Around the world, young people are concerned about the environment, protecting nature, and the future of the planet. Yet, while they have the desire to take action, they often lack clear pathways into jobs or volunteering roles that will deliver a more sustainable future. In fact, only 44% feel equipped with the skills needed to become the green workforce of tomorrow. 

Helping young people step into green careers is the goal for the winning team in the latest Capgemini Global Data Science Challenge (GDSC) – an annual hackathon that brings together Capgemini colleagues from around the world in teams, working to make real-world change. 

The team members bring their own experience in sustainability solutions, and skills in data science and AI, and collaborate with non-governmental organizations, developing innovative solutions to benefit the planet. 

Delivery architect Dennis Senzel works on AI projects in his day-to-day role at Capgemini and was a key member of the winning GDSC 2025 team from Germany. 

“Our clients all have their own sustainability targets,” he says. “To help them achieve those, we draw from a wide range of skills from across Capgemini. We knew with the GDSC that our goal was to create real impact. We had to show young people that sustainability isn’t something that only sits alongside your job; it can actually be your career.”  

In this latest edition, the GDSC was also supported by Capgemini’s technology partners Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Mistral AI. It contributed to Capgemini’s support for UNICEF’s Generation Unlimited target which, through its Green Rising initiative, aims to encourage 100 million young people to take the lead in climate solutions by 2030.  

The challenge of career guidance 

Dennis explains how they set about developing an agentic AI powered assistant to help young people explore green career pathways while taking their personal circumstances into account. 

“To begin with, we needed to understand the complex nature of the problem,” he says. “We started by analyzing the datasets of a traditional job agency, and quickly realized that someone with experience in the food industry might have transferable skills applicable to sustainability roles. Our job was to spot those matches and make those links.”  

They then created an AI assistant that organizes and interprets raw data to uncover insights and understanding about individuals’ green career ambitions, education and skills, before making accurate and personal recommendations about career options. 

“The idea was to create a solution for young people in Brazil which has just held the latest COP climate conference,” he says. “We want to help them find a career in sustainability, and we know that it isn’t always clear what paths are open to them, or what paths also provide enough money for them to live and support their families.” 


AI for deeper understanding 

The goal was to provide them with a personalized recommendation that would prove much more useful than standard career guidance tools. 

It used agentic AI and large language models (LLMs) to learn more about the complex relationships between people’s specific skills, experiences and ambitions, and the opportunities in sustainability. The solution also needed to be flexible enough to adjust to the various interaction styles of the individual users, and the specifics of the information they would be willing – or unwilling – to share with the tool. 

“As the information is so wide-ranging, we decided to build a knowledge graph,” says Dennis, “and then let the LLM search through this graph and provide the final recommendations. Using these technologies together brought us much closer to the gold standard we were looking for.” 

Innovating to make it real 

As winners, the team were invited by UNICEF to the UN City Copenhagen – a hub where 10 agencies and people from more than 100 countries come together to collaborate on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. 

Project manager Swetha Pokle was also a team member. She says the project underlined how, when innovation meets purpose, real change can happen on the way to meeting UNICEF’s Generation Unlimited targets.  

“If we have supported that ambition in even just a small way,” says Dennis, “then I’m grateful to have been part of it all.”  

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