Loading...
October 30, 2026 · By Mahroo Shahbaz and Stephanie Bertels
Share this post on:LinkedIn
Corporate sustainability spaces and the sustainability professionals within them are experiencing a profound shift. As the world of sustainability continues to evolve, so do the skills, knowledge and opportunities needed to succeed in the sector. Regulatory fragmentation across regions has altered how companies are approaching sustainability, high-profile and political pushback against sustainability has shifted how sustainability roles are framed, and emerging technologies have changed the skillset many professionals will require in the future.
Whether you’re just starting out or looking to take the next step in your career, future-proofing your sustainability career means embracing continuous learning, developing adaptable skills, and leveraging the intersectionality of your role for meaningful impact.
In our Peer Discussion in October, our network discussed this topic and how sustainability professionals were future-proofing their careers against these shocks. The following stems from the research and discussions on the emerging competencies and skills that sustainability professionals need, the importance of working cross-functionally, and how sustainability teams are developing these skills.
In our research, we identified the following traditional and emerging competences that sustainability professionals will need to be aware of and balance within their roles:
The fundamentals of sustainability are still crucial to this work.
Foundational topic knowledge remains critical to ensuring that the work sustainability professionals are undertaking aligns with supporting key environmental and social systems. This includes keeping up to date on key topics like climate, nature, water, human rights, worker wellbeing, and community resilience, with particular attention to how they play out in the contexts where your company operates. Sustainability professionals will need to engage in constant retraining and reframing of their knowledge base to remain on top of these expectations.
Systems thinking – the ability to look at a whole system rather than just its parts and understand the relationships between the components – remains a powerful skill in identifying leverage points for change. Thinking systemically supports identifying root causes and unintended consequences, informs planning and decision-making, and supports collaboration and communication between different stakeholders.
Regulations and disclosure remain important drivers of company action. Keeping up to date on emerging developments and understanding the strategic implications of emerging policies and reporting standards is increasingly important. Shifts in regulations help to frame and influence organisational action at scale, and sustainability professionals who understand and can effectively translate and leverage the implications of these shifts for their companies are more likely to influence them.
In our research and discussions, the importance of sustainability roles as actors that bridge across issues and across functions was consistently emphasised.
Sustainability professionals are often tasked to work across dynamic and complex environmental and social issues. They are not only expected to have foundational technical knowledge in multiple topics, but are also expected to understand and explain the strategic implications for strategy, brand, risk, operations, supply chain, and more.
That means that sustainability leaders need to work effectively across different departments and business functions. Each of these bring different norms, objectives, vocabularies, communication patterns, and skills. Sustainability professionals need to invest in building this fluency to translate between teams, frame the work clearly, and leverage shared language to socialise issues and align with each group’s priorities.
Sustainability professionals also often need to influence without authority. Relationship building, strengthening trust, and demonstrating reliability all play a role in building connections and influence across the organisation; this includes being able to explain the relevance of sustainability to key functions, framing the “why” in ways that align with differing language and priorities, and proposing concrete, realistic next steps.
Sustainability investments compete for capital, and sustainability professionals need to be involved in building the business case. To do this, they must develop their fluency in finance, operations, and risk so they can clearly link environmental and social risks to enterprise value. Investing time to better understand the work of these other functions yields dividends.
Our network also identified that sustainability work is also becoming more quantitative – investors and regulators are increasingly demanding data-driven systems to track, verify, and report on the impacts of environmental and social initiatives. With this push towards better ESG data, sustainability professionals are expected to support the effective deployment of new technologies such as AI while simultaneously being asked to identify and find ways to mitigate the actual and potential impacts of these technologies.
Future-proofing your sustainability career is about more than keeping up with the latest trends; it’s about building the knowledge and skills to turn sustainability ambitions into meaningful, measurable change. A strong foundation in sustainability principles, the ability to bridge the gap between teams and bring people together, and confidence in using financial and data-driven insights are all essential to the future of sustainability professionals.