Continuing from How I Got Here: 1.0.
Sustainability Career 2.0 – The Lost Years
Towards the end of 2011, we landed in Boulder, CO. “We” became a deciding factor from this point on, both a challenge and an opportunity in building a lifelong career. I was working remotely for another consultancy on Federal Contracts. This consultancy was an education in two key things:
- Focusing on profit ahead of product
- Working alone
Aside from fieldwork, my work weeks were maybe 20-hours. I did a lot of hiking and I began experimenting with entrepreneurship. As educational as this all was, I wasn’t getting anywhere financially.
As we grew tired of Boulder we began to think about what and where might be next. My career offered up two big opportunities. Boise, ID, and Park City, UT. After much consternation, “we” decided on Park City, UT.
Park City is where I currently call home. It is an awkward and expensive love affair. I’ve never owned a Porsche but I wonder if its the same. The barrier to entry and maintenance costs are high but you get to derive pleasure in mundane moments, oh, and you get a hat;)
Working for Park City I experienced “Terrible Bosses.” I also built nationally recognized programs, started a nonprofit, built lifelong friendships, and learned an incredible amount about myself. Scars and all.
In early 2016, a friend and colleague of mine tossed me a lifesaver, a move to the University of Utah.
I entered “The U” as a Sustainability Manager. It was a mediocre and somewhat desperate negotiation on my part with someone I’d later learn was “as tight as a Scotsman.” So maybe I did alright. Title aside, my role was essentially introducing and scaling sustainability on the operations/facilities side. I quickly learned that a University is a small, vertically integrated city. Significantly more control and responsibility than what I had in the past, even if no ever knows who is in charge.
The big shift was moving from an organization of roughly 500 to over 10,000. One of the biggest benefits was upward mobility. I left the University in 2019 as a Deputy Program Manager, co-managing a team of eight.
It’s worth mentioning that as much as I was taken care of at the U, I knew it wasn’t a fit. The culture of success is narrow. The stereotypes of beuaracratic bloat are true. My biggest critique is that university’s, on the whole, are disingenuous about their business models. Business model alignment is critical for successful sustainability programs, so I knew there was a ceiling.
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