Here's the Series 5 grand finale, featuring the best bits of the latest guests on ProGRESS, the podcast promoting green, ethical, sustainable and socially responsible careers.

The podcast was set up with the notion that listeners might like tips and ideas for how to follow in guests’ footsteps if they wanted to do something similar. As time has gone on, and 50 episodes in, it’s apparent that many of the guests have good human interest stories to tell about making a difference to the planet so win-win!

Everyone on the show has brought something special - and usually more than one single thing - to their episode, so here’s a round up of some, by no means all, of the best bits from Season 5.

Featuring:

Reena Mahajan

Connor Cashell

Matthew Payne

Dr Fernanda da Silva Tatley

Stuart Goldsmith

Matteo Menapace

Sarah Flynn

Johnathon Miller-McCall

Katie Goldsbrough

If you enjoy this little meander through some of Season 5 subscribe to the podcast wherever you usually listen so you don’t miss out.

And please share the link to the podcast, here on Acast, through or our webpage, LinkedIn group or wherever you usually listen.

Keep listening for more career insights. Season 6 will start dropping in September.

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible jobs, courses or activities and asks for real-world insights into the pathways and careers that led to them.

Subscribe and find out how they got there and how you can too.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

LinkedIn

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Drawn to both science and the arts when she was at school, Reena Mahajan’s studies and work took her to three continents. She studied architecture in New Delhi before moving to Paris to study urban planning and sustainable development. When she moved to Uruguay, she broadened her horizons and studies into gender responsive design and children-friendly planning.

Now a strong advocate for sustainable development, women’s mobility, social impact and gender equality – among other things – Reena founded Studio Divercity, with a mission to transform car-dominated urban areas into people-centric spaces. She recently set up StreetSmart, a digital platform that enables communities to reimagine their streets and environment, and she has joined the contributors to Lab of Thought, a Netherlands-based organisation set to transform urban environments.

So far so stellar – so what's next? She has some brilliant advice for anyone searching for values-led employment and says optimism comes from action, even if it's small.

Read more...

Mentioned in this podcast

Prof Dr Marco Te Brömmelstroet and the Lab of Thought

The Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo

Other episodes to listen to:

Sanjuktar Jithendar, Architect, Mikhail Riches S1 E9

Nick Molden, CEO and founder of Emissions Analytics S1 E4

Sarah Daly, Sustainability strategist, marketing professional, lobbyist, entrepreneur, thought-leader and visionary S3 E1

Divya Kumar, Community engagement manager at Earthwatch Europe S4 E4

David Kohnstamm, Chief sustainability officer and co-founder, Leafcloud S4 E3

Connor Cashell, Campaigns manager, Cycling UK S5 E5

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible jobs, courses or activities and asks for real-world insights into the pathways and careers that led to them.

Subscribe and find out how they got there and how you can too.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sarah Flynn is a career coach who works with purpose-led, empathic leaders making a difference to the world. In addition, Sarah teaches resilience for sustainability leaders on the Cambridge sustainability leaders masters.

Discussing her own squiggly career journey, Sarah explains how she felt when she discovered psychology as a teenager and then became inspired to study it in depth, thinking she’d work in clinical psychology.

She talks about moving to Italy to teach English as a foreign language, what led her into working in psychotherapy and how she became first a research psychologist and then a corporate career coach.

Listen in to hear Sarah's tips for developing a career in psychology, her co-authored book Climate Change Coaching: The Power of Connection to Create Climate Action, and how to introduce resilience and empowerment into life.

Mentioned in this podcast

Association of Sustainability Practitioners

Climate Change Coaches

Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL)

Ikigai

Books

Parenting out loud – Elliott Rae

Find your zone of genius – Laura Garnett

You might also like to listen to:

Shaheer Hafeez Director ESG strategy and climate risk KPMG S3 E2

Jonathan Mearns OBE careers coach, sustainability entrepreneur and adventurer S3 E9

Lydia Carrington Sustainability manager, Edgbaston cricket stadium S2 E1

Stuart Mabbutt Wildman environmental learning S3 E3

Dr Matthew C. Halteman Professor of philosophy S3 E10

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible jobs, courses or activities and asks for real-world insights into the pathways and careers that led to them.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When he was young Matteo Menapace spent many afternoons playing video games and learnt to code so he could hack his first game.

So how does a kid playing video games (with a Saturday job making pizzas) turn his hobby into a professional career that challenges people to think about the most pressing issues of the era, including climate change?

Listen to hear the philosophy and ethics behind serious games design, why you don’t need to have studied graphics, games design or even to have a degree to be a successful games designer and what Matteo does in a typical week.

Read more...

Mentioned in this podcast

Paolo Pedercini aka Molleindustria

Dr Chloe Germaine

Elizabeth Magie and the story of Monopoly

Goldsmiths University

Norwich University of the Arts

Matteo Menapace

Matteo's LinkedIn profile

You might also like to listen to:

Maddie Booth Sustainability consultant, educator and speaker S4 E6

David Kohnstamm Chief sustainability officer and co-founder of Leafcloud S4 E3

Rachel Warren Professor of global change and environmental biology S1 E7

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible jobs, courses or activities and asks for real-world insights into the pathways and careers that led to them.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Johnathon Miller-McCall grew up in South London, seemingly an unpromising location for wildlife observation and a career as a conservationist, science communicator and storyteller.

Yet, Johnathon reveals, there are more than 14,000 species in the city, and it’s one of the world’s largest urban forests – you just need to know where to look.

Now Johnathan wears three hats, working as a comms and engagement officer for Synchronicity Earth, as a presenter and content executive for Earth Minutes and creating content for his own feeds.

So how does a shy boy go from keeping his (slightly uncool) interests to himself at school to finding a course that suits his knowledge and satisfying his calling to spread a love of nature, especially when there was little guidance at school and nobody like him on television?

Johnathon explains how he forged his own career path as a nature nerd, rather than in finance, how he found a community at London Wildlife Trust (LWT) and what keeps him resilient.

Mentioned in this podcast

Synchronicity Earth

Earth Minutes

Natural History Museum Generation Hope

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan – 10 year water clean-up plan

London Wildlife Trust

Flock Together

Johnathon Miller-McCall Linktree (J Talks Nature)

Hamza Yassin Photography

You might also like to listen to:

Sarah Kessell, CEO of The Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales S1 E5

Stuart Mabbutt, Wildman environmental learning S3 E3

Divya Kumar, Community engagement manager, Earthwatch Europe S4 E4

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible jobs, courses or activities and asks for real-world insights into the pathways and careers that led to them.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Connor Cashell combines his socially responsible and ethical values with a push for sustainability and a job campaigning for Cycling UK.

After university Connor worked in Belgium where he facilitated meetings between European leaders and the people who really understood what was going on in exploited mining communities, particularly in South America.

From there, it wasn’t a huge step to move to Peru to work for a partner organisation, Grufides, among the people being affected by the mining.

When Connor returned to England, he found his role at Cycling UK, where he supports and connects campaigning groups seeking to improve cycle networks in the UK. That includes making cycling more child- and woman-friendly, improving cycle paths and lobbying for better cycling facilities, such as improved lighting and safer parking.

Connor shares good advice about avoiding overwhelm at university, and insights into how he found his role at Cycling UK – searching for an organisation that matched his values was key.

Mentioned in this podcast

Links

Cycling UK

My Ride. Our right.

CATAPA

Grufides

University of Sheffield

Charity Job (job board)

You might like to listen to:

Don Weatherbee CEO of RegenX Tech, S3 E7

Jo Faulkner-Harvey Head of income generation at Shakespeare Hospice S3 E5

Duncan Goose founder of Global Ethics and One Water S1 E10

Lydia Carrington Sustainability manager, Edgbaston cricket stadium S2 E1

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible jobs, courses or activities and asks for real-world insights into the pathways and careers that led to them.

Subscribe and find out how they got there and how you can too.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There's no doubt that Dr Fernanda da Silva Tatley's scientific career has been one of purpose. A medical molecular microbiologist, she’s researched tuberculosis (TB), listeria and cancer, working with Glaxo Wellcome, then enabled other researchers as an account manager for Roche Diagnostics.

Delve a little deeper and there’s a tale of a thwarted career however – she’d have liked to be an archaeologist but her father wanted her to go into medicine, so she compromised and studied sciences.

Alongside her career path, Fernanda has embraced many different experiences and roles, from Reiki Master and reconnective healing practitioner, to orienteer and photographic model.

The inspiration behind Fernanda’s business actually started in the 1980s and was parked.

Find out what took Fernanda so long to follow her dream, and why.

Listen out for Fernanda’s insights into managing parental expectations, changing career and why freeing your mind can open up a wealth of possibilities and opportunities.

Read more:

Mentioned in this podcast

Links

Azurlis

Anita Roddick (Wikipedia entry)

University of Otago, New Zealand

University of Cape Town, South Africa

You might also like to listen to:

Sarah Ashworth, Researcher developer at University of Manchester S1 E11

Dr Bushra Schuitemaker, Zoologist, microbiologist and award winning communicator S4 E2

Duncan Goose, Founder of Global Ethics and One Water S1 E10

Maddie Booth, Sustainability consultant, educator and speaker S4 E6

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible careers, courses and activities and asks for real-world insights into the paths and decisions that led to them.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Still in his early twenties Matthew Payne parked his career plans and degree course to work for a tech start-up to try, as he puts it, to fix the National Health Service.

Matthew was due to finish his final undergraduate year and had ticked all the boxes to make himself a good candidate for a well-paid traineeship in corporate law.

So what drives a person to work in a tech start-up facing such a tricky task – risky even if you believe in its products, the founders and can see that it might be going places?

The answer, in part, lies in Matthew’s strong ethical values, his sense of social responsibility and his push for sustainability.

With more than 1000+ GP practices in England signed up for Healthtech-1’s support, the firm is already making a difference and is looking to expand and improve its offerings.

Listen to the podcast to hear Matthew’s thoughts on taking on voluntary roles, the benefits of part-time work and of getting involved in new things at university. He runs through ideas for what might happen later in his career and emphasises the importance of getting young people's voices into the places that matter.

Mentioned in this podcast

Links

Healthtech-1

Sustainable Recruitment Alliance

Y Combinator

Science and Tech investment to ignite UK Growth

Do you need a degree to work in tech? (BBC)

Student Minds

Worcester University

Reading University

Other episodes you might like to listen to

Laura Yeates and Leora Schlasko – Sustainable recruitment alliance S1 E3

James Adeleke – Founder and CEO of Generation Success. Equality champion S4 E5

Maddie Booth – Sustainability consultant, educator and speaker S4 E6

Stuart Goldsmith – Climate comedian and podcaster S5 E2

About ProGRESS:

Host Sandra Kessell invites guests to discuss their pro- Green, Ethical, Sustainable and Socially responsible jobs, courses or activities and asks for real-world insights into the pathways and careers that led to them.

Subscribe and find out how they got there and how you can too.

Instagram: @progress_green_careers_podcast

Original content © Sandra Kessell

Original music © Lyze Kessell

Email: hello@mypro-gress.co.uk

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.