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Chat With Sustainability Champion

Chat with a Sustainability Champion

4 min
Posted: 01 June 2023
Kristina Zdrillic Siljedahl

Chatting with the champions

Sustainability Champion: Kristina Zdrilic Siljedahl

Travel is a key part of creating and maintaining your important connections. That’s why our Sustainability Champions play an important role in educating businesses on how their travellers and stakeholders can trot the globe in ways that are friendlier to Earth.

So, we sat down for a quick chat with one of Egencia’s Sustainability Champions, Kristina Zdrilic Siljedahl, to discuss how she helps our customers to reach their sustainability goals through sustainable business practices. After all, the planet works hard for us, so we all need to make sure we’re minimising our environmental impact while giving back and nurturing it as much as we can.

What’s your role at Egencia?

I am responsible for a number of global accounts in my portfolio, headquartered in EMEA. As Global AM we have the global commercial responsibility for the contract and are involved in many different topics besides the actual contract follow up. Some of these customers have bought ‘Extended Account management’ which means that some customers have contracted extra time for dedicated Account Management delivery.

And what’s involved in your role as Sustainability Champion?

As Sustainability Champion, I’m involved in writing the Egencia content for the Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reports for American Express Global Business Travel (Amex GBT) Group. Over the years I’ve also done a lot of educational sessions for sales, account management teams and customers.

I really enjoy presenting our sustainability offer in different customer meetings to inspire them to take the next step and teach them how to use our different solutions. Recently, I joined the Amex GBT *EcoVadis working group which means extensive work in different areas to maintain our current level of Platinum certification.

How do you support customers throughout their sustainability journey?

I’ve participated in many customer meetings over the years. It’s always exciting and inspiring to learn how far our customers have come and how we can support them in the best possible way. Some have just started their journey and need help to set goals, others are interested to learn more about our CO2 reporting and our great features. More recently we have customers wanting to discuss the fact that Amex GBT Group is submitting SBTi (Science Based Targets initiative) goals and how Egencia fits into the EcoVadis certificate.

And how do you help Egencia teams to encourage better behaviours?

I’ve created educational materials for our account management, sales and bid teams to help understand what we can offer as a company and how we can contribute as individuals. It’s important to include sustainability on the agenda in both internal and external meetings and walk the talk. For example, in Sweden we’ve done varied charity work for refugees, collected clothes/things for homeless people and cleaned up natural areas.

What’s your favourite sustainability feature that Egencia offers and why?

I think we have several different great features that I’m proud of. If I have to choose one, I’d say the ‘Carbon Offsetting' feature that we offer free of charge. The offsetting initiative from the company is displayed along the booking path and this solution leads to actual offsetting projects around the world with help from our partners.

 

You’re clearly an advocate for climate friendly travel, what inspired your interest in sustainability?

I was really inspired when I lived and worked close to the rainforest in Costa Rica.

How did you become a Sustainability Champion?

I’ve been passionate about sustainability for many years, so it feels natural to include sustainability in everything I do at work and outside work as well.

And finally, what’s your favourite sustainable travel tip?

To travel light and always carry a reusable bottle for water.

 

As corporate travel returns to your company’s business strategy, carbon emissions and a growing carbon footprint can be a concern as environmental sustainability programmes become more common. This has a direct impact on how leaders and shareholders embrace solutions that use renewable energy to retain a competitive advantage in tandem with sustainable development of climate change efforts and energy efficiency efforts for your corporate travel programme.

If you want to discover how Egencia can help your business with sustainability initiatives for a positive impact, visit our sustainability page now. Developing a corporate sustainability strategy is a great way for business leaders, CEOs and travellers to support sustainability efforts while modernising their business model and growing the bottom line.

*EcoVadis is the world’s most trusted provider of business sustainability ratings, intelligence and collaborative performance improvement tools for global supply chains. Backed by a powerful technology platform and a global team of domain experts, EcoVadis’ easy-to-use and actionable sustainability scorecards and metrics to provide detailed insight into environmental, social and ethical risks across 200+ purchasing categories and 175+ countries.

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