People, we have never forced ourselves on anybody. We do not try to evangelize our way of life, but we try to show it through our own actions by offering acts of kindness, compassion, and forgiveness. ”

Look at what has happened to people of colour around the world – they have been dehumanized because of colonization, because of the attitude that a man can denigrate another human being because they look different. These people have never seen the diversity of nature and the beauty of the inner diversity we see in nature. Somehow, they equate that diversity in humanity as needing separating, and saying that one is superior to the other. What an awful way to continue to think that we are not in truth, all related, that we are brothers and sisters.

I am not an Indigenous person but feel a strong affinity to the idea of connecting with the land. This can almost feel impossible in a city, which often feels like it made for humans and machines, rather than supporting nature. How do you recommend that people connect with the land in such settings?

Let me first put it in its simplest context – as long as we all walk Mother Earth, it is who we are walking on. That is how connected we are being in the city or not in the city.

The foundation of life is the land itself, even though the city it is in has been filled with concrete and things like that. No one has the power to stop the movement of the life force that comes from the Earth. You will see a road that has been paved and is not used anymore – then you start to see nature tearing that concrete apart. That is the power of nature. So, no matter where we walk, we are walking on Mother Earth. And the old people say, “Make sure you walk softly and gently on Mother Earth.”

When I am in the city, one of the things I usually do when I go to a city is to try to find a park. I find a tree or a river, something that has more of a spirit of life. The concrete does not give you that. You just need to take the first step and make that journey to go be on the land, even if it is for an hour. You have to take the time and have a conversation with the land itself. Talk to her like you would talk to your own mother. She is alive, and she has an intelligence, and she has a language. I work with a lot of young people, and I have used the trees a lot and I tell young people to go over to the trees and talk to them. Initially, they think it is a foolish idea because they have never been taught that, and they have never experienced it, but the tree always manages to reach one or two of them to have a conversation if the person is open enough to hear that voice of the truth. That is where true education comes from – it does not come from books or real life; it comes from nature itself.

In our culture, we never go to the land and take anything from the land until we make an offering – whether it is food or cloth – in a ceremony of gratitude to say, “Thank you Mother Earth, in spite of what we have done to you, your unconditional love prevails.”

Every human being has the capacity to be able to hear the language of the Earth, but they choose not to hear it because they have overpowered that spirit and clouded their minds with everything that is in opposition of what is the truth, and what the spirit is all about. It is not necessarily about being an Indigenous person - it is about all of us hearing that call from the inside and to be able to hear that universal language of nature itself.

And my last question - are you optimistic of pessimistic about the future?

I am very optimistic, but also being a realist, I know that we are going to have to go through some tough times in order to make it to that day of reckoning when we realize that we cannot continue down this road. It will be very tough for young people, and we are going to have to rely on a lot within out own spirit to be able to meet challenges. We received a prophecy that said that Mother Earth is going to give birth to a new life and I believe that. She will purify herself and new life will be born again. As she is giving birth to New Life, we also have that same opportunity to give birth to new life. And this will have to come from within ourselves.

Learn more about the incredible work of Turtle Lodge. All pictures above provided courtesy of Turtle Lodge.

Ray Dhirani: Stewarding the Planet through Sustainable Finance

Ray Dhirani. Photo credit: Ray Dhirani

Who are you?

I am a sustainable finance professional living just outside of London, England, but also a father of two great children, Nicolas and Cordelia, and am striving to make their world a more secure place. In fact, future generations are counting on all of us now to take meaningful action.

What was your journey like?

I grew up in Canada and then went to university in the U.S., and was always interested in economics and finance. I went into banking and markets as a way to pursue that further. I was enjoying it, then I got to a point when I started to want more meaning in my work, and became very interested in the environment. I didn’t have any formal background or real understanding of the issues. That's when I left banking and came to the UK for my Masters program. We were only planning to come for one  year to study. Now it’s been 11 years!

I found a job at WWF, which was looking for someone with the ability to engage with the finance sector. I think with my Masters and my professional background, it made sense. I’ve now been at WWF now for 9 years.

With Silverback Films, you recently helped develop Our Planet: Too Big to Fail - a film based on  the Our Planet series on Netflix, which is incredible in terms of being a succinct and visually striking summary about responsible investment and there are some pretty heavy hitting sustainable investment folks in it…. Mark Carney, Tavaziva Madzinga, Steve Waygood, Kate Raworth, Hiro Mizuno. What was the most exciting or rewarding part of it? How did it come together?

Our Planet was a hugely ambitious, global impact project built around the eight-part Netflix original documentary series, which has now been viewed by over 100 million households. Our goal at WWF was to ‘mainstream green’, with a target to engage over half a billion people around the world over the course of five years, beyond viewers of the series itself. We knew that in order to inspire action and a sense of urgency to protect the planet, we needed to reach the highest levels of global decision making – and identified business and finance as major players in both the destruction of nature but also the potential to be a powerful force for change.

We created “Our Planet: Our Business” as an industry film and soon after, the finance sector started to ask, “What does that mean for us? Can you make something bespoke for the finance sector?” It wasn’t long before we had secured involvement from some of the most respected names and forward-thinkers in finance. We filmed some of it before the pandemic. I remember sitting in my makeshift home office on a Friday afternoon and getting an email saying that the Swiss Re UK CEO [at the time], Tavaziva Madzinga, was not going to be able to participate because of COVID and difficulties filming in South Africa, where he was temporarily based. We really wanted his view as when we had spoken to him on the phone he had expressed such a unique perspective as a reinsurer on the issues. Tavaziva has different ideas and brings a helpful development perspective as well. We managed to convince him that we could do this all remotely from the comfort of his own home. I’m so glad we figured out a way when it looked as if it wouldn’t be possible.

Diversity was also key for us when creating the film. We wanted to capture the views of people from a wide range of backgrounds and nationalities who could speak to all areas of the finance sector. As a result, this film has been globally resonant.

Ray worked with Silverback Films to create Our Planet: Too Big to Fail for WWF and Netflix. Source: WWF International via Youtube.

Why do you think diversity and sustainability is important?

Before the pandemic, I was in a boardroom meeting in London, discussing a global interconnected issue of some significance. There were about 30 people sat around the table, and at some point it just hit me:  I was the only person of colour at the table. We were not discussing a localised issue; we were discussing a global issue that affects people in countries around the world. Yet, the people making the input and decisions did not represent that. I started to think about, "Well, actually, how would the conversation shift and where would the focus be and what other solutions would we be coming up with if that was more represented?"

There's still a lot of work to do. Diversity is important in general, but particularly so when you're designing and talking about global issues. I've considered diversity in my team because it helps with the outcomes and diversity of thinking. We need people from a greater range of backgrounds in the world of sustainability and that is an issue we're beginning to collectively address now.

For a more sustainable world, it's going to help to have more diverse voices around the table, not only of colour, but diversity in all forms. Over the last few years, since Tanya Steele came into WWF UK as CEO, we've seen a positive shift in diversity within the organisation, particularly with more women in leadership roles. This is great and now beginning to expand in terms of diversity, which is encouraging to see.   

It's amazing to see this shift and highly welcome – it's not only the right thing, but I think it will make a better conservation and climate impact as well.  But someone has to focus on it beyond just having a meeting here or there. It's actually saying, "We need to change the way we recruit and the way we engage."

Do you have a mentor?

Yes, my previous manager who has since left WWF. She came from the finance sector, so that was helpful because she knew where I was coming from and it's quite a difference in culture. The main things I have learned from her are on the people side -  I was lucky to be managed by her, as she was such an amazing people manager and leader. It's doing the simple stuff right.

She never forgot about the importance of the whole person. She would always ensure that what's important to you in your life outside of work took priority and needed to be maintained regardless of what's happening at work. As a testament to that, we keep in touch now and we spoke just the other day.  I'll always reach out to her and she's very willing to talk.

What advice would you give to someone just starting out in the sector?

This is definitely an exciting time, and there are a myriad of different job opportunities in this sector. Sustainability is here to stay. It's the only way business and society and all of us  can function. If you want a meaningful and dynamic career, there's no better time for sustainability.

If you are passionate about the environment and sustainability, follow that passion and drive because that's more important than the money or the other perks that wear out, in terms of keeping you personally and professionally motivated. Don’t be afraid to carve your own path and try something new.

What have you been most proud of while at WWF?

The big change stuff doesn't happen that often, so it's an exercise in patience. But when we campaigned for World Heritage Sites and trying to get SOCO International to end its oil exploration in and around Virunga National Park, we saw some tangible success. There was a big finance sector engagement piece behind it, then SOCO committed to never enter World Heritage Sites in future and wrote off their investment in Virunga.

We learned a lot and through that, began to engage the OECD and do some great policy work, which got picked up by investors.

Another proud moment was in 2015, ahead of the Paris Agreement, when we worked with global pension funds and Mercer consultants to publish a seminal  report which said that investing for less than two degrees was not going to be damaging to long-term investment portfolios.

That was a key message in advance of the Paris Agreement to get politicians to be bold and ambitious and actually have the backing of industry. I mean, these things take a year or two or more to come to fruition and sometimes they don't. We have to keep focusing on where we can have the biggest impact and where we can tip the system because this system cannot continue the way it is now.

“Over the years, there have definitely been a few times where we’ve had pause for a moment of celebration and hard work that’s gone well. In the NGO space, you really do have to celebrate those because some of the time it can feel as if you’re banging your head against the wall and trying to change capitalism in a way. It’s difficult, and you can feel like an ant crawling up a mountain without those wins.”

What quotes/advice do you most live by?

Don’t be afraid to carve your own path. When I left banking to  do a Masters degree, most people probably thought I was crazy, and maybe they still do. There was that element of not knowing where my path would take me. Now, in retrospect, my career path makes sense  – it's about following your passion and your curiosity, and not being afraid to go against the grain.

 If you're doing something different, maybe you're doing something right, or right for you. It's hard to have confidence with that because I think we're relative creatures. If we see everyone doing one thing and we're off doing something different, it makes us  feel isolated. It's much easier to follow the herd.

I feel like the worlds of finance and sustainability are beginning to come together, albeit not at exactly the pace of change and scale that we need. But it is coming together and that is a really good sign.

Another piece of advice is guarding what you think is important because no one else is going to guard it for you. The only person who knows what really makes you happy and fulfilled is yourself. You've got to show people what's important to you and live your life that way, professionally and personally. If people don't like it, well, you're probably at the wrong place.

In most cases, it's about being honest with what you want and what makes you tick and what you can do. People appreciate that. Don't be scared of asking for what it is that you need, or just working the way you want to work. I think people are a lot more accepting of that now, especially if you're achieving the results. In fact, if you're happier, then you're likely to produce better results anyway.

Ray is focused on making the world a more secure place for Nico and Cordelia. Photo credit: Ray Dhirani

Are there any other issues in sustainability that you're really excited about?

I’m excited about the whole revolution around food. The notion of alternative proteins and questioning if conventional meat production is a ‘stranded asset’. In a way, it’s where the energy system was 5 or 10 years ago. We know that food is the biggest cause of biodiversity loss and we know we have a growing world population and need to feed everyone. It's a huge challenge, and it's exciting because it’s tangible for people – everyone needs to eat!

If we don't tackle our global food system, then we'll likely lose on climate change because of the greenhouse gas emissions created as a result of deforestation and other ecosystem destruction.

Nowadays, progressive companies come out of nowhere and become gigantic and capture the imagination of the finance market. The technology and the revolution happening outside means you're getting brand new companies springing out of almost nowhere, like Tesla did, that then could completely change the game. We are starting to see similar things on the food side. The reason it's interesting is that now the pace of change is so fast in the way markets can be upended and hopefully that can be harnessed for real solutions to the climate and nature crisis.  

Meet our co-founders: Marie Jurcevic

Who are you?

I am Marie Jurcevic, Sustainability Lead at ARC Resources and Co-founder of Diversity in Sustainability. I’m a mom, wife, daughter, the youngest of 12 children, and aunt to 35 nieces and nephews. I have six brothers and five sisters. I was born in the Philippines, my family moved to Canada when I was a child. My family moved to Canada for economic reasons and family reunification. For many years, my father worked abroad in order to make enough money to support our family. He worked in the Middle East, Australia and Vietnam in the construction industry. My father had extended contracts that in some cases lasted for several years. I have photos and gifts from my dad’s time abroad but I was fortunate to also have memories with him as he was able to be there for me growing up once we moved to Canada. On the other hand, my brothers and sisters only spent time with my father for the short stints when he went home to the Philippines for his allotted vacation time from his work. I think it’s ironic that he came home to vacation.

When we moved to Canada, it wasn’t necessarily the utopia that my family was perhaps expecting. It was tough as my family had to navigate a new life and continue to deal with economic hardships but in a foreign country. At the time, we literally knew every Filipino in the city as there weren’t many of us. However, as of the last civic census, Tagalog, the official language of the Philippines is the second most commonly spoken language in Calgary. I remember growing up, my family decided to speak to me in English exclusively as they felt it would be easier for me to integrate into Canadian society. There are so many ways that the choice they made for me can be unpacked, it raises issues about the colonized mindset but unfortunately, it’s far too complex to address in this introduction.

I know the decision was well-intentioned, they wanted to give me every possible opportunity and minimize the barriers and challenges I could face. By chance of birth order, I was afforded a lot of opportunities that my siblings didn’t have. For instance, I’m the only one of the 12 children with post secondary education. My siblings opted to work, taking low paying jobs to help my parents make ends meet. They did this by choice and it was definitely an admirable, selfless decision to make.

“I’m inspired by the sacrifices my family made for me - it is what grounds me to this day. It’s also what propelled me to pursue what I believe to be meaningful work. This is my inspiration for choosing a career in sustainability. ”

Why do think diversity in sustainability is important?

Five years ago, I had coffee with a colleague who at the time I didn’t know well but over the years she has become a dear friend. One of the first things she said to me when I told her about myself and my career was, “wow, you’re a unicorn”. Of course, I was curious as to what she meant by that so I asked. She then proceeded to explain to me that I was the first person of colour she has met working in sustainability, not to mention in the oil and gas industry. For additional context, my friend is a Black woman with three degrees in Environmental Engineering, Mathematics and Economics. She started her career working in technical environmental roles but she has transformed her career by working in supply chain management. Based on what she has shared of her experience and my own observations, I know someone “like her” is also uncommon in her field and industry but apparently more common than a person of colour working in sustainability.

What she said caught me off guard and it definitely had me thinking and reflecting on what this all meant. While I was flattered by the positive references and comparison, she was making between me and a mythical being known to be rare and special, the thought troubled me. It had me digging deeper and thinking about what being a unicorn meant in this context. Someone like me working in this field and sector shouldn’t be considered unique, rare or special in any way. I don’t want to be a one-off, exception, fluke or be a token.

“What she said had me questioning why there aren’t more people “like me” working in this field. If people like me are rare what does that mean? From my perspective, it’s disheartening if a values-driven field, dedicated to social and environmental justice and striving to make the world a “better place” isn’t walking the talk on the foundations it was built on as field of practice. Therefore, it’s incumbent upon those of us who were able to break in to use our voice to challenge the status quo and create opportunities to truly live up to what this field is supposed to stand for. Otherwise, it would be hypocritical and I know I wouldn’t be able to authentically do this work. ”

Do you have a mentor? How have they helped you in your career or personal growth?

Yes, I do. My mentor is the former Chief Sustainability Officer at a company I used to work for, actually I’m probably not the only person who would consider her a mentor, as she’s a renowned and highly respected sustainability leader. However, upon further reflection, I would say that she may have started out as mentor but over time she became my sponsor. She has helped my career by challenging me to go outside my comfort zone to explore opportunities that helped broaden and deepen my experience in sustainability. There were many times when she sent me to meetings, events, to lead projects etc. to help build my profile with senior executives and expose me to areas of sustainability that were not in my wheelhouse. I can recall several instances when she was invited to participate in an event or meeting with her peers but she would send me instead. When I had self-doubt and lacked confidence all she would say is to not let their titles intimidate me, because I’m an expert in my field and they can learn from me. I could go on to extol her virtues, as she has many, and I have high regard for her but essentially, she has helped shape my career and how I approach my work. She took the time to invest in me, to share her knowledge, experience and network. Most importantly, she leveraged her position and influence to help me advance in my career.

You’re a sustainability professional working in the energy sector, how do you reconcile working in an industry that is known to have significant social and environmental impacts?

I think that when developed responsibly, the oil and gas industry has a role to play in the energy transition. I fully acknowledge that this is a very polarizing topic and there are varying opinions. However, working in the oil and gas industry and being a sustainability practitioner shouldn’t be mutually exclusive. There are many sustainability professionals working in the energy industry. I chose to practice my work in this sector because I truly believe that I can and have made meaningful contributions to help this sector address critical social and environmental issues. I welcome the dialogue. I think having uncomfortable conversations is an important part of growing and learning, whether it be about contentious sustainability issues or racial injustice and inequity. We need to start being comfortable with being uncomfortable. I believe that the hardest conversations are often the ones that need to be had. These conversations will need to be grounded in respect and it will require us to be to be vulnerable and to recognize that life is an ongoing process of learning and unlearning. The reality is, we’re at different stages on this journey.

There’s a lot of shifts happening in the energy sector right now. What developments are you most excited about?

I'm really excited about the conversations happening in the energy sector about its role in a low-carbon future. There are many companies in the sector that have published TCFD reports and have made net-zero commitments. I'm also seeing a growing number of companies create energy transition teams. 

In addition to discussions about a low-carbon future, I'm excited about the cross sector collaborations that are happening. For instance, in 2020, the company that I work for, Seven Generations Energy, or 7G, (which as of April 6, 2021 became part of ARC Resources), entered into a responsible natural gas supply agreement with Énergir, Quebec's main natural gas distributor. The agreement was governed by the EO100™ Standard for Responsible Energy Development. Globally, this was the first transaction executed under the EO100™ framework and establishes a new standard for transparency across the natural gas value chain. This initiative was a collaborative effort between the former 7G, Énergir, Equitable Origin and the Pembina institute. Equitable Origin is a non-profit that partners with business, communities and government to support transparent, equitable, and sustainable development of energy and natural resources. The Pembina Institute is a non-profit think-tank that advocates for strong, effective policies to support Canada's clean energy transition. The agreement and the accompanying transaction, was the result of extensive collaboration between four parties with diverse perspectives and a shared vision to address the concerns of their stakeholders and Indigenous communities. It also has helped to foster further discussions with various stakeholder groups about the role of responsibly developed natural gas in the transition toward a low-carbon economy. 

Is there a quote that inspires you?

I’m inspired the proverb, to whom much is given much is required. I believe that I’ve had privileges and opportunities my family didn’t have so I wanted to honour my family’s sacrifices by pursuing work I deem to be important and have a positive impact on society more broadly. Also, as a person of colour I believe I’ve had a successful career in my field and I want to use my experience, network and my voice to support BIPOC in this field in whatever capacity that I can be of service.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

I consider myself an optimist by nature. So, I’m definitely optimistic about the future. I have full confidence in the resiliency of human beings. I think conversations are shifting and we’re seeing an increase in social and environmental consciousness. Although we’re dealing with many complex issues, I think collaboration between individuals representing diversity in all its forms will foster the social and environmental innovation we need to address many of our societal challenges.

Mei-Yee Man Oram: creating inclusive spaces

Who are you?

My name is Mei, and I lead the Access and Inclusive Environments team at Arup. I was born and live in London, but my parents are originally from Hong Kong. Outside of work, I am involved in wildlife rescue, where I am currently rehabilitating bats and squirrels, and and enjoy travelling. My most recent trip before the pandemic was to the Galapagos and Amazon.

What drew you to creating accessible environments?

I was interested in the built environment and the impact that this has on society, and so when I completed my studies, I was delighted to find that there was something that combined both these areas of interest . I started off with some work experience at Arup, joined their graduate programme, and have never looked back since!

Your first full-time role was at Arup and you’ve grown within the company. Did you run into challenges finding the role and/or advancing in the organization?

I think this is all to do with the values of the firm, and the support of the colleagues you have around you. I have been very fortunate to have had very supportive team mates and leadership, and with a firm that shares similar values and ethics. Early in my career, I think I had a preconceived idea of what being successful meant – but was fortunate to be able to see role models around me that aligned much more with my own personality and communication and working style. This allowed me the space to develop in a way that was organic and natural to me.

It has been important to reflect on what success means, and to reassess priorities and objectives too, as this has, and will continue to, change over time and at different points in a career. For me, I think success in the early part of my career was about doing justice to the work that I was involved in, and having a social impact on the projects that are being delivered. Whilst that is still really important to me, as my role and responsibilities evolve, my priorities have also changed and success now also encompasses the happiness of the team around me; the impact that I have on the culture within the firm and the wider industry; and how collaborations can help to progress the journey into a more inclusive future.  

The Access and Inclusive Environments Team at Arup during the pandemic.

How do inclusive spaces tie to equity?

Without inclusive spaces, we cannot begin to create equity. The built environment is the stage on which we have our social interactions with other people, the backdrop to our home, work, and leisure activities, and so in order to provide people with equal opportunities to access this, we need to design inclusively. This includes consideration of physical access to space and facilities, the experience of this, and how this can adapt and respond to changing needs over a person’s life stages.

“This needs to become a standard part of how we design spaces and places, and we have a responsibility to challenge how things are designed and whether this is the right path going forward. For example, historic buildings have typically been viewed as problematic for accessibility, with the existing constraints and the heritage or conservation considerations. However, if the Acropolis can improve visitor experience as a building from the 5th century BC, then is there really an excuse? ”

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

Diversity in sustainability is important to ensure that the solutions that are being implemented reflect the needs of our societies. This includes both diversity in the team, to make sure that decisions reflect a diverse range of perspectives, as well as the inclusiveness of the solution itself, in terms of who can use it, and how easily, safely or comfortably they can do so.

 Do you have a mentor? How have they helped you in your personal growth?

There are a number of people that spring to mind. At work, there are several people who I have looked up to as role models, who have supported and encouraged me throughout my career; they have been honest and generous in sharing their own experiences, and have coached and challenged me in my work.

In my personal life, there are two people in particular that have, and continue to inspire me – my mum, and my older sister. My mum inspired my siblings and I to embrace opportunity and challenge the stereotypes and barriers that we faced as women, and as first generation immigrants. Despite the incredible trials in her own life, she remains one of the most positive and selfless people I know. As the eldest, my sister not only stepped in as an amazing sibling and friend, but also as translator for my parents, and tutor and role model to my brother and I.

A young Mei with her mum and sister, two of her role models.

What has been your proudest moment to date?

I have been immensely proud of the work that my team in Arup have done over the past few years, from growing in size and reach, to the impact that they have had on our clients and on their projects. We have seen a change in attitude, from one of compliance or box ticking, to a genuine desire to create good design for all, and this has been through the incredible work from an incredible team!

I am working with a number of clients at the moment who share this ethos and commitment to inclusive design, and it really is a huge pleasure and sense of accomplishment when we see the solutions that have challenged the status quo, created aesthetically pleasing designs, whilst not impacting on the cost or programme, thus proving that if it is thought about early on in the process, then this really can be an integrated solution.

What advice/quote do you most live by and why?

Henry David Thoreau’s quote: “If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.”

This is similar to something that one of my work role models recently said to me, which was to ‘shape the world you want to see’.

This resonates a lot with the message that my family always lived by when I was growing up, and focuses on the importance and difference that we can each have as individuals.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

I am feeling optimistic about the future. Whilst the past 12 months have been challenging for many people and have drawn focus to the inequalities that exist in our societies - from the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on BAME communities, gender and gender identity rights, and the Black Lives Matter movement - I am hopeful that the momentum from this will drive a change for a better future.

This includes rethinking the function of work and home spaces, public space for active travel, and how neighbourhoods are designed to facilitate a more flexible set of needs. We are currently working on, together with Sustrans and Living Streets, a research study on walking, and how streets can be made to be more inclusive and safer for more people, and in turn, impact on health, air quality, and other sustainability objectives.

Priya Bala-Miller: connecting social justice and sustainability

Who are you?

I am a sustainability professional with two decades years of experience in a variety of sectors.  I am also a settler who is grateful to live on the on the unceded, ancestral and traditional territory of the Coast Salish Peoples, including the territories of the xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil- Waututh) Nations. I make this acknowledgement, with a deeply intertwined sense of purpose and place mediated through a differentiated but shared experience of colonialism.

What motivated you to launch Palmyra Partners?

In 2020, I founded Palmyra Partners to build bridges between social justice and sustainability, with a thematic focus on natural resource governance. I felt the need for a more independent and inclusive platform to advance sustainability leadership, and wanted to create my own space to work on these issues after repeated personal frustrations at confronting the “glass-ceiling”.  Other motivations for creating Palmyra Partners are rooted in my maternal ancestral village of Idinthakarai, in South India.  The palmyra palm tree is indigenous to the area and continues to be widely used for construction, agriculture and holds a deep cultural significance.

Childhood visits to this village are full of memories of my grandmother, who after being widowed, continued to farm rice and coconuts on our ancestral land. In the 80s – the decades of my childhood, India itself was on the fast track to becoming an emerging economy and key to this growth was energy security. Idinthakarai is also woven into that story, as it also happens to be close to the site of a major nuclear power plant. The land for this power plant was acquired from the community in return for jobs, progress and prosperity. However, by the 1990s persistent drought, overfishing and unkept promises of employment at the power plant drained this village of its youth. Many of them, like others across India, searched out economic opportunities abroad. As an educated professional, my mother too made the very difficult decision to leave our urban home town for a more lucrative job abroad that would ease the financial stress she endured as a single parent of three children.  

“My family arrived in Dubai on August 1st, 1990. On August 2nd, Saddam Hussain invaded Kuwait, destroying seven hundred oil wells and spilling millions of barrels of oil into the Persian Gulf, much of which washed up on Dubai’s beaches. I was ten at the time, and as I got older, it became increasingly difficult to ignore making the connection that the region’s oil wealth was also wreaking havoc on the environment and society. We saw increased water scarcity, aridity and marine pollution. ”

Camels and fish both with plastic in their guts, while lush golf courses sprung up everywhere. On a social level – story upon story of gross labour rights abuses piled up like bricks – construction workers and domestic workers bearing the brunt of Dubai’s gleaming towers across a skyline that seemed to grow overnight. What my mother shared with these workers was precarious work – the slightest professional mis-step would mean a cancelled visa and deportation at best. Our eventual migration to Canada in 1996, would offer a reprieve from some of these forms of oppression, but not others. Taken together, the themes that were central to four generations of women in my family – land rights, economic migration, displacement, precarious labour, peace and security, gendered access to resources and education and systemic racism had a profound impact on me in terms of my choices to pursue work that ultimately contributes to social justice.  In my case, the feminist adage popularized in essays by Carol Hanisch and Audre Lorde, ‘the personal is the political’ rings true.

What was your first job in sustainability and what did you learn?

My first job in sustainability was a paid internship with the United Nations’ Environment Programme’s Division of Technology, Industry and Economics (UNEP-DTIE) in Paris, France, supported through Canada’s Youth Employment Strategy (YES), in collaboration with the Environmental Youth Alliance. I gained first-hand knowledge about the Millennium Development Goals (now SDGs), and youth-led sustainability initiatives while taking on research and policy analysis on a joint UNEP-UNESCO initiative on sustainable lifestyles and sustainable procurement initiatives.

Thoughtful mentors such as Isabella Marras (now Coordinator of the Sustainable UN Facility) and Bas de Leeuw (now Managing Director of the World Resources Forum) made this early-career experience very valuable in assigning meaningful work, encouraging curiosity, according junior staff a genuine degree of professional respect. This is a model of the mentor-mentee relations that I sought to replicate in the later stages of my career.

Though my time at UNEP was relatively brief, it left a lasting impression on me about the scale of sustainability challenges at the global level, and the need for trusted global institutions to facilitate meaningful cooperation and action. I also learned about dramatic power differentials within global environmental negotiations not only across states, but also within key demographic constituencies such as women and youth that prompted an anti-oppression/rights-based lens in my future policy work.

When did you realize that your diversity made you different from your counterparts in the field?

I was very fortunate to have had primarily positive early-to-mid career experiences in the field of sustainability working within the UN system and with global civil society in largely international policy spaces, while based in Europe. In this phase of my career, I was very comfortable in embracing my identity as a South Asian woman of colour with diverse lived experiences, and for the most part, I felt that my expertise and perspective on sustainability issues was valued and rewarded in terms of career progression.

However, in these early days, I also faced a few instances of gender-based discrimination and one instance of sexual harassment from males in senior leadership positions outside the organization I was employed with. I was at times asked to take on tasks outside of my job description that men in comparable roles did not want to do or were simply not approached to do due to regressive gender norms (such as taking minutes or dealing with travel logistics).  

“Systemic racism and related glass ceilings have come into sharper relief as I have assumed more senior sustainability roles upon my return to Canada. I believe my understanding of issues that can only be experienced “from the margins” are formative components of my empathetic and human-centred leadership style. They also make me more prone to question status-quo approaches and institutions than counterparts who lack these lived experiences. This orientation is not always recognized as valuable or rewarded. ”

What quote do you most live by and why?

I am a planner. I love lists. As an A-type personality, I like structure, predictability and accountability. When I graduated high school my oldest brother, a Beatles fan, reminded me of the lyric “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans” from John Lennon’s  “Beautiful Boy”. It was almost a prescient, and yet gentle encouragement to let go sometimes and just let life happen. This lyric guides my present sustainability work, as I am deepening my knowledge and engagement with transformative practices and principles of emergent design which foreground traits such as adaptability, agility, responsiveness and ambiguity.  

This recent praxis turn for me has been valuable in navigating complexity and unknowns in our collective efforts to tackle the systemic changes needed to create a more sustainable world. It also perhaps speaks to my sense of fatigue with overly general “talk shops” in the global sustainability policy landscape that result in beautiful action plans, but very little concrete action. Since the pandemic, we are also surfacing greater needs for more localised, generative, (and therefore perhaps more effective) solutions to systemic sustainability challenges.

What made you realize you should be in the field?

Sustainability is a vast field, and yet across the public sector, private sector and civil society leadership positions, barriers persist in recruiting and retaining sustainability leaders who do not represent or embody hegemonic identities and discourses. As an undergraduate student, I was active in youth advocacy around a variety of human rights issues. Early on, I also gained an appreciation for the nexus between environmental and rights-based social justice movements, and was disheartened at cross-movement silos on campus. I vividly remember attending a conservation-oriented youth club on campus, where I was the only person who was not vegan, had a more “mainstream” appearance and did not wear Birkenstocks. Based on these factors alone, I was othered and silenced by the older, white, male group leader in the discussion on advocacy priorities. Needless to say I never went back. I did not look and sound the part of a West-coast Canadian environmentalist and my “otherness” did not make me feel welcome in that youth space. This experience only deepened my commitment to find more inclusive spaces for BIPOC youth to engage on issues of social justice on campus and beyond, and in general these spaces were more focused on rights-based frameworks. This formative moment also motivated me to find my voice on sustainability issues, and to use it, even from the margins.  On this issue, I’ve also come to have a deeper reckoning with how white adjacency in social justice, environmentalism and conservation movements have undermined Black and Indigenous voices.  My present work also makes efforts to dismantle these historical patterns where possible, including within myself. Recent writing by Jedediah Purdy, Carolyn Finney and Drew Lanham on these dynamics in the context of the United States have deeply resonated with me.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

Most sustainability folk are well-rehearsed in the business case for diversity. We know more diverse boards perform better. We know more diverse teams are more likely to innovate. Such teams are more likely to be needs-responsive and less likely to fall into decision-making traps such as “groupthink”. For all these reasons and many more, diversity in sustainability is important.

As a community of practice, where we are failing to move the needle is meaningful inclusion and a more nuanced understanding of how intersectionality affects equality of opportunity for sustainability leadership. In my view, the corporate and public sectors are at an advantage over smaller, less well-funded civil society and non-profit organizations vis-a-vis well-resourced HR departments that can take data-driven and evidence-based approaches to tackling systemic barriers for meaningful inclusion. From this lens that some public institutions and firms continue to lag way behind on performance when it comes to diversity and inclusion is staggering.

Despite aspirational commitments to the contrary, such organizations are reluctant to engage with the power shifts involved in creating a more diverse workforce. Civil society and non-profits with limited diversity in leadership structures, and who are facing resource scarcity are likely finding it hardest to innovate and change to meet the demands of meaningful inclusion.  Given the role that civil society plays in demanding corporate and state-based accountability for sustainability commitments, this situation also means that BIPOC-led organizations are competing for scarce resources and shoulder a heavier burden in diversifying the sustainability landscape. Ultimately, getting to the high-bar of inclusion will involve a more authentic discussion on power and how it is leveraged, as well as deep transformative shifts that are needed at the individual, organizational, cultural and systemic levels.

What advice would you give to students that want to get into this field?

The number one question I get asked from students is what graduate program they should pursue. I often respond with an invitation for careful introspection about that clarity of purpose in pursuing grad school.

 For some of it is about wanting a toolset that will better equip them to be social justice warriors, for others a route to financial stability or hiding out the uncertainty of a pandemic, and yet others may be facing unrelenting parental pressures. I don’t think any of those drivers are more laudable than any other. But, I will say that having a clarity of purpose on why one is going to grad school is ground zero, and then there is an encouragement to bring their whole self to exploring that decision.

Will grad school leave you a better person emotionally, financially, socially, culturally? Weigh up these possibilities holistically because a narrow focus on career and money may not enough to build up resilience for what lies ahead in the world of work, especially for BIPOC folk who will have to confront largely unsupportive institutional climates as the norm.

I also encourage my peers and mentees to bring their whole selves to work – are you a brother, a sister, a parent, a rock climber, an artist, a sommelier? We are much more than our job functions and our job titles, I think this is the future of the world of work – a more humane and human centred one, rather than where people are viewed simply as a form of productive capital. From this lens, I also encourage students to try to find supportive communities of practice that are more aligned with their values when seeking out work and professional development opportunities.

Sustainability-engaged youth today are already leading. What those of us a little further along in the journey can do is to support the deepening of their praxis that comes as the result of experience, to listen more authentically, and also - to know when to get out of the way.

Learn more about Palmyra Partners.

Monica Wilson: transforming buildings and communities for greater accessibility and inclusivity

Who are you?

I am a biracial first-generation college graduate. My parents had me when they were teenagers and chose to finish high school and work many jobs to raise me as soon as they graduated and got married. You could say that I got to watch my parents grow up and become adults because they had me so young. My mom is white, and my dad is black, so my identity shaped how I understand race and its effect on not only how you see yourself, but how others treat and see you. My parents didn’t raise me to see hierarchies of people based on social constructs. Instead, they gave me a dual experience of what it means to be "both", which a lot of mixed kids miss out on.

I currently work for the United States Green Building Council as an Environmental Scientist where my focus is on wellness, healthy and green buildings, and human health in the built environment, following the standards of the WELL Building Standard created by Delos and what is now the International WELL Building Institute.

What drew you to sustainability?

In 2006, my 9th grade Earth Science teacher made our class watch “An Inconvenient Truth”, which is a documentary about the future of global warming. I was so frightened by the film that from that moment on, I chose a path of math, science, engineering, and ultimately sustainability that has brought me back to the complexities of climate change that I saw in that film.

What was your first job in sustainability and how did you go about finding a job in the field?

I worked in wastewater treatment as a Chemist, Project Engineer, and Pilot Plant Engineer in a research lab, which I applied for online about 7 months after I graduated college. Yes, you read that right, human wastewater! I had the opportunity to analyze water in the lab, order mechanical parts and review drawings for water disinfection systems on the project engineering side, and then actually go test out all the equipment on-site at a major treatment plant.

It was not a glamorous job, nor was it intended to be, however, I worked with a very intelligent international team who gave me sensible advice on working in the industry as a woman. I enjoyed my time there and the constant learning curve I was on. It was a very physically demanding job, and I would work different shifts throughout the day and night when I was in the field on assignment. Water Chemistry is still an important aspect of my role today, which makes me thankful for my first job.

Your current work ties to the built environment and the notion of health and community. Do you see linkages to equity as well?

Yes, there are so many moving parts to the levels of change that are vital to driving equity in a sustainable manner that stretches beyond just listening. Equity is not a one-time conversation, nor is it just about cool green buildings. Sustainable spaces are those that are inclusive and accessible and built on a foundation of community trust. Health equity means providing opportunities for everyone to live the healthiest life possible, no matter who you are, where you live, or how much money you make.

I advocate for building industry leaders and corporations to build environmentally advanced developments where black families can feel safe and can access food, and the sense of community that many privileged cities and communities experience within the green building lifestyle. No one is free until everyone is free. To be in the right relationship with the environment first requires us to be in the right relationship with each other.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

I think it's important for two reasons. The experience of a minority professional in the field can be isolating and traumatic. Aside from the integrity of my work, my hair texture is being judged when it comes to appearance. When I am being vocal, others are paying close attention to how I speak, whether I “sound black”, aggressive, or shockingly, articulate. There are additional challenges that come with being black in the workplace, and for me being mixed race, having both a white and black experience, these are situations I have dealt with my entire life. 

It can be a shock to be the only black employee, even if you are the first to do so. I'm not ashamed to admit that I have been the “first” in multiple jobs because I recognize my importance. I was usually the only black student in my classes in my undergraduate career. That isolating experience in college ironically prepared me for what was ahead. With diversity in the field, we understand that it’s always much deeper than just showing up to work and doing your best. You must find a way to show up as who you are and feel valued by others when everyone is meeting in the same room, and not hesitate to open up about yourself in fear that any information could be used against you or create a racial divide in the workplace.  

The second reason is that the sustainability of this earth cannot be managed and achieved by only non-minorities. At times I am deeply frustrated because eco lifestyles are so out of reach and not accessible to minority groups and instead catered to communities with better neighborhoods, better schools, and better grocery stores. These factors can impact the trajectory of one’s life, putting minorities at a huge disadvantage than their white counterparts.

When you are living paycheck to paycheck, how do you have time to reduce harmful toxins in your house? You don’t have the time, nor the mental capacity, because you are in survival mode. I want this harsh reality to be more understood in this industry, and no more turning a blind eye. My parents didn’t have these environmental thoughts while raising me at their young age because they were overcoming racism while becoming functional members of society without access and privilege. I’ve had to educate myself as well as my family on the concept of being well beyond just surviving and paying bills.

Do you have a mentor? How have they helped you in your personal growth?

I currently do not have a mentor and am always open to that experience. In the meantime, I am inspired by women who are navigating their lives and careers in a way that works for them across different industries. I love following stories of female founders and CEO’s who have evolved so much as women where they left jobs, refused to accept the status quo, uprooted their life, welcomed new beginnings, did lots of inner work, went on to start families, and ultimately have everything work out in the end under a successful business and village because they followed their intuition and lived in their truth. There’s a lot of grit, tenacity, loss, and hard times in those stories. Those women keep me going. I see myself in them as I am constantly evolving.

What has been your proudest moment to date?

Personally, I am proud of myself for preferring an outdoor lifestyle in my free time despite the negative stereotypes that exist about people who look like me in the great outdoors, and the lack of black people having outdoor hobbies. During the 2020 part of the pandemic, I went camping without cell service multiple times, completed 30 short distance hikes, and climbed my first 14er (14,000 ft) mountain. I also traded in my comfortable city life and embarked on a van vacation, traveling across 8 states, 3,000 miles, and living out of a camper van for an entire week. While that may not be appealing to others, it was the best experience I have had to date. Being able to only rely on essential items, have an open mind, and the freedom and flexibility to travel is much more important to me than material items and keeping up with a certain lifestyle we are all told to have. 

Professionally, passing the WELL AP exam on my first try with a 93% score was a big surprise and accomplishment for me during the pandemic. It's not uncommon to have to retake the exam. There’s a lot of medical scientific data that you must understand, such as Optometry and understanding the endocrine body system. I am not a doctor nor was I a health science major, so studying for the exam took extra time and effort. I studied for 4 months, before and after work, on the weekends, took online classes, 11 practice exams, and did not have much time to be virtually social during 2020. It paid off big time, although it was a challenging season of my life. 

What advice/quote do you most live by and why?

I'm living by something so simple yet so deep written by wellness guru Hannah Bronfman. “Do what feels good”. I have been trying to understand what this means for me after once meeting Hannah at a book signing of hers two years ago. To me, that does not always mean slack off and have an easy day or go back to sleep. Rather, it means being real with myself. I do what feels good by being intentional about the outcomes in life I want and the woman I want to be. Like most, the pandemic has forced me to reevaluate connections, friendships, the type of daughter and sister I am and decide to let go of what I have outgrown and what is not a good fit. That's what has felt good right now, although it's tough, deep work that must happen. 

What issues in sustainability are you most concerned about?

I'm concerned about buildings and facilities that will have to invest in occupant health by upgrading their building envelope, based on what we have learned about the indoor transmission of COVID 19.

What development(s) have excited you most in the field?

It makes me happy to see the workplace prioritize health and safety for its people without compromising the workplace experience by developing strategies to better prepare organizations for short-, mid-and long-term changes caused by COVID 19.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

Both. I do not know if I will leave this earth better than I left it, but I will remember that in my lifetime climate events were once predictable, and then started to worsen over time. I’ve lived through bad storms, earthquakes, and wildfires and it is traumatic. I will remember being a little girl and learning about the Civil Rights Movement in textbooks and then being an adult and seeing riots in 2020. It's hard being a human during these times, and so the best I can do is give myself grace and know that my relatives that are long gone overcame so much so that I could simply exist and make a difference in modern-day society.  

What’s next for you?

When the world opens back up, most likely I will travel internationally for work, which is very exciting. I will experience what it is like to work globally and remotely. For now, I'm being more strategic this year with my time before I turn 30. My life isn’t going to stop once I turn 30, but I am gearing up for bigger shifts and I am laying the groundwork down now and staying open to what the future holds. I am also reflecting on how much I have evolved and how I created my path to walk down as a trailblazer. Personally, I’d like to climb a couple of mountains this year, do another cross-country van trip, and enjoy life more without the internet taking over every aspect of it.

Karista Olson: Building the Indigenous Forest Bioeconomy

Photo credit: Kaidyn Leigh Photography

Who are you?

My name is Karista Olson and I come from the community of Sik-e-Dakh, also known as Glen Vowell, in Hazelton B.C. which is located on the traditional and unceded territories of the Gitxsan First Nation whom have proudly served as stewards and protectors of this beautiful 33000sk piece of the north since time immemorial. Having matrilineal roots within the Dakelh communities of Stellaquo and Nak’azdli Whu’ten, I was formally adopted by Wilp (house of) Weg’yet, one of the Gisgaast (fireweed) houses in 2012 alongside my family following in the footsteps of my late maternal grandmother. My maternal grandfathers Gitxsan lineage is where I center myself, as these are the communities that claim me in return, but I also acknowledge my Dakelh roots as well as both Persian and Swedish ancestry. I am a daughter, granddaughter, niece, cousin, and auntie-in-training.

I am also an alumni of multiple programs focused on youth development and leadership (CWY, IYLC, CANIMUN etc) as well as having recently left the University of Northern British Columbia where I received a Bachelor of Arts, joint majoring in English and Environmental Studies with minors in First Nations Studies and International Studies. Currently, I have the honor of serving as the Policy Analyst for the Innovation, Bioeconomy and Indigenous Opportunities Branch of the Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development alongside a wonderful team of brilliant, passionate, professionals to whom I came by way of the Indigenous Youth Internship Program (IYIP).

What made you realize that you should be in the field of sustainability?

As a function of my culture and upbringing, mutual recognition of our surroundings as an extension of ourselves, as our non-human relative, was simply the way in which I viewed the world. So I knew that no matter where my personal or professional journey may lead, that would be a guiding principle. The opportunity to work directly within a space that reflected the intersectionality of my own values, experiences, and skills was very much to the credit of the IYIP team and their decision to assign me to what would eventually become an amazing step forward in my career.

Tell us more about the work you’re doing on the Indigenous Forest Bioeconomy?

The branch as a whole undertakes a wide array of work directed at advancing the BC Bioeconomy, and part of what my team focuses on is the provision of the Indigenous Forest Bioeconomy Program (IFBP). The IFBP provides resources and support to Indigenous communities and their partners through building relationships,  co-developing economic development opportunities and supporting research designed to empower communities to undertake projects that address their social, economic and environmental needs. This is a decidedly broad and dynamic field which means we are always looking at new and exciting ideas as to how we can optimize biomass residuals, develop high-value bioproducts, and advance new technologies in ways that create jobs, increase capacity, and keep long-term benefits in community while also contributing to the growth of the industry-at-large and working to meet our environmental goals.

Why do you think diversity in sustainability is important?

I think that diversity, inclusion, and equitable participation in all things that effect us on a societal level is vital to a healthy and functioning collective. When it comes to sustainability, however, as it applies to natural resource management, there is a particularly well documented embodied impact that unilateralism can have on the land base, on our integrated socioeconomic systems, and how we place ourselves in relation to the physical world around us. It is encouraging to see a shift in diverse representation and how we approach complex issues, but we clearly have a long way to go before I can stop getting really excited whenever I see another Indigenous woman at the table.

Do you have a mentor? How have they helped you in your career or personal growth?

This path started with my returning to complete my adult dogwood at the Gitxsan/Wet’suwet’en Education Society at the tender age of twenty-one. For a class project, I wrote a paper on a combined heat and power unit for a housing complex in my community not knowing that less than a decade later I would be in a position to support communities doing exactly this kind of work for real. Without the well-placed, passionate, people that supported me early on I may never have had the nerve to bet on myself the way that they did.

I have been blessed to have had many people who have helped inspire and guide me over the years, but I have never really had designated mentors in the conventional sense. Rather, it took entire communities of people to get and keep me on my current path, from my students that showed me resilience and humility to my classmates that were also parents who showed me balance and dedication to the seasoned professionals from whom I learned diplomacy and organization (still working on that last one). I guess I needed all the help I could get, but it led me to a place where I can contribute to something meaningful which is a great position to be in so early in my career.

What advice do you have for someone just starting out in sustainability?

Establish your support systems and learn how to be gentle with yourself, burnout and crisis fatigue will creep up on you before you realize it’s there. Working in sustainability is a unique experience for many reasons, one being that there is such a strong socio-emotional connection to why and how that work is being done. So know exactly what it is you’re fighting for and be willing to be challenged in your beliefs and preconceptions.

“It is easy to work in service of something when one feels that it is objectively ‘right’ and focuses solely on that, but the true work is found in deconstructing and understanding the why of a thing just as much as the what. It can be complex, uncomfortable, and exhausting, but it is work that we need to do in service of a shared vision. ”

Is there a quote/mantra/advice that you most live by, and why?

As an Indigenous woman currently living far from home, during a global pandemic, I could fill a book with the positive affirmations upon which I rely on a daily basis. There is a deeply ingrained notion, however, that lives rent free in my mind that I am sure guides more of my behaviour than I may care to admit; none if it is for me.

“ We were taught as children the importance of planting seeds for trees under whose shade you know you will never sit, a thought that resonated with me but never quite felt complete. As I got older I realized how much more work it is to truly be in service of that notion. To continue the metaphor, one must cultivate healthy soil, ensure that the conditions are optimal, protect it, leave instructions for its care when you’re no longer there to nurture it. It’s not planting a tree and walking away, the labour is in maintaining what you have planted and all that surrounds it. It is an emotional labour that can sometimes feel near invisible and thankless, but it is labour worth doing for work that you care about. ”

How do you maintain traditions far from home? How do you continue your relationship with the land in an urban setting?

Simply put, I don’t. My personal connection to my culture is such that without my people and my territory I very simply do not have that element of my life active when I may need or want it to be. I love Victoria, it is a beautiful city in which to live and I was honored to have stood with my cohort and been formally welcomed to these lands by the Songhees in their big house over a year ago. But my roots don’t grow in this soil. We don’t recognize each other.

I have oft compared returning to an urban environment after being home to be like stepping off a boat after weeks at sea, it doesn’t move properly. Yes you adjust eventually but there remains the lingering sense that you are about to miss a step and fall on your face (something I am known for doing).

How we forge our relationships with our surroundings is a complex and deeply personal process that can be challenging to articulate. I have always endeavored to return home every few months to see my family, get re-grounded and maintain my connections within my communities. Unfortunately, like so many others, I am struggling to adjust to being unable to do so. It is in times like these, however, that I am grateful for the humour and resiliency of my people even when old wounds are reopened like they are now. We rally, we support each other, and despite all the hurdles in doing so – we teach our elders how to use Zoom. Or rather we try to (Sorry, Mom).

What issues in sustainability are you most concerned about?

There are several high visibility issues surrounding sustainability that have garnered considerable attention over the last few years, but I think what concerns me most is how we are educating on these issues. Discourse is, in my opinion, distractingly if not understandably segmented where we may need it to be as complex and diverse as the systems that led us here and resulted in these issues to begin with. We have some of the most engaged and proactive generations rising to positions of influence now and over the decades to come, and I am hopeful that the gaps will continue to shrink and that our conceptualization of our place in the world evolves to reflect that.

What development(s) have excited you most in the field?

With how easy it is to be lost in the uncertainty and doom-fatigue of our current shared reality, I think we forget that sometimes you need storm clouds to get silver linings. Movements and advancements in sustainability have historically not always had clear paths forward, but there are a lot of gaps that are closing in terms of innovation and adaptation. We are beginning to think differently en masse in a way that doesn’t happen very often, new voices are at new tables, and sometimes those old tables are being tossed out the front door.

“This is what truly excites me, not just a new piece of technology or a minor breakthrough in national policy but rather a changing of the guard. This, I think, will result in the biggest generational interruption to environmental degradation that we’ve ever seen.”

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future, and why?

I try to maintain a healthy balance, enough optimism to keep me passionate and enough pessimism to keep me critical. There are admittedly a lot of uncertainties on the horizon, but I think that a lot of brilliant people are connecting in ways and on a scale that we have simply never seen before. The interim will be uncomfortable, but the future has promise and I have faith that whatever challenges may come we will meet them head on.