The expansion of ESG

- Climate jobs aren't just for scientists and environmentalists, they're for everyone. Addressing the demands of the climate crisis requires leadership from all skill sets, industries and experience levels. I always say that getting a job in climate is one of the most tangible individual actions anyone can take. It's 40 plus hours a week that you're funneling into concrete climate action. However, I recognize that transitioning your career to climate isn't feasible for everyone for a variety of factors. It could be as simple as genuinely enjoying your non-climate job, and that's perfectly okay. We can have the utmost impact if we take a twofold approach to jobs in climate. The first approach will be the foundation of this course, building new, meaning fully transitioning your career to climate and dedicating all of your energy to one climate solution. The flip side of this is optimizing what you currently do with a climate lens, meaning making your job a climate job, as coined by Project Drawdown. And that's what we'll be focusing on in this video. For better or for worse, corporations hold a lot of power when it comes to the planet. If you work at a non-climate company and care about these issues, you have a unique opportunity to use your voice and implement changes on an internal level, something that's oftentimes wrongly overlooked. Let's go back to the construction engineer example I provided a few videos back. This engineer could have worked for a national firm that isn't climate focused. However, if they were to implement green building practices and echo those sentiments to their supervisors, they would be making their job a climate job. It can no longer be the sole responsibility of small sustainability teams to do the climate work of an entire company. Rather, individual employees can encourage internal actions that extend the realm of sustainability teams. Employees are the backbone of every company. Hiring and retention are baked into the core of every business. External and internal stakeholders are actively considering the cost of recruitment and retention, and will oftentimes make amends that lend to happy employees and more marketable hiring opportunities. Making your job a climate job can be as simple as encouraging your leadership to transition to a green 401(k) plan, recommending a cost benefit analysis of switching to an electric fleet, kickstarting a green employee resource group. The list goes on. We no longer have the luxury of ignoring the importance of sustainability, nor can the privilege of taking the easier or cheaper way out be an option. We have less than 10 years to evade the catastrophic effects of climate change, and everyone has a role to play.