How to Survive and Thrive as a Sustainability Professional

Drawing on decades of experience and real-world examples, Erik Foley, Sustainability Practice Leader at our Associate Antea Group USA, outlines four essential roles sustainability leaders must play to stay relevant and drive business value—from strategist and collaborator to risk analyst and bridge-builder. Most importantly, he explains why sustainability conversations need to start with business priorities and not ESG acronyms. 

Read the excerpts below and then head over to the full original article.

Getting Clear on Sustainability Definition of Work

If you are working on sustainability, you are working on the wrong thing. You should be working on the business. Sustainability is the means by which you are working on the business. Getting this turned around can be disastrous and I know of good sustainability professionals who have lost their jobs (sometimes the whole department) in part due to this problem.

In the same way that R&D, HR, IT, IR, marketing, etc. are means for realizing business objectives, sustainability is in service to the business. That may seem obvious but after working in sustainable business for decades I can assure you that it is often missed and puts the whole field--and perhaps your job if you have sustainability in your job title--at peril.

Sustainability professionals must constantly demonstrate the strategic value of their work. Those who succeed are the storytellers, the data-sharers, the connectors who translate sustainability efforts into tangible financial gains, cultural cohesion, and operational effectiveness.

The Four Essential Sustainability Roles: Strategist, Bridge-Builder, Collaborator, and Risk Analyst

It is my contention that the best sustainability professionals bring irreplaceable value to companies, and they do so when the fulfill four critical roles: as Strategist, Bridge-Builder, Collaborator, and Risk Analyst.

1. The Strategist

Perhaps most crucially, the best sustainability professionals link their initiatives to business performance. They highlight how smart sustainability can reduce costs, mitigate risks, drive revenue through new products and markets, and enhance brand reputation. This not only can lower capital costs but also attract and retain talent, contributing to long-term value creation.

2. The Bridge-Builder

Internally, the best sustainability professionals are the nexus of dynamic networks that facilitate the flow of vital information, resources, and insights across corporate structures. It is common for sustainability professionals to create such networks, formally as committees or working groups or informally. They become incredibly well connected and able to bring an agility and responsiveness to their organizations. In this way, their work transcends environmental and social performance, offering strategic advantages that ripple through all facets of the business.

3. The Cross-Industry Collaborator

The best sustainability professionals are engaged in robust networks such as associations, working groups, conferences, consortia, and roundtables. In such groups and at such events, they mingle with competitors and value chain partners. This interconnected web provides a stream of strategic insight that companies can harness to understand their industry, their peers, consumer behavior, and to vet technological innovations.

4. The Risk Analyst

The best sustainability professionals present the facts, translate them to business relevance and help their companies prepare for the future. They keep their eyes above the waves of today's volatility to see the trends and act as translator of those for different audiences.

It is easy to get lost in the second and third order effects of sustainability– things like sustainability reports and acronyms like CSRD, CDP and ISSB--and forget about the first order drivers. Sustainability, at its core, is a response to a set of existential environmental and societal risks made possible by--and continuing in spite of--incredible technological and economic growth (see the recent EY report "The New Economy" and its concept of the "polycrisis"). Without these severe risks, we wouldn't need sustainability. Think about it. If slave labor didn't exist in rare earth mineral supply chains and carbon emissions weren't reaching 430ppm, we wouldn't need a concept that brought our attention to those risks, since they wouldn't exist. In that world, we would just need your basic business, economics, government, education, healthcare, etc.

But sustainability signals that we do face very real risks to human flourishing on this planet. The best sustainability professionals are able to point this out and make it actionable.

Sustainability is not just about the environment but about a better way of doing things.

Too often sustainability is approached as an end in itself. Discussion is about reporting and disclosure requirements, a range of acronyms and voluntary reporting frameworks, and a range of other paper-pushing, administrative hoop jumping amounting to little. Such an approach puts the sustainability officer and team at great risk. After all, such frivolity might be permitted in good times but will be dispatched in bad.

Sustainability professionals are the corporate crystal ball gazers, constantly scanning the political, economic, social, and technological horizons. Their insights are a treasure trove of future-proofing strategies, addressing not only environmental and social impacts but also providing solutions to the most pressing business challenges of the day.

When they put the business first, sustainability professionals can be the architects of resilience and innovation. Their work is not just about safeguarding the planet—it's about securing the future of the companies they serve.

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