Meet the torchbearers of sustainability leadership who have shaped edie 23
Our edie 23 Advisory Board is a forum of the most influential members of the edie community who meet, share ideas and experiences and advise on the shape of the event programme. Our Board members represent the key industries and job functions that this event is relevant for – from CEOs and Finance Directors to Sustainability Executives and Youth Activists.
Aliza Ayaz is a 23-year-old climate activist founder of Climate Action Society and the youngest member of the United Nations Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change.
Ayaz is fighting to correct the huge accessibility gap in climate change resources. Aliza helps the U.N. redirect attention to most up-to-date climate data and promising adaptation and mitigation solutions on the climate crisis.
Now practicing as a health and business consultant, Aliza is continuing to implement sustainability measures at fashion brands and corporates.
Andy is a Cofounder and Chief Community Officer at Seismic, a sustainability advisory that helps businesses to change society and fix our planet by being a force for good. Andy specialises in helping organisations accelerate their sustainability journeys and bringing communities together to generate real change. He worked as an internal corporate practitioner at Skype for many years, and now works as a trusted external impact advisor. Andy and the Seismic team have advised or partnered with a number of organisations in Europe and internationally including Patagonia, Ramborn, innocent drinks, IBA Group, Eckes Granini Group, NASA, PZ Cussons, TED, Pukka Herbs and JLL, amongst hundreds of others.
Christa has spent her career working in the marketing, tourism and sustainability industries for some of the world’s best brands including Heathrow and TUI, where she created award-winning content that positioned sustainability as a key marketing message for TUI UK, reaching 4.5 million holiday-makers in the process.
After many years in the tourism industry, in 2020 Crista joined Ecologi one year after their launch with a focus of scaling their marketing team and impact. Since its inception in 2019, Ecologi has planted over 50 million trees and avoided 2.2 million tonnes of carbon, with the aim to reduce half of the world’s emissions by 2040.
Crista holds a MSc in Responsible Tourism from Manchester Metropolitan University and is an alumni of Edie’s 30 Sustainability Leaders Under the age of 30.
Working with Enterprise and SME organisations across multiple sectors and specialist channels, David is a former Chief Sustainability Officer and was an original Board member of the Supply Chain Sustainability School. David also achieved the Queen’s Enterprise Award for Sustainable Development, and presented the benefits of responsible business to the UN in Geneva. Prior to Alcumus, he led Director and Executive roles in the technology, media, infrastructure and public sectors, founded an independent advisory practice and served for 20 years as a senior military officer. Supporting Edie for nearly 6 years, he has chaired panels and spoken at numerous events, produced blogs, videos and mentored rising stars in the sustainability profession.
James has led the Capgemini sustainability agenda since 2008 with the setting of the Group’s first carbon reduction targets. Since then, this focus has extended into the Group’s current global net zero program to reduce Capgemini’s environmental impacts in line with climate science, with targets to become a net zero business by 2040.
James also brought a client focus to Capgemini’s sustainability vision, establishing a target for the Group to help its clients with their sustainability and carbon reduction goals.
James has a doctorate in sustainability with Henley Business School and lectures on sustainability at a number of universities. He is a member of both the Environment Leadership Group at Business in the Community (BITC) and the Senior Advisor Network to the Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders at the World Economic Forum (WEF). A founder member of the edie Sustainability Leaders Club, he speaks regularly at industry conferences.
Jo Chidley is a circular economy expert, chemist, herbal botanist, and co-founder of Beauty Kitchen, the highest scoring B Corp in the UK beauty industry. Founded in 2014, Jo has set out to change the face of the beauty industry by creating the most effective, natural, and sustainable beauty products in the world.
Widely regarded as one of the pioneers of sustainable beauty, Jo is championing a Reuse Revolution through sustainable innovation by implementing Cradle to Cradle design into Beauty Kitchen’s circular approach. Among her achievements and award accolades, Jo has been instrumental in developing the world’s first closed-loop solution for beauty packaging and has powered the service behind the ground-breaking Re programme & Refill Stations. Thanks to her leadership, Beauty Kitchen is recognised on the UK’s 50 Most Disruptive Companies list and has won numerous industry awards, including ‘Who’s Who in Natural Beauty’.
Jon Khoo is the Head of Sustainability (EAAA) at Interface with a focus on sustainability, inclusive business and intrapreneurship. Jon specialises in the commercialisation of Interface’s sustainability initiatives and response to the current climate emergency, such as its mission Climate Take Back – to run its business in a way that reverses the effects of global warming.
Jon is also the host of the Designing With Climate In Mind podcast a series of interviews with experts taking an in-depth look into the ever-evolving world of sustainable design.
Jon currently serves on the trustee board of UK environmental charity, Surfers Against Sewage.
Katie looks after sustainability for WARP Snacks, the business behind the Eat Real and PROPER brands. Katie joined the WARP team in 2021 to set-up the sustainability function within the business to deliver on their sustainability targets. Previously, Katie spent 6.5 years in the sustainability team at innocent drinks, where she set-up innocent’s approach to social compliance auditing, spearheaded innocent’s first ‘good all round’ report and latterly led the business in their B Corp recertification.
Natalie Campbell is an award-winning social entrepreneur and broadcaster. She is Co-CEO of Belu Water, a drinks business that puts people and the environment first. Prior to this Natalie led on insight and innovation for The Royal Foundation and co-founded A Very Good Company (AVGC), a global social innovation agency that worked with brands (e.g. Virgin Media, Marks & Spencer, W Hotels and Channel 4) to embed purpose and sustainability practices. She is a strategic advisor to several fast growth businesses in finance, hospitality and consumer tech and holds a number of public appointments and non-executive positions related to leadership and inclusive economic growth.
Richard is a people centred leader of large teams, building a shared vision and creating conditions for people to reach their full potential.
He has over 35 years of experience in executive, non-executive and advisory positions across retail, construction, global supply chains and financial services.
Driven by the belief that Sustainable transformation and strong ESG delivers growth and value creation. He spent over thirty years with Marks and Spencer and Kingfisher in a broad range of commercial and transformation roles. Latterly as the Chief Sustainability Officer for both organisations he was the driving force behind their sustainability programmes globally (Plan A & Net Positive).
As the Chief Operating officer of mutual insurer Simplyhealth, he has delivered radical change and re-structuring and guided the business to carbon neutrality and ‘B-Corp’ certification.
He is an Associate Partner at the foundation LLP a customer lead growth consultancy, a contributor to Windsor leadership and Leaders Quest programmes.