Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
S3E7 - The Value of Us w/ Richard Evans
0 Playsin 55 minutes
Richard Evans is the Founder and CEO of Talent Nation, Australia’s leading Sustainability, ESG, Environment, Sustainable Finance and Climate & Energy recruitment agency. The company is a B Corp and 100% employee owned. He serves part time on the Membership Advisory Group of the UN Global Compact Network Australia. He has a background in management consulting and banking, and joins us from Melbourne.
Richard tells us about the risks and opportunities of a career in sustainability. The good news? The market is picking up after a two year doldrum and salaries are higher than they were a few years ago. The bad news? The focus is still on compliance over strategy. Expect more opportunities over the next nine months, but also expect to buckle down to the core needs of your organization rather than the more lofty goals of the profession.
👉 We'd love to hear your feedback, share your questions or comments below.
👉 Like & Subscribe so you won't miss out on our upcoming episodes!
👉 Keep up to date with the Infrastructure Sustainability Council:
Website: https://www.iscouncil.org/
LinkedIn: / infrastructure-sustainability-council
#podcast #infrastructure #sustainability #buildingtomorrow
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Opportunities in Sustainability
00:00:00
Speaker
There are a lot of opportunities out there and you can see just from the online activity. I think there will be there will be a number of exciting roles that that do pop up.
Podcast Introduction & Guest Introduction
00:00:16
Speaker
Welcome back to Infrastructure Connections, the podcast where we explore what makes sustainable infrastructure work. Brought to you by the Infrastructure Sustainability Council, I'm your host, Seth Scott, and today we'll be speaking with Richard Evans.
00:00:30
Speaker
Richard is the founder and CEO of Talent Nation, Australia's leading sustainability, ESG, environment, sustainable finance, climate, and energy recruiting agency.
Richard Evans' Background and Career
00:00:40
Speaker
The company is a B-Core and 100% employee-owned.
00:00:44
Speaker
He serves part-time on the membership advisory group of the UN Global Compact Network Australia, and he has a background in management consulting and banking. He joins us from Melbourne. Hello, Richard. Welcome to the show. Thanks, Seth. Great to be here.
00:00:59
Speaker
So you've been doing this quite a long time now. I had 1998 was when I first stepped into the recruitment space. So 28 years with a bit of study in between. And then specifically within the impact space since 2009. So clocking out 17 years in this space now.
Investor Influence and Transparency in Sustainability
00:01:20
Speaker
What are some of the big differences between when you started and now? So I guess if I look at where we were 17 years ago, um car was starting to be talked about.
00:01:31
Speaker
ah Sustainability was was a nice to have, you know, often it was, you know, it involved things like yeah your volunteering program or corporate giving or it was definitely a cost to the business and saying that was was something that ah built goodwill within employees predominantly but then evolved into into customers um and then that shift has continued to move where ah yeah Larry Fink from BlackRock came out and said, you know you need to start integrating climate into yeah into your um decision making.
00:02:09
Speaker
and then the the investors got involved. And as soon as the investors got involved, then ah Boards got really interested in it. Executives got really interested in that so it. So it's kind of shifted from that bottom-up approach to top-down. And so it became this almost perfect storm where it was getting pushed from below and above. And then you had customers coming in and greater transparency. so And I guess from that, if you look at the the professionals within the space, a lot more pragmatic and um understand how
00:02:44
Speaker
Sustainability needs to integrate into the business strategy. It can't sit off to the side. and So the the profession has has evolved and grown up a lot and is still at the point where it it continues to evolve rapidly.
Upcoming Sector Insights Report
00:02:57
Speaker
I understand you have your annual sector insights report coming out at the end of the month. um Tell us about that. The main focus of it and the thing that everyone's always interested in is, you know, how much do get paid and how does that compare with the rest of the market? We've broadened it out over the last couple of years, which is where we can touch on elements such as burnout. You know, what the things that the softer elements that people are interested in? So what are organisations doing to keep their staff?
00:03:27
Speaker
to To access a copy of the report, and we request a donation to our charity partner, One Girl, to to help provide solar lights for for scholars in Sierra Leone. Something like 60% of sustainability professionals are happy with their work.
00:03:43
Speaker
Yeah. yeah which ah which is great because you should be. You know, I think it's um it's a really rewarding sector and it's full of really nice people. We're busy saving the world. That's right. We're the heroes.
00:03:55
Speaker
Yeah. It's good when you're the protagonist. that's right. That's right.
Accreditation and Career Advancement in Sustainability
00:04:00
Speaker
So the report mentioned that accreditation is a plus for professionals and you've been working with us at the ISC for a while. How is ISAP training and IS resources help job seekers?
00:04:11
Speaker
I think it's it's all about the credibility and and how do you how do you demonstrate the skills and experience you have often in an environment where um the hiring manager or the recruiter doesn't actually understand fully what you do.
00:04:30
Speaker
So I've i'm always been a big fan of accreditations and independent ah assessment of of people's capability or organisations capability.
00:04:42
Speaker
um So it's something that I look at and go great, it's a that's a qualification or ah an accreditation accreditation that you have that people go, right, I know what this means or I know that yeah you can't just ah get this label and put it on your CV. You need to go through a process.
00:05:03
Speaker
Anyone that's gone through the ICF accreditation process knows ah how involved it is. um And so those qualifications are are really critical. That will get your next role because the organisation will go, that this is a challenge for us.
00:05:22
Speaker
So I know the last couple of years are kind of tough for the industry. It looks like sustainability salaries have remained relatively flat over the last few years and continued to in the last year in this report.
00:05:35
Speaker
um where Where do you see that going or what do you think is driving that trend even as inflation goes up? Yeah, I guess if you if you put it in that perspective, then the net salaries would have drawn back a bit.
00:05:49
Speaker
um
00:05:52
Speaker
my The main driver for them and being relatively static is is we did have a period of of accelerated growth. So salaries were jumping significantly.
00:06:04
Speaker
So they they have leveled off. Yeah. And I just I think it it it is a symptom of the skill shortage in the space and people being progressed through into more senior roles more quickly.
00:06:17
Speaker
And that was my next question. Setting aside wages, do you see that career advancement is a positive in the sustainability industry where they're moving up rather quickly? There's no shortage of growth potential in the space. yeah yeah It is an area that is evolving so rapidly.
00:06:33
Speaker
um
00:06:36
Speaker
that you know there is never a dull moment like you're constantly having to come up to speed and we're seeing people being exposed to to board and executive far earlier in their career than they would have normally um if you're early to mid-career there's lots of opportunity for advancement if you are a head of role or or more of a strategic role there are less opportunities out there at the moment What do you see in New Zealand, or especially Australia, um as far as what the market's looking for? And do you see it picking up in general?
Employment Trends and Compliance Focus
00:07:14
Speaker
Yeah, so I guess if you look at the broader employment market, it it has been on a downward trajectory for the last almost two years, kind of January 23. Sustainability was reasonably immune from that because teams have been lean and and there have been these obligations and commitments, fear of greenwashing, so making sure that they're not exposed. ah We definitely saw things slow ah middle of last year, so middle to back end of last year.
00:07:45
Speaker
And then we've noticed an uptick as recent as December last year. So December through to now, there's a lot more activity, again, being driven by ASRS and mandatory disclosures.
00:08:02
Speaker
the The last 18 months, the majority of roles have been analytics and ah data focused rather than leadership roles. and But then we're also seeing other more interesting roles pop up as well where an organisation feels like they've got climate disclosures under control and they're now thinking about, well, what does next year look like?
00:08:24
Speaker
Because yes, we've got disclosures and we've got that covered, but this isn't going away. So how do we evolve? you know We're going to need to bring our suppliers into the mix and they're a small entity.
00:08:37
Speaker
They've got no idea how to approach that. So how do we support them and educate them and start to build programs? because ultimately that's going to help us down the track. You mentioned that there's more disclosures coming down the pipe and we just seem to see more and more. and now we're incorporating the financial disclosures, the CSRD, SEC rules, ISSB, TNFD. And then on top of that, we've got organizations interested in circularity and planetary pricing and I think what we need we need more acronyms. ah That's really what's missing. We're not just going for the three-letter acronyms. we're now We've now got four-letter and we're yeah really owning that space.
00:09:20
Speaker
How does that affect sustainability professionals? Are they going to become more specialized or are they going to get stuck in roles where they they do just the reporting they have to do and that's where they are most valuable to the company?
00:09:33
Speaker
I mean, that's an interesting question from a timing perspective. yeah we've we've We've always seen that um yeah know the the holy grail for sustainability practitioners was was like the chief sustainability officer, know so wanting to get onto the executive and that sustainability role. And what we've seen is that there have been some CSO appointments, but the majority of CSOs in Australia are in blended roles, so they might come from a corporate affairs or risk or strategy um background side so they're an executive first and foremost rather than sustainability.
00:10:09
Speaker
from ah From a role perspective at the moment, disclosures are dominating the conversation. So so we are definitely in that compliance phase at the moment.
Strategic Contributions and Burnout Challenges
00:10:19
Speaker
Over the last 18 months we've seen organisations that have been a leadership positions have ah hit pause in terms of their their ambitions.
00:10:30
Speaker
and now they're waiting for the laggards to catch up. And I think that sums it up really well in terms of where we're at and it in the market. and you're going to be find it very challenging. Sustainability managers seem to have this ability to look beyond the reporting that they're doing, and they're very in touch with what's coming down the pipe so that they can see into the future, some distance, five years into the future.
00:10:54
Speaker
And then on top of that, they've got a platform-level view of what's happening in the organization because they're tapped into all that data. I feel like that's an untapped resource that organizations tend to under-appreciate. Yeah, I think you're right. And I think um there is an ability to go, okay, well, what what do we need to focus on? And organisations are getting a lot better at that in terms of, going okay, well, there's more disclosures happening. Yes, the focus is now, but we have got this awareness that um that we're going to need to think about what's next. And often that comes down to the maturity of the organisation to be able to unlock that capability within their sustainability team.
00:11:36
Speaker
The practitioners that are able to to plug into the market, definitely. they um Futurist isn't the word, but I'm sure they can see the trends coming. and Yeah, maybe risk manager is a better word.
00:11:48
Speaker
Yeah, but it's it's ah it's a risk for the organization. I guess that's one of the pluses and minuses about the sustainability profession is that we we all wear so many hats that we're very useful to an organization in multiple places, but that at the same time we can get stretched thin that way, especially when we're not being paid very much to begin with.
00:12:09
Speaker
ah it's It's a lot better than it was. so yeah and i And I think that's the thing. it's you know You don't move into this space for the money. yeah and that's So that's ah that's always a factor. that you know We look at ah you You only need to look at um yeah the healthcare profession, side so nurses and paramedics and and essential services, and and they're not doing those roles for the money. They're they're doing it for the for the impact that they have on on society. So um sustainability professionals, certainly not in that category, you know and and we've we've seen salaries move significantly in previous years, not so much in recent times, but I think that's largely because um
00:12:53
Speaker
there's more people being promoted into more senior roles more quickly. So the so the salaries have have kind of maintained, but the years of experience have dropped for those levels. So for for us, when we look at scoping roles, we're now starting to think that we need to to rework um or realign the position descriptions because what we call a sustainability manager now,
00:13:21
Speaker
five years ago would have been a senior advisor. So, you know, it's just the role titles have increased and and certainly the accountabilities have increased, but in terms of the years of experience, they're probably sitting more at that senior advisor level, whereas now they're they're a manager and they've got a lot more pressure on them to to deliver.
00:13:43
Speaker
We're seeing a lot more burnout now, and that's unfortunately ah kind of a symptom of the fact that people care so much about their work and that they're willing to say yes to everything. What are your organizations doing to kind of curb that amount of burnout or to help individuals work through it as a or help them work through it as an industry overall?
00:14:00
Speaker
So I've seen individuals that have reached burnout and they've left their role, but they've stepped into a new organisation and they've been able to redefine the parameters around what they're doing so they so they don't have the expectations that they that they previously
Managing Burnout and Role Alignment
00:14:17
Speaker
had. And a lot of them were were self-imposed as well. So I have seen some individuals that have stepped in and and they've been really clear and gone, okay, here's the scope of work that you want me to deliver.
00:14:29
Speaker
There's only a certain amount of hours in the year, so I can deliver this. So if that' if you're happy for me to park that, that's fine. If not, then I need resources to do that. And then then becomes a conversation around how you fund that or how you resource that.
00:14:47
Speaker
And your report said that 37% of the organizations you surveyed says they have sustainability KPIs for their executives. What was that? What kind of KPIs did they have and how did that come about?
00:14:58
Speaker
where I've seen it done really well when people have um not come from a sustainability background but have moved into these executive roles is that they're not trying to be the expert. like they They recognise where their strengths are and they hire really well. So they hire someone and to be the head of sustainability.
00:15:18
Speaker
They bring them along to all the board meet and they they're not trying to take credit for any of the work that's been done. they They're quite happy to... um devolve responsibility to the individual, but they know that their role is to help smooth things at the executive level, at the board level, ah but also give them exposure and help them with their progression into that role.
00:15:43
Speaker
And that then aligning with the um the executive and then the board as well for them to sign that off. That's good. Well, i want to wrap up, but I just want to ask you, where do you think this is going in the next year?
00:15:57
Speaker
What's next for the industry? There are a lot of opportunities out there and you can see just from the online activity from job ads and LinkedIn. And, um, so there haven't hasn't been a lot of movement over the last 18 months that is starting to free up now. And I think there will be, there will be a number of exciting roles that that do pop up, but I think for the next nine to 12 months, um,
00:16:22
Speaker
you need to be comfortable that it it will be about reducing the risk for the organization and giving it a level of comfort that they're not going to end up in a six-firing line. Yeah, that's good. Well, that sounds like good news overall. I think it's good news overall. You know, it's not, yes, we want to be working on these elements, but I think it's going to provide a really solid platform.
00:16:47
Speaker
That's great. Well, thanks so much for being on the show, Richard. It's good having you. Yeah, it's ah it's a pleasure. im Yeah, I'm a huge fan of um of the Infrastructure Sustainability Council, so we real pleasure to be here.
00:17:00
Speaker
Thank you very much. Great. Thanks, Seth. Thank you for listening to Infrastructure Connections. Please take a moment to follow us wherever you get your podcasts, and we want to hear your feedback. Leave a message down below to let us know your thoughts or drop us a line at Infrastructure Sustainability Council.
00:17:17
Speaker
Stay tuned for another episode of Infrastructure Connections.