Meet the Sustainability Team - Gemma Osaseyi

Learning lessons from the past

I grew up in a rural area of Co. Kilkenny that, as a child, seemed a million miles from city life.  Growing up in the 80s and 90s, when consumerism wasn’t the phenomenon that it is today, sustainable food practices were part of everyday life in the country.

I remember growing vegetables, smaller servings, and food scraps being given to animals such as our goats and chickens or alternatively ending up in the compost bin. However, my interest in sustainability really came to life during my career at Deloitte, where the interconnectedness between running efficient offices and benefitting the environment was evident.

Finding my purpose

My career with Deloitte has spanned over 18 years and I am very fortunate to have had the opportunity to develop my career here. After almost two decades, I  am still energised by what further impact we can make, not only in our organisation but in the Irish market.

After several years working in facilities administration, I was drawn to the area of health and safety as it aligned with my personal values in doing the right thing.  Over a period of time, that interest evolved to include environment management. 

I’m now a Senior Manager in the Real Estate and Workplace Solutions department, with responsibility for internal sustainability, workplace safety and business travel.

It is a really exciting time to be working in this area with both facilities and sustainability now top of the boardroom agenda. 

Setting the standard for sustainability

My sustainability role is to implement Deloitte’s WorldClimate strategy in Ireland, working with our COO, Head of Real Estate & Workplace Solutions and other function leads to embed sustainability into all aspects of our business. 

On a practical level, this involves managing our ISO14001 environment management system, collaborating with the Deloitte NSE WorldClimate team to progress our collective plan, and working with local learning and communications teams to raise awareness and engage our professionals on climate and sustainability topics.

One of my career highlights has been getting through my first ISO14001 recertification audit in 2013, after picking up the mantle a few months earlier with very little experience.  Looking back, accepting the challenge to take on the environment management system was the best professional decision I have made.

Challenging perceptions

I am continually inspired by a quote from Henry Ford: “Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty.  Anyone who keeps learning stays young.”

During the summer, after almost a decade away from structured learning, I nervously signed up for the University of Cambridge Institute of Sustainability Leadership (CISL) Business Sustainability Management course.  It was an intense content packed course over eight weeks and it definitely challenged some and solidified other perceptions I had around sustainability. 

The sustainability landscape is always changing, and it can be difficult to keep up with every change. However, with the current appetite for action among business, governments, regulators, academia and society, there is hope that through collective action, the global issue of climate change, will be truly addressed.  

Gemma’s vision for the future

The science is pretty clear when it comes to climate change and there were some positive commitments made during COP26.  In the coming years, I hope to see real action to solve major climate challenges. 

However, that action needs to be equitable with climate justice front and centre - not only between the Global North and Global South but, in Ireland, a programme that includes all parts of society and where businesses work collectively, without blame, to innovate and transition all industries to a low carbon economy.

Meet the others

We hope you enjoyed finding out a bit more about Gemma. Our sustainability team are here to help, so don’t hesitate to get in touch if you’d like to find out more. And if you want to meet the others, you can find out more about our team at the link on the right. We’ll introduce you to new people every month.