Episode 17. Emily King on Leading with Vision and Strong Systems

Hey there,

Here comes another exciting episode of the Sustainability Skill Set podcast!

This time we’re joined by Emily King, Sustainability Specialist at Schreiber Foods.

We discuss the fact that a sustainability job means constant variety and change, which can be both the best and worst part about it, and we reflected on the implications for who is best fit for this work.

Emily described that her priority in sustainability leadership is creating a shared vision. Then she dove into strategies she uses to make sure everyone is on board and excited about making progress.

Because she started her career in marketing, Emily uses her storytelling skills to win buy-in and move projects forward.

We also covered how smarter data systems, including AI, can minimize the reporting grind so we can focus on real impact. This is one of her biggest efforts right now.

Finally, Emily described what she looks for in sustainability interviews, providing some great tips for those looking to get into the space.

I really enjoyed her playful energy and spot-on analogies for the sustainability world. I think you will too.

Here’s what I found most interesting:

1. The Best and Hardest Part About Sustainability Jobs

Sustainability favors people who are curious and hungry for variety, because there is no such thing as a typical day. Emily’s week can start with onboarding a new data platform with the IT team, jump to customer conversations in South America about farm collaborations, and end on a manufacturing floor or dairy farm. The hardest part and the best part is working without traditional metrics or a fixed playbook while the rules and technology shift month to month. We learn by moving, and the work rewards those of us who enjoy uncertainty and discovery.

2. Lead With Carrot Cake, Not Just Carrots

The most important thing to bring as a sustainability leader is a real vision people want to join. Emily does not write that story alone; she visits facilities, talks with farmers and cooperatives, and listens across teams and the executive level to weave a quilt that fits the company’s culture. The message stays consistent, but the language adapts to the audience. With skeptics she focuses on efficiency, pride in local improvements, and what success would look like for their site rather than using abstract climate objectives. Relationships make the vision believable, and the vision makes the difficult projects feel worth doing.

3. Solve Reporting to Focus on Impact

Reporting is part of every sustainability job and it is not going away, but the right tools can cut the time dramatically. Emily is implementing an AI-enabled platform that centralizes sustainability data, reduces spreadsheet chasing across departments, and lets her query a living database rather than send constant emails. Her goal is to cut reporting time in half so there is more bandwidth for actual improvements, including creative pilot projects like worm-driven food waste solutions. We connected this data and reporting thread to my last podcast conversation with Carlos Villalpando, noting that a durable data foundation unlocks better decisions and faster progress. As Emily put it, sustainability reporting is in its adolescence, and the awkward phase is part of growing into new systems that will dramatically change the way we work.

4. Soft Skills Win the Interview

Emily described that hard skills get us in the door, but soft skills carry us through the work and onto the team. During interviews, she looks for curiosity, storytelling and public speaking skills. She wants to hear stories demonstrating a candidate’s ability to tailor a message to specific audiences, resilience when the answer is no, and a healthy sense of levity and gratitude. She reminds candidates to be themselves, avoid letting AI speak for them, and bring real examples that show how they learn and collaborate. She has hired math and science-strong candidates with no formal sustainability background because their integrity and learning mindset were obvious. She recommends sharing the interests that light you up, even if they sit outside the job description, because every job can be a climate job when we connect it to impact.

5. Hope Will Carry Us Through

The sustainability problem that keeps Emily up at night is freshwater availability and the inequity in how we price, govern, and access clean water. She points to moments like Cape Town’s Day Zero as signals that the issue is urgent, and she argues that water should be treated as a human right, not just a commodity. She is encouraged by water reuse and cross industry solutions in food manufacturing, although she believes adoption is not yet at the scale the moment requires. Her closing note separates optimism from hope. She describes that optimism can be naive, while hope is grounded, and it lets us lean on one another when the work is hard so we can keep building real solutions.

If these topics resonate with you, listen to the full episode and share it with a colleague who you think would also be interested. Your support helps more people discover the show.

Wishing you the best,

Louis DeMaso

P.S. Feel free to hit that reply button anytime. I would love to hear from you.