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David Corsar: What is your day-to-day work in public governance and policy like?
Jessian Choy: At San Francisco Department of Environment (SFE), I co-create and implement policies and contracts for all our 29,000 city staff to buy less toxic, green products. Anyone can find product names, vendors, and use our policies and contract criteria at SFApproved.org, a site I co-created. We strive to create our policies to be innovative. I also redesigned GreenCitiesCalifornia.org where you can copy leading green policies and programs in plain english for your city or organization.
DC: What difference can graduates expect to make by working in careers in public governance and policy?
JC: Anyone can indulge their deepest, utopian fantasies in a career in government, especially in my field of sustainable purchasing. Everyday, you and your organization can choose to buy products and services that protect human and animal rights, our health and environment, and prevent corruption. Co-founding a student organization in 2001 was just one of ways I tried to apply pressure to institutions from the outside. But working inside an institution for years has led me to see many more opportunities for change that I'd never see from the outside..
DC: What advice can you provide to students/young professionals interested in pursuing a career in public governance and policy?
JC: Telling people why and how to do the right thing does not significantly change behavior. I learned the hard way. So I became obsessed with classes and books on the science of behavior change. In my talks, I share a checklist to help people create change. Here are two tips:
First address the root cause of whatever challenge you're working on. Ask six people (with different viewpoints) who’ve experienced the challenge, "What gets in the way?" Then ask them "why?" five times.
No one wakes up and says they can’t wait to hear about a boring, confusing government program. So if you work in government, don't sound like you're from the government. Sound conversational. And walk in the shoes of people you’re trying to target. Tell them you want to know what they really think. First, ask them to tell you anonymously via a survey or suggestion box regarding their barriers to completing your call-to-action. Then observe the user experience of six people in-person one-on-one. Invite them to complete your call-to-action via your program, website, social media posts or flyer, etc. What might make sense to you might not make sense to them. So ask them to say aloud what they really think each step of the way so you can understand their barriers.
DC: How do you view future career opportunities in this field?
JC: Many policies don’t prevent or address all the loopholes. So I see the need for jobs that can address that. First, you need to create policies that are legally binding (not resolutions) and enforceable.
Some laws are unenforceable, meaning the government has no way to enforce the law. For example, these are challenges facing all organizations I know that try to buy green. The world needs a more automated tech solution to reduce the time it takes for people like me to:
DC: How might certification as NWF EcoLeader make a difference to potential employers?
JC: In 2001, very few colleges had sustainability offices or permanently funded student groups to advocate for the campus to go green. I know from personal experience that NWF's leadership program helped me go from being extremely shy to co-founding the University of CA Santa Cruz Student Environmental Center (SEC) and recruiting dozens of students and advisors (campus staff, faculty, alumni). Before I started SEC, I never spoke in class, joined any clubs or started an organization.
DC: How might certification as NWF EcoLeader make a difference to potential employers?
JC: You can change your words to change our world. Here's what the experts say can help you create change:
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Click Here to Return to the Policy and Governance Career Sector Overview
Interviewee: Jessian Choy
Green Purchasing and Toxics Reduction Analyst
San Francisco Department of the Environment
Interviewer: David Corsar
David Corsar: What is your day-to-day work in public governance and policy like?
Jessian Choy: At San Francisco Department of Environment (SFE), I co-create and implement policies and contracts for all our 29,000 city staff to buy less toxic, green products. Anyone can find product names, vendors, and use our policies and contract criteria at SFApproved.org, a site I co-created. We strive to create our policies to be innovative. I also redesigned GreenCitiesCalifornia.org where you can copy leading green policies and programs in plain english for your city or organization.
DC: What difference can graduates expect to make by working in careers in public governance and policy?
JC: Anyone can indulge their deepest, utopian fantasies in a career in government, especially in my field of sustainable purchasing. Everyday, you and your organization can choose to buy products and services that protect human and animal rights, our health and environment, and prevent corruption. Co-founding a student organization in 2001 was just one of ways I tried to apply pressure to institutions from the outside. But working inside an institution for years has led me to see many more opportunities for change that I'd never see from the outside..
DC: What advice can you provide to students/young professionals interested in pursuing a career in public governance and policy?
JC: Telling people why and how to do the right thing does not significantly change behavior. I learned the hard way. So I became obsessed with classes and books on the science of behavior change. In my talks, I share a checklist to help people create change. Here are two tips:
First address the root cause of whatever challenge you're working on. Ask six people (with different viewpoints) who’ve experienced the challenge, "What gets in the way?" Then ask them "why?" five times.
No one wakes up and says they can’t wait to hear about a boring, confusing government program. So if you work in government, don't sound like you're from the government. Sound conversational. And walk in the shoes of people you’re trying to target. Tell them you want to know what they really think. First, ask them to tell you anonymously via a survey or suggestion box regarding their barriers to completing your call-to-action. Then observe the user experience of six people in-person one-on-one. Invite them to complete your call-to-action via your program, website, social media posts or flyer, etc. What might make sense to you might not make sense to them. So ask them to say aloud what they really think each step of the way so you can understand their barriers.
DC: How do you view future career opportunities in this field?
JC: Many policies don’t prevent or address all the loopholes. So I see the need for jobs that can address that. First, you need to create policies that are legally binding (not resolutions) and enforceable.
Some laws are unenforceable, meaning the government has no way to enforce the law. For example, these are challenges facing all organizations I know that try to buy green. The world needs a more automated tech solution to reduce the time it takes for people like me to:
- Manually verify green product claims throughout the supply chain. First on the ecolabel (e.g., Energy Star). Then on manufacturer and vendor websites. Sometimes ecolabels don’t ban some toxic chemicals. Or even when they do bans, they often do not test each product they certify to make sure it doesn’t have chemicals they banned. Some manufacturer and vendor websites often list products with green claims that are incorrect (says it's recycled when it's not) or meaningless (“plant-based,” “biodegradable”). There are laws saying products can’t be listed as biodegradable unless they are certified compostable. But manufacturers and contracted vendors list them anyway.
- Manually survey manufacturers to list product names that meet green specifications via Google Sheets. Buyers like my employer sometimes can’t just get product names from an ecolabel website for two reasons. First, sometimes we want to buy products that are greener than the ecolabels. Second, even if we just pick products certified by ecolabels, they don’t always list what customers want before I finalize policies or contracts. Customers want to see the total number of products, exact product names, images and prices. We don’t have the tools to efficiently survey all manufacturers for what could be hundreds of furniture product categories and thousands of product names that meet all our specs. And we can’t keep those product lists up to date.
- Steer staff to buy green in our finance system. I don’t know anyone who has a finance system or that successfully prevents vendors from selling products we banned in contracts..
DC: How might certification as NWF EcoLeader make a difference to potential employers?
JC: In 2001, very few colleges had sustainability offices or permanently funded student groups to advocate for the campus to go green. I know from personal experience that NWF's leadership program helped me go from being extremely shy to co-founding the University of CA Santa Cruz Student Environmental Center (SEC) and recruiting dozens of students and advisors (campus staff, faculty, alumni). Before I started SEC, I never spoke in class, joined any clubs or started an organization.
DC: How might certification as NWF EcoLeader make a difference to potential employers?
JC: I highly recommend an interdisciplinary major. I majored in legal studies so I could take classes in almost every major. More importantly, I learned the different lingo each field uses. Then I could better understand people from different disciplines. I only took about three environmental classes.
Run, don't walk to the most important trainings I think everyone should take as soon as they're born: diversity and inclusion, public speaking, behavior change, game theory, negotiation, design thinking and user experience, and political campaign management. You can create more change faster on any issue you care about if you take those classes. I summarize some of them in my blog.
I spent my two week vacation at a really intense American University campaign management class. I highly recommend it because you have to create a startup, manage a huge budget, and win. You can move up a lot faster in a political campaign than in other fields. You can be a volunteer one day. And then maybe in a bit of time, you can be a (highly paid) leader.
And I strongly recommend working on ballot measures. Unlike politicians that are unpredictable, ballot measures create policies that can't easily be changed. When I co-founded SEC and passed a campus ballot measure, I learned things that I didn’t learn in class or in internships. Internships are also a great way to learn. But you can learn different things when you create your own organization.
That said, if you intern with me at SFE on green purchasing or California Student Sustainability Coalition, I'll share even more secrets to help you get your dream job. And there'll be snacks!.
DC: Any closing words of wisdom?Run, don't walk to the most important trainings I think everyone should take as soon as they're born: diversity and inclusion, public speaking, behavior change, game theory, negotiation, design thinking and user experience, and political campaign management. You can create more change faster on any issue you care about if you take those classes. I summarize some of them in my blog.
I spent my two week vacation at a really intense American University campaign management class. I highly recommend it because you have to create a startup, manage a huge budget, and win. You can move up a lot faster in a political campaign than in other fields. You can be a volunteer one day. And then maybe in a bit of time, you can be a (highly paid) leader.
And I strongly recommend working on ballot measures. Unlike politicians that are unpredictable, ballot measures create policies that can't easily be changed. When I co-founded SEC and passed a campus ballot measure, I learned things that I didn’t learn in class or in internships. Internships are also a great way to learn. But you can learn different things when you create your own organization.
That said, if you intern with me at SFE on green purchasing or California Student Sustainability Coalition, I'll share even more secrets to help you get your dream job. And there'll be snacks!.
JC: You can change your words to change our world. Here's what the experts say can help you create change:
- Use the word “freedom” instead of “rights” or “regulation” (e.g., “freedom to have clean food, air and water")
- Don’t repeat your opponent’s words. It just put their ideas in your audience's minds.
- Use user-friendly words that can be understood by a third grader and create pictures in people’s minds (“biking” not “alternative transit,” “pollution like greenhouse gas emissions,” “poop to power” instead of biogas")
- Be inclusive. Instead of saying, “Hi guys! Please support my cause," say “Hi everyone, How would you all like to support each other’s causes?”
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Type
Interviews
Sector
Business and Purchasing
Category Career Center Resources
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