Andrew Peterson

Tell us about your career journey with Capgemini.

I am the sustainability lead for the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) team in the Americas, and I started this role in 2017. Before that, I joined as a campus hire – straight out of college. I was a staff consultant for two years doing project management and business analysis, but sustainability has always been a huge passion of mine.

I have some education in it, and I got very quickly involved in the Employee Resource Groups and other CSR initiatives after I joined because it was a fantastic way to start to exercise some of those passions and grow my network and make good connections within our organization, and I was really in a fantastic position when this role opened up. I was able to slide in and it’s something I’m thankful for every day.

How did you transition from a consultant to your role in sustainability?

Well, I would say that the transition was easier than you might think because consulting as, I guess, a skillset or a type of work, really sets you up for success in a lot of different areas, right? Because it’s all about problem solving, critical thinking, it’s almost more learning the art of transformation. And sustainability at its core is also really about transformation. Working in consulting was a great preparation for the actual career of corporate sustainability. I was able to bring a lot of knowledge that I had from my education and just my own personal interest in sustainability to bear in a way I obviously hadn’t before, but all the other skills that I learned at Capgemini and have been growing translated perfectly into the sustainability world. So, it was not as challenging as you might think.

Tell me about how Capgemini has supported you in your learning and development growth at the organization.

I think the growth opportunities and skill-building opportunities that I’ve been afforded at Capgemini have been universal in some sense. I’ve gotten the opportunity to take courses on sales, and again, somebody might not expect somebody working in sustainability and carbon emissions reduction to want to take training in sales, but the reality is I’m selling every day.

I’m selling our colleagues and our leaders and our customers on the importance of this topic and why they should care about it. And so, learning how to do that type of thing is beneficial in my role. I have been able to take training in effective people management, and even though I don’t have direct reports necessarily, I work in a sort of unofficial leadership capacity and a mentorship capacity with a large number of our colleagues through the Employee Resource Group program, through some of the ambassadors’ networks that I’ve set up to help take action on sustainability. And so again, those types of universal soft skills training have been omnipresent here and always been available to me anytime I felt the need to continue to grow my skillset in that area.

How has Capgemini’s flex abroad program supported you and your career journey?

Most of our global sustainability organization is based out of the UK. And so that afforded me a really fantastic opportunity, not only to live somewhere abroad and experience an exciting new country and culture, but also to spend a lot of time collaborating very deeply with some of the smartest people working on the same topics that I am throughout our company and, frankly, in the world. So that was valuable for me, obviously, because I value the experience of travel in general, but I was able to advance my own knowledge of sustainability and my own career skills by collaborating more closely with folks who I only ever get to see virtually otherwise. So that was a great opportunity.

I also have been afforded the opportunity to visit Capgemini’s campus at Les Fontaines outside of Paris a few times as part of our CSR program. It becomes this amazing melting pot of luminaries on CSR topics coming together from across the group to be co-located for a short period of time, but almost live, eat, and work together for several days, and really make some progress on these topics. So, a lot of great opportunities I’ve been afforded in that space.

How has Capgemini helped you get the future that you want?

Capgemini has enabled me to get the future I want by affording me the opportunity to work professionally on a topic that I personally am very passionate about – sustainability.

As a young consultant, I had a passion for sustainability, but I didn’t know how to pursue a career in this field. And Capgemini’s strong sustainability, CSR, and ERG program in general afforded me the opportunities to build a network and a skillset that was necessary to then transition into this career. And I don’t think I ever would’ve had that opportunity in another workplace.