The green side of business - how "green" matters to you no matter what job you want

By Jennifer Coleman

Environmental Defense

Scott Walsh and Kyle Cahill, who work for national nonprofit Environmental Defense, have seen first hand how green know-how matters in every business. Scott and Kyle both work with businesses like DuPont, FedEx, and McDonalds to help them find ways to create significant environmental benefits while making good business sense.

"The idea is not to have new, separate positions to address environmental concerns," says Kyle Cahill, Corporate Partnerships Project Manager with Environmental Defense. "Regardless of the business you are in, the idea is to consider environmental opportunities in every job. In an ideal world, sustainability would go far beyond a department of a business. The concept of sustainability would be built into the company."

Scott most recently worked with DuPont to develop the "Nano Risk Framework" - a method that companies can use to evaluate the safety of products that use nano-scale materials. Kyle works to spread the word about green innovations to the industry at large. He has worked to bring greener paper practices to offices, and helped develop a "green fleets" program for auto fleet companies to reduce and offset their greenhouse gas emission.

Here are some examples from Scott and Kyle about how green thinking applies to the top entry level occupations.

#1 - Business Operations, HR and Financial Services: Accounting, financial analysis and research, management and administration, and human resource and labor relations.

Scott: The project team at DuPont included people who probably never expected to be working on a project related to environmental protection. There were business development people on the team, as well as finance staff."

Kyle: "When we're talking about greener paper or reducing paper, the key contact could be someone in finance or operations. It really varies. Eventually, we have to make a connection with the senior executives to see if the company is serious about adopting a change. But the ideas can come from anywhere."

#2 - Sales and Marketing: Brand and product marketers represented the most rapidly growing segment from within this category, growing more than 300 percent, year-over-year.

Scott: "Communications people were really essential. The communication people would call up and say, you are at the stage of the project that you need to think about presentation -- fonts, images, layout. I should have known from business school that marketing is very important to any project. I really came to rely on our communications staff."

"I hope the framework will change the way that products get developed. People who are in the business of product marketing will have to start thinking about environmental benefits and risks up front. So it will require product developers to have environmental skills - or at least work with people who do!"

#3 - Architecture and Engineering: Naval architects and marine engineers are the most highly sought specialists by employers hiring in this category, followed closely by electrical, civil and mechanical engineers.

Kyle: "We're also getting phone calls from companies who want help to measure, track, reduce and offset their greenhouse gas emissions." These emissions can come from products, travel, energy use - many aspects of a business. Engineers can help businesses create plans to reduce their emissions.

#4 - Computer, Information Technology and Mathematical: Of the top five, this category experienced the most growth, increasing almost 18 percent year-over-year. Opportunities for workers in programming, computer maintenance and support, geographic information systems (GIS) and web design are the most desired positions.

Kyle: "It varies tremendously who I might talk to about greening business practices. There's often an internal champion who is taking the initiative and believes strongly in an environmental practice for some reason. This could be a product manager at an insurance company, a fleet manager -- or someone in Information Technology or Research & Development at a technology company."

#5 - Office, Administrative and Customer Support: The most popular jobs in this category include administrative assistants, customer service representatives, receptionists and data entry clerks.

Kyle: "There are opportunities at service companies that reflect a growing consumer interest in green products."

"We're seeing more and more companies interested in people with certain skills, interest, and experience in green issues. The buyer/supplier relationship is changing to include an interest in environmental dynamics. Purchasers are asking their suppliers more and more about the makeup of their product, including resource materials, manufacturing processes and other elements that make a difference for the environment. The supplier needs to not only measure these elements, but communicate them through customer support."

The final word

Scott: "The project with DuPont- and lots of our projects - prove that there are opportunities to make an environmental impact from many different skill sets. You could be an excellent communications major, and have an important role to play in leveraging the impact of a science or business person. Figure out what it is you like to do and are good at doing, and then look for the opportunities to leverage that in environmental opportunities."

Kyle: "The idea is not to have new, separate positions to address these environmental concerns. Regardless of the business you are in, the idea is to consider environmental opportunities in every job."

© 2008 MonsterTRAK