Our environment has been in serious jeopardy since long time. The difference now is that, it is getting accepted by almost all today from people in power to general mass. The on-going discussions and dialogues from past two decades by nations across every corner of globe have given significant gravity to the issue.
Arguments and challenges can be seen translating towards innovations and business cases.
On-going international cooperation, regional governance to private sector commitments is continuously channeling money into saving our environment. With an understood nexus among climate, water, energy and so on, climate change domain offers a very wide spectrum of new professions. Within its capacious connotations from research to technical experts, advocacy mangers to policy professionals, certifiers to trainers, renewable energy experts to sustainability rapporteurs; doors has been open for all.One of the major attractions for professional’s already part of and those who aspire to be in Climate change regime is its highly multi-faceted nature.
Spanning across mitigation to adaptations, with constant changes in technology, policy and business development, green professionals have a wealth of new career options available to them today that would have been unheard of ten years ago. Climate change as a domain has unfurled opportunities for and with all. The work can be seen as multidisciplinary and transdiciplinary. The real challenge is knowing where and how to get started. Students and professionals need detailed, relevant info on climate change career trends, yet most available resources talk more about policies, theory and impact, rather than its job prospects.Here are some of the trends and tips about environment employment and what green professionals can do to ensure their career success.
Clearly, there’s a lot to look forward in climate change profession. This rising trend is something that is often not well-understood or regularly communicated in a lot of existing literature about green jobs. In fact, many popular connotations of green job growth looks only towards emerging green sectors, such as green retail or carbon and climate change mitigation. While these areas may certainly be growing, this does not necessarily translate into strong employment numbers. In reality, many of the latest green job openings can actually be found in more established environmental sectors, such as environmental protection, consultation and resource conservation.
Clearly, the integration of environmental knowledge into corporate strategy and business planning is a major area of opportunity that is trending today. While Climate change has been on international agenda, national policies have successfully trickled down to corporates with sustainability in their agenda and portfolios. With more and more green collar jobs sprouting, seekers and aspirants need to focus on skillsets that involves application of environmental expertise in business development, planning, technology & Product Development. In other words it is about incorporation of environment resilient practices in business cases.
One needs to have command on some of the soft skills like Problem solving (solution based approach), Project Management, Research and analytical thinking with excellent writing skills. Communication has been a significant skill set for both practitioners and aspirants as they should not only write technical reports but also to be able to explain complicated technical concepts to clients in layperson terms.
People who want to work in green careers needs to be highly motivated and engaged in their jobs than most. It not only requires defining ethics but also a sense of value, a sense of responsibility and a sense of belonging towards environment.
While dedicated research centers and schools for this domain is a recent trend, it appears to be getting stronger as nations are shifting towards green economy. Climate change practitioners are rarely confined to just one area of expertise. The education demands interdisciplinary approach i.e. coming up with solutions that address environmental, economic and social needs altogether. Similarly text knowledge has to be factored with practical knowledge to complete the picture.
