Top 10 Women of Sustainability

In this second installment in our series on leading women in cleantech and sustainability sectors, we offer up our top picks for the sustainability sector. Quite often this category is dominated by women working in Corporate Social Responsibility, as it’s a sector where women have made great strides to gain leadership roles in the last few decades. However, for our series, we are saving those women of CSR for a later post. This let’s us focus more on those women doing unique sustainability work that might otherwise not be noticed. Stay tuned for our Women of CSR post, it’s not far behind!

1. Nikki Pava – Co-founder, Eco Tuesday & Founder of Alegria Partners

Nikki Pava is both the co-founder and president of EcoTuesday and part of the organization’s Ambassador team in San Francisco. EcoTuesday is a renowned networking event for sustainable business professionals that takes place every fourth Tuesday of the month in cities across the US. The organization’s 5-year anniversary celebration takes place on February 21st with special guest speaker Brian Black, president of the Sustainable Industries Magazine.

Most recently, Nikki launched Alegria Partners, an integrated marketing and sustainability consulting firm that helps to manage and grow businesses. Clients include Technology Forecasters, Blue Coat Systems, Maestro Conference and Greenopolis. As an independent consultant, Nikki has also worked in a strategic capacity with Williams-Sonoma on a project to decrease waste in their stores and played a key role in implementing Burning Man LLC’s five-year sustainability plan. She also helped Morrison & Forester (one of the country’s largest law firms) establish its Cleantech Practice Group. Nikki has an MBA in Sustainable Business from the Presidio School of Management and has worked in a strategic capacity with Fortune 500 companies, small- and medium-sized businesses, and non-profits to develop strategic plans and coordinate teams to reach specific and measurable goals.

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2. Elizabeth Sturcken – Director of Corporate Partnerships, Environmental Defense Fund

Elizabeth Sturcken is the Managing Director of the Corporate Partnerships program at the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). There she develops and implements joint projects with leading companies in order to create environmental change. Elizabeth currently works with Wal-Mart to create a broad environmental change in crucial areas of its business, including climate change, China, seafood, and packaging. Additionally, she has worked with FedEx to develop environmentally advanced heavy-duty delivery vehicles. With UPS she helped implement innovative changes in their express delivery packaging.

3. Karen Flanders – Senior North American Representative at Prince of Wales’s Business and Sustainability Programme

Karen Flanders is a Senior North American Representative at Prince of Wales’s Business and Sustainability Programme where she contributes to the organization’s mission to draw on world-leading research and networks of Cambridge University to help business leaders address the critical global challenges they face today. Karen is also a Senior Associate (Fellow) with the University of Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership (CPSL). In her 20 years of experience working on the sustainability field, both domestically and internationally, Karen has become an important member of several major corporations, NGOs and intergovernmental organizations.

Prior to joining CPSL and working with PWBSP, Karen served for eight years as the director of sustainability for the Coca Cola Company. Prior to that, she lead the European and global advocacy campaigns for WWF for 12 years. She is also part of the board of the Women’s Network for a Sustainable Future.

4. Bonnie Nixon – Executive Director, Sustainability Consortium

Formerly an executive with Hewlett Packard, Bonnie Nixon is known for her ability to inspire and serve as a catalyst for transformation in the field of sustainability and social and environmental responsibility. As Executive Director for The Sustainability Consortium (TSC), Bonnie is responsible for providing strategic direction and executing on the TSC’s bold vision for independent global product standards. TSC works to help set the standards and develop transparent methodologies, tools and strategies that will drive a new generation of products and supply networks that address environmental, social and economic imperatives. Some of the Board of Directors representatives are companies and organizations of the caliber of Arizona State University, the University of Arkansas, The Walt Disney Company, Wal-Mart, PepsiCo, Proctor & Gamble, Dell and more.

With her more than 25 years of experience in social and environmental responsibility for large corporations, Bonnie serves on many multi-industry consortiums, including global retailers, footwear and apparel, toy, pharmaceutical, chemical, automotive, consumer goods and mining. She is also the Board Chair for Sustainable Silicon Valley and Board Member of Blue Planet Network.

5. Marianna Grossman – Executive Director, Sustainable Silicon Valley

Marianna Grossman leads Sustainable Silicon Valley, who’s mission is to create a more sustainable future within the Valley by collaborating with local government agencies, businesses, and community organizations to identify and address the most pressing environmental issues of the area. Marianna’s goal is to catalyze innovation and action to produce economic value, while at the same protecting the environment. She brings more than 25 years of business and leadership experience with knowledge of climate change, sustainable technologies, Total Quality Systems and transformation management. All of this aims to create value for clients across the different sectors of the industry, including the entrepreneurship, computer hardware and software, semiconductors, automotive, educational and civic organizations. Marianna has also both developed and led training courses from executive to individual contributors on four continents. She is an expert in increasing revenues while at the same time taking advantage of both new market opportunities and improved use of energy.

6. Diane MacEachern – Author, Big Green Purse

Diane MacEachern is the founder & CEO of Big Green Purse, the award-winning environment-focused website. She is also the author of the best-selling book Big Green Purse: Use Your Spending Power to Create a Cleaner, Greener World as well as Save Our Planet: 750 Everyday Ways You Can Clean Up The Earth. She’s also a a regular commentator on Martha Stewart’s Whole Living radio program.

In addition to writing, Diane is a founding member of Green Moms Carnival, one of the most reputed green lifestyle blogging networks on the web. During her career, her main focus has been to empower consumers – especially women – to use their marketplace clout to protect the environment. Due to her passion in these endeavors, Diane has garnered a series of awards and recognitions, including the Best Green Website of the year 2007, being the finalist in the Books for a Better Life award 2008, being featured in the Top 100 Environmentalist Blogs from Design Sprout and much more.

Follow her on twitter here>>

7. Nina Simons – Founder, Bioneers

Nina Simons is a social entrepreneur, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of Bioneers, a national nonprofit that helps highlight, gather and disseminate breakthrough solutions to the most pressing environmental and social challenges. Nina’s life and work have been shaped by her passion for the natural world, women’s leadership, systems thinking, and the arts’ capacity to shape culture and consciousness.

Throughout her career, Nina has served as president of Seeds of Change and as director of strategic marketing for Odwalla, being instrumental to the success of each of these companies nationwide. Since beginning Bioneers in 1990, she and her partner and husband Kenny Ausubel have collaborated to grow the organization and its influence. Bioneers now reaches many millions through its annual conferences, satellite conference partners, award-winning radio series, broadcast and print media, interactive website and book series.

Nina Simons has also been vital in restoring the “feminine” to a balanced place in our culture. In 2006, she began offering Cultivating Women’s Leadership, a five-day intensive for diverse women with the passion and capacity to effect change in their communities. This intensive training emphasizes skillful collaboration across differences, and the creation of relationships and networks to cultivate leadership, build alliances and encourage mutual support.

Follow her on Twitter here>>

8. Pamela Gordon – Author, Lean and Green: Profit for Your Workplace and the Environment

Pamela J. Gordon is the President and Founder of Technology Forecasters Inc. (TFI), as well as being the Lead Consultant for TFI Supply Chain and TFI Environment. TFI is an organization that helps technology companies create more efficient supply chains while at the same time reducing their environmental impact. She specializes in sustainability and is a popular keynote speaker, having presented at high-tech conferences in Asia, Europe, and the Americas. Before founding TFI, Ms. Gordon was a senior analyst at McGraw Hill’s electronics industry market-research firm Gnostic Concepts Inc. She is also the author of the influential 2001 book, Lean and Green: Profit for Your Workplace and the Environment. It features 17 electronics companies from around the world and has been required reading at the University of California Haas School of Business.

On top of all of these achievements, Ms. Gordon has received the 2011 Sustainability Summit Community Award which was given in recognition of “the person who has most generously dedicated time and effort to support the development of a legacy of environmental stewardship in the [electronics] industry.”

9. Astrid Lindo – Co-founder, The Living Seed Company

A native of Colombia and raised in Miami Beach, Astrid Lindo always lived close to the earth. This led her early on to understand modern human’s disconnection with the natural world and contributed to her desire to found The Living Seed Company and inspire people to live more harmonious lives with their environments. The organization specializes in providing people with the best possible choices for food diversity.

With her formal training as an interior designer from the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City, she has also built a career as an ecological interior designer. Astrid holds a Certificate in Green Building and Permaculture, as well as an LEED accreditation. Her firm Astrid Design Studio supports more sustainable practices in the design field.

Follow her on Twitter here>>

10. Stacie Shepp – 2011 Executive Director, San Francisco Green Chamber of Commerce

In 2011, Stacie Shepp was the fearless leader the San Francisco Green Chamber of Commerce. The organization empowers businesses to achieve economic, environmental, and social sustainability. Members benefit from increased visibility, educational tools to improve operational performance, and extensive networking opportunities.

Stacie is also co-founder of Earthsite, a Digital Consultancy for Sustainable Brands that specializes in building web strategies, design and social media marketing campaigns that are sustainable and optimal. Stacie is a graduate of the Green MBA program at Dominican University of CA.

Article by Lisa Ann Pinkerton.

About the author:

Lisa Ann Pinkerton is founder of Women In Cleantech & Sustainability, a San Francisco Bay Area group dedicated to the advancement of women in various environmental and technology sectors. She is also Founder and President of Technica Communications, where she handles marketing and public relations strategies for cleantech and biotech companies. Lisa Ann is a former award-winning broadcast journalist who reported for National Public Radio, PBS Television, WPXI-NBC, American Public Media, and Free Speech TV.