The importance of making friends if you work in sustainability

This is certainly an exciting time to work in sustainability.

Climate change is the biggest and most complex challenge that human beings have ever faced, and companies worldwide are on a race to develop new business models so that purpose and sustainability are embedded in the company culture and are equally important as historic metrics of success.

A charming message adorns a white-tiled wall, framed by lush greenery, extending a warm and welcoming sentiment to passersby on the street.

Still though, if you work in an energy or sustainability role, you may know that it can sometimes feel like a lonely journey. Perhaps because the organisation that you work for is not large enough (or committed enough) to have a dedicated team and you are the sole driver of the climate change agenda in the business, or maybe because embedding sustainability in the company culture requires massive behavioural and mindset change across all organisational levels, and that is a difficult thing to achieve.

So, what is the best way to avoid the feeling of being lonely and have some company on the journey? Well, the answer may be as simple as: Make Friends.

Sustainability is a team sport and building an internal and external professional network is not a “nice to have”, but a necessity to fulfil the potential of our professional roles.

If you have not spent much time building your sustainability professional network, but you are keen to start, here are some first-hand tips from my personal experience:

Start internally

Before you even start approaching networking in the outer world, you should start within your own organisation.

Make a list of all the teams and individuals that have a part to play in developing and delivering your organisation sustainability agenda. Think about something interesting and relevant for them that you are working on, showcase what you do,

reach out directly, ask questions, offer your support, and share some interesting contents. Just build up the relationship, day by day. Enthusiasm is infectious and if people see passion in you, they will follow you.

Something that may help you is the concept of obliquity: in simple terms, find out what matters to people, and use it as a proxy to gain support for what matters to you.

A typical example would be when engaging the Maintenance team to present a proposal for a new air conditioning system, before talking about the carbon reduction associated with the project, spend time to also share the benefits of the reduced maintenance regime of the new equipment, how much time will the team save and how drastically complaints will decrease during the summer months.

If you want to know more about the subject, I recommend you to explore the Energy Conscious Organisation (EnCO) resources and in particular an article written by John Mulholland on “The principals of obliquity”.

Make the most out of LinkedIn

if you are reading this article, you’re already in the right place. LinkedIn is an excellent tool to grow your professional network, from the comfort of your sofa.

As with everything though, you need to put commitment in if you want to see results. I am sure there are lots of guides out there on how to make the most out of the platform, and this is my very simple approach:

• Be accessible – I get lots of connection requests from people that I don’t know, and equally I send some. Unless there is something suspicious on people’s profile (i.e. no connections in common, poorly built profile, phishing risk, etc.), I will always accept a connection invite. The idea of LinkedIn is that you connect with people that you don’t know directly but have something in common with you. I also get a lot of cold sales messages, and I answer them too. It may take me some time, and it may just be a polite “no thank you” – but I will reply, in the same way that if I am attending an event in person, I will stop by if someone is trying to talk to me. You never know what opportunities are at the end of a connection request or message.

• Follow people that share good quality contents – because reading a thought-provoking post, will allow you develop further research and get involved in the conversation (see point 3). If you need some suggestion on who to follow on LinkedIn, these are some of the profiles that consistently appear on my feed and always share insightful, informative, and original contents on anything related to the environment and climate change. Munish Datta – Alessandro Blasi – Jan Rosenow – Roberta Boscolo – Andrea Licata - Katharine Hayhoe

• Participate – This is probably the most important point. It’s great to put a like on a post, but make sure that you also share some original content yourself. May that be writing an article about something that you are passionate about, share something you read or that you have been working on, or just engage in the conversation if someone else has shared something that you found interesting. And keep in mind that re-sharing a content usually reaches less people than writing a post or article from scratch.

  
  

Engage with a professional body

These are a catalyst to build your professional network across peers and like-minded individuals. They often offer dedicated opportunity for networking, but also training and professional qualifications. The principle is similar to LinkedIn though, the more you put in, the more you take out. Do some research to understand what professional body is the most appropriate for your role and how you can get involved. If like me, you are interested in energy and sustainability management, the Energy Institute, Energy Manager Association (EMA) and the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment (IEMA) are the best places to start.

Beyond work

We all live remarkably busy lives, but if you can find some time and energy, try to get involved in sustainability related initiatives outside of work.

You have lot of knowledge and expertise, that can support the growth of the whole industry and society. There are lots of different initiatives that you can get involved with, or even start yourself. Do some research, understand what you are passionate about and what commitment you can make.

Personally, I believe local communities have a great role to play in driving grass roots sustainability initiatives – and therefore, I started a little side project to promote sustainability-focussed organisations in my community – this gave me the opportunity to meet some inspiring people near me, and from the most diverse background.

Building a sustainability professional network and establishing strong relationship takes time and effort, but the benefits are huge as a professional and as an individual. And as usual, I would love to hear your personal experience and advise on this matter!