Environmental Professionals Radio (EPR)

Career development, Mentorship, and the Future of Environmental Careers with Kevin Doyle

July 15, 2022 Kevin Doyle Episode 75
Environmental Professionals Radio (EPR)
Career development, Mentorship, and the Future of Environmental Careers with Kevin Doyle
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

Welcome back to Environmental Professionals Radio, Connecting the Environmental Professionals Community Through Conversation, with your hosts Laura Thorne and Nic Frederick! 

On today’s episode, we talk with Kevin Doyle, Executive Director of Career and Professional Development at Yale School of the Environment about Career development, Mentorship, and the Future of Environmental Careers.   Read his full bio below.

Help us continue to create great content! If you’d like to sponsor a future episode hit the support podcast button or visit www.environmentalprofessionalsradio.com/sponsor-form 

Showtimes:
2:04  Nic & Laura talk about Getting the Most out of a Mentor Relationship
9:56  Interview with Kevin Doyle Starts
11:55  Mentorship
18:12 Career Development
27:13  Future of Environmental Careers

Please be sure to ✔️subscribe, ⭐rate and ✍review. 

This podcast is produced by the National Association of Environmental Professions (NAEP). Check out all the NAEP has to offer at NAEP.org.

Connect with Kevin Doyle at https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-doyle-98aa4820/

Guest Bio:
Kevin Doyle is Executive Director of the Office of Career and Professional Development, and a member of the leadership team at the Yale University School of the Environment (YSE), one of the world’s leading environmental graduate schools, with ten specializations and twenty Centers and Programs.

Before coming to YSE, Kevin was President of Green Economy, an independent environmental consultancy in Boston, from 2007-2019, serving dozens of public, private and nonprofit clients throughout the US and its territories, with a focus on coastal management, clean energy, and environmental workforce/professional development. He continues to serve as a professional development consultant for NOAA’s Coastal Management, Digital Coast Management, and Coral Reef Conservation Fellowship Programs.

Prior to 2007, he was National Director of Program Development for the former Environmental Careers Organization (ECO), a national nonprofit organization that organized and managed more than 12,000 employer-paid internships and fellowships, including a national Diversity Initiative paid internship program. 

Kevin is the co-author of four popular environmental career guides for Island Press in Washington, DC.

Music Credits
Intro: Givin Me Eyes by Grace Mesa
Outro: Never Ending Soul Groove by Mattijs Muller

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Transcripts are auto-transcribed

[Intro]

Nic 
Hello and welcome to EPR if your favorite environmental enthusiast Nic and Laura, on today's episode, Laura and I discuss getting the most out of a mentor relationship. We talk to Kevin Doyle about career development, mentorship and the future of environmental careers. And finally, rats laugh when they're tickled. Just like that, yeah. A tickled rat. Lets out tiny giggles that are too high for us to hear what scientists have actually measured their ultrasonic gear. The rats are particularly fond of their back and belly rubs. So keep that in mind next time hanging out with one. Oh man, I got it.

Laura  
I have no idea why that tickled me so much. I could just picture it and it was cute.

Nic
Alright. Let's hit that music.

[NAEP Event News]

Laura
Join the Pennsylvania Association of environmental professionals for a follow up from their February 2022 webinar. Vlad Odarchenko who is senior product manager for environmental and sustainability at ACT engineers will present sustainability 101 as part of the PA EP webinar series on implementing sustainability. The discussion will include opportunities to incorporate sustainable principles into various types of projects, how to initiate a sustainability program at the office and how to think and act sustainably and everything that we do. Register by July 22 at paep.org. We appreciate all of our sponsors and they work keep the show going. If you'd like to sponsor the show, please head on over to environmentalprofessionalsradio.com and check out the sponsor form for details. Let's get to our segment

[Nic & Laura Segment: Getting the Most out of a Mentor Relationship]

Nic 
One of the things we didn't talk about was the mentors can be people at different ages, different experience levels, different careers, different paths, doesn't have to necessarily be like your boss or your project manager or your boss's boss. You know, it's almost worth finding people who are in not completely different fields, but who are doing different things too because they can give you an outside perspective and you know, you can have more than one which is another thing we didn't really mention in the call so I don't know what your experiences with that but in my mind, you know and having someone who's younger as well, being a mentor is pretty neat. You can kind of get a better understanding of where things are and like where the future of things are gonna go when you're talking to people who are younger, who have different ideas, different ways of doing things.

Laura 
Yeah, I think the general consensus is that mentor-menteeship is on its way out and it's more mentor-mentor relationship. And that's really just seeing the value in each other so you don't have an OK Boomer who's just like I'm here to tell my knowledge on you. And the young person who's like you're outdated Dude, I don't care. We have to say you know but if you're both asking each other questions and interested in each other now I will say though from practical experience, it's usually a junior looking for help from someone with more experience. So there is you know, you can't totally discount that like someone is the mentee. Not all cases I have a peer mentor, my friend and I meet every single week, every two weeks so that we can just catch up on our goals and, you know, we mentor each other. And it's really awesome. So I highly recommend that for anybody.

Nic 
Yeah, and I think you know, getting to that younger, older relationship like what I tried to say to it is what you said where it's really more about understanding both people trying to understand each other, not just, Hey, young person. This is what I know. Write that down.

Laura
Yeah,

Nic
Because it is a relationship right? I mean, it's like you do treat it like you would any other relationships where it's you have to put time, energy and effort in and that goes both ways.

Laura 
That's the biggest thing with the mentors that you know, whoever would be the more senior mentor in the relationship. You got to show up. I have so many young people that I talked to, who have tried as a career coach in some of my other endeavors, it's my job to help people find mentors. And a lot of times they reach out and that person doesn't reply or they said they mentor me but then they haven't reached out and or they, you know, they, they cancel and you're just telling that person, they're not valuable to you and they're not important and that really can make them feel bad and it can turn them off to mentoring altogether. They're afraid to ask another person, because the way they've been treated. So, you know, for me, I'm always urging people to take their mentor role seriously, because it really impacts people in a way that you're maybe not even considering.

Nic
 
Yeah, I think there's always a good balance too between, you know, the men mentee the you know, whoever is in that basic role, you know, having some initiative, reaching out, or the Yeah, the mentor has to be engaged as well, it has they have to want to do that. You know, not everybody does. And so as long as you don't pretend that you want to do it, it should be fine. But yeah, you're totally right.

Laura 
I have been on the flip side, where someone has said, you know, I want you to be my mentor or been paired in an actual program and that person doesn't show up and you know it so it does go both ways. But as the more wise and experienced person, if my mentee doesn't show up. I don't care. Oh, a free hour for me. I mean I care but at the same point, it's like, I'm not gonna be hurt by it. But when I don't show up for a mentee, mentor relationship, I can be hurting the other person. So you do have to understand your role in that kind of a way. The other thing is I have a mentor. I have a mentee who is starting her own business. So she's like she is on it. She's like, can I ask you this? Can I ask you this? Can we have called can we catch up and she's just taking advantage of it. And that's totally fine. And I can say, you know, I don't have time or we can wait till next week. But that's what I don't see for most people in the mentee sort of position is just because they're always saying, Well, I don't want to bother you,

Nic
I know, I know.

Laura
it's just like, do it until I say no, do it. And then it's not my job again to tell her. She'll say, hey, what do you think about these logos? And I go, which one do you like best? Why do you like that one? You know, I'm not telling her what to do. I'm just saying. What do you think and letting her like, you know, spread her own wings. And figure out how to fly on her own

Nic 
Yeah, use her own brain? Yeah. Yeah. And I think you're approaching it in a way where it's not just this personal telling you what to do. It's just a really bad mentality to have because you don't learn anything from it. Neither one of you do, really. And so some things I used to do when I was younger, and then I've seen too is just be like, Okay, well tell me how to be better. And that's not a good it's not a good approach. It's not. Try to have some goals, try to have some actual tangible and you might not know what those are. So then, okay. First question you can ask, okay, I'm trying to figure out my goals. I'm trying to learn where I want to go. And you know, using a mentor has gone through those things. You know, it's like, Hey, you have to, you have to understand who you are as a person first, right? Like, what do you like to do? What are the things you enjoy? And when you're doing those things, your career path, your job, what you're passionate about, it's much easier because you're already lining up who you are with what you do. And so, you know, there's lots of stuff like that where like, even when you think you don't know, you can get to an answer. And you can probably do it on your own before you even talk to a mentor. You just have to you know, sit down from it.

Laura 
Yeah, your mentors, that's what they're for, to encourage you to validate your ideas to point you in the right direction. I think one of the other cautions in that, that I see an even see in myself, you have to recognize your own bias and your own judgment and not apply that to the other person's situation. So you know, the same student was a Senate in her college, and she was having a problem with another peer on the team. And again, I couldn't tell her what to do. I don't tell her what to say, tell her, you know, I'm not putting my what would I do on it? What's the best thing for you to do? Because I don't want her coming back to me and saying, Well, you told me to do this and it didn't work. I don't know your situation. I'm decades older than you. I can't even imagine what it's like today. Right? So I've learned from from listening and watching to her and I've been very proud of the decisions that she's made. But I've let her make them on her own. But I still you know, there's a way that she talks that I wouldn't talk professionally.

Nic
Right.

Laura
And I have all the urges in the world to say you shouldn't say that, or you should talk this way or you should and I'm like, Nope, don't do that. Don't do it. Like that's something she's gonna learn on our own. Now if she sends me something typed and asked me to review how to send us email, I'm certainly going to tell her how to make that look professional. But you know what I mean, like so in that's a self awareness thing that I think mentors also need to have is just when are you giving actual guidance? And when are you putting your own judgments on things that maybe don't matter?

Nic  
Yeah, exactly. And like the the world changes, right? Especially the more technologically advanced we get the faster things change. And so what was the norm what was the standard eventually does you know fades away and there's a new norm and new standard. So you have to be understanding of that because you know, there's a there's new new workers coming from a new with a new perspective on things and when they get in, you know, in charge of companies and making decisions, they'll make different ones. Yeah, so it's really good to have that mentality. Some would say you're pretty good at this thing, Laura, huh. That's pretty cool.

Laura 
I don't know. I think we're about to talk to one of my biggest fans, which is awesome.

Nic 
Let's get to it.

[Interview with Kevin Doyle Starts]

Laura 
Welcome back to EPR. Today, we have Kevin Doyle, Executive Director of the Office of Career and Professional Development at the Yale School of Environments on the show. Welcome, Kevin.

Kevin Doyle
Thanks, it's good to be here.

Laura
Awesome. It's really good to see you again. I wanted to start off right with a super fun fact because I think this is really cool. You were an undergraduate in the geography department at the University of Iowa in 1979. And you were the editorial assistant to Dr. And I'm not going to say this name right. name right, Raj, Rajagopal?

Kevin Doyle
You got it. Right.

Laura
Awesome. On the environmental professional, which was an official journal of the National Association of environmental professionals, and that was your first job. That's so cool.

Kevin Doyle 
It was amazing. And Dr. Rajagopal was an amazing mentor and introduced me to the National Association of Environmental Professionals and I've heard about it and talk to him about it other people ever since. So it was fantastic.

Laura 
Yeah, that's really awesome. I didn't know that. So when I saw that, it was like, wow, this is I'm so glad you're here with us. You did also mention though, that he was a mentor and that he picked you out of a number of other interns. So how did that come about? What made you stand out for him to make that choice?

Kevin Doyle 
So you have to ask him that, but I think if I can speak for him. I think what he mainly saw was just somebody who really wanted to learn, curiosity. I was a student who stuck around after class to ask for questions. I always wanted more office hours and you know like would trail him, No, no, no, I just have another question. And so I think he just felt like that curiosity was something that he wanted to reward and he had a graduate assistantship, and he was nice enough to offer it to an undergraduate. So it was good, so I didn't have to work in food services.

[Mentorship]


Laura  
Gotta love that. You're now on the other end of that where you're mentoring and doing a career advice and everything for other people. So how do you feel after all these years of experience and having been a mentee, people can be better, better mentors today?

Kevin Doyle 
So it's a really great question. And there's actually been an explosion of interest in even what the word mentor means. Mentoring shows up in things for at risk youth. Mentoring shows up in mental health programs, mentoring shows up in, you know, working with high school students. And so here at the Graduate School, the Yale School of Environment is only graduate school and no undergraduates. I think for us, mentoring means just a person who is interested and willing to provide assistance to another person based on what they think they want. I think, you know, the definition of bad mentoring is, I'm a wise person. And here we just sit at the feet of the master and learn from, you know, learn from me, you know, based on my experience, and as long as you just listen to my stories, you'll be well off. That's like the anti mentoring, you know, real mentoring is getting to know a person first to questions and, you know, inquiry and listening. And then finally saying, How can I help? And I think when when we hear back from our graduate students in their engagement with alumni, or people who work with them on a summer experience or classmates, that's what makes the definition of [13:37 unintelligible] good mentor. But that means that the mentee has a responsibility to know when they want to know what they want and for if a mentor is going to say, Listen, this is an open space. I'm asking you, How can I help? You need to know your answer? What do you need? And I think a lot of people who enter mentoring relationships as a mentee, I expect the mentor to fill that space. And so there's this moment when you kind of need to figure that out.

Laura 

Absolutely. 100%. I always say the mentors role is to listen first and then ask questions and the mentees role is to ask questions first and then listen. So it just sums up what you just said. So for any young persons listening, who are looking for mentors, what kind of questions should they be considering or thinking about asking?

Kevin Doyle 
So it's interesting, I think a lot of people who go looking for someone that they call a mentor, sort of send a blanket request out and then whoever first says, yes, that becomes you know, someone who's a mentor. I'd encourage people not to do that, to actually go after the person that you think will probably say no, because you know, oh my God, why would they want to help me? You know, they're so busy, etc. But that's exactly the person who's probably is the person you want to ask. But just don't use the word mentor too early. Will you be my mentor, well I don't even you. First of all, get to know each other a little bit. But if there's somebody who is showing up in the media or showing up in your life or showing up in your work as oh my god, if I could do what you're doing, I would really love that you seem to be walking a path. That's something like the path that I imagined for myself. That's the person. Reach out to them. Start a relationship with something small, you know, just a piece of advice. And then as Can I stay in touch with you and over time those are the kinds of people who can become true mentors. Those other people are just friends, allies, helpmates, etc. But they don't really rise to that level of mentorship. So pick the people that you think are walking the path that you want to walk, and all will be well in the end. Because even if they have to say no, they know somebody else who can serve that function.

Nic 
Yeah, I think I mean, it's absolutely great advice and I think I literally just said this yesterday. I'm like, I mean, if you don't know the person, that's okay. A lot of times, even someone who's super busy, enjoys giving back like a lot of people would love to be asked why they're How did you get to where you are, but like that first step is really hard, right? Like reaching out, the unknown. How can people kind of break that thought process it's a good thing to do, but how do people actually do it?

Kevin Doyle 
So one of the best and easiest ways to do it is to not do it yourself, but to ask for help on that step. So you probably know somebody, who knows somebody, who knows the person that you're eventually want to reach out to. And it's a reasonable assumption that just calling out to somebody blind on email, you're probably right. Follow that basic idea that probably you're correct that that's not going to get you that next step very quickly. So if you find somebody in that person's network, who can say, hey, you know, I know this younger person, and they're looking for an opportunity to learn from you. You know, I wonder if I could connect the two of you, you know, me, I'm not going to do that 4,000 times. You know, I'm not going to inundate you. I've picked this individual person out of the crowd, and hope that you might be able to spend some time with them. They will almost always say yes, in support of someone who is a friend. So you're, you're taking advantage of that relationship. Instead of trying to form one on your own with someone who is rightly very busy and has a lot of other things going on. So use their friends to make that connection.

[Career Development]

Nic  
That's perfect. But switching gears just a little bit here. You were also the president of the Green Economy. So what type of work did you do there with that company?

Kevin Doyle 
So I'm not doing that anymore. I formed my own consulting firm back in 2007. And I closed it down in 2019 to come and take this job at Yale. But when I was working in private practice, and I named my sole proprietorship, Green Economy, I worked in three different areas. I worked in coastal management in supporting coastal CCM programs, those are management programs and others. I worked in workforce development, you know, as a continuation of the work that I have been doing with universities working on, you know, helping people put together workforce development, how do we recruit talent, matching together universities with key employers, and then the third area that I worked in, which was also really a wonderful area is in the deployment of clean energies towards climate change mitigation. So clean energy deployment, coastal management, and workforce development. And when I closed it down, I made a list of all of my clients that I've worked with, and that's posted on my LinkedIn. So I had something like 50 clients by the time I was done, and it was hard to give up all the good and bad things about working for yourself, but in the end, I feel like working here at Yale is really the perfect capstone to a long career.

Nic 

What made you switch? What made you decide to give that up?

Kevin Doyle 
So I got recruited. I had done a job for the Yale School of the Environment as a external consultant. To come in to do a review of some of their programs. And at the end of that review, I as all good consultants do, I made a pitch I made my recommendations. And soon after that, I got a call which was something along the lines of hey, you talk a big game, you know, you seem to be you know, like, you really look at all that I know, here's some things that somebody else should do. Here's my recommendations. And they said, maybe if you're interested, maybe you could come and actually implement these recommendations because there's some changes here happening anyway. And I thought, You know what, I cannot turn my back on that challenge. So, here I am.

Nic 
So how did you get the initial budget to work them initially anyway, how did you get that piece?

Kevin Doyle  
So I think like all good sole proprietors, you learn very, very quickly. You know, when you first start out as a sole proprietor, you think that your content knowledge is going to be where you drive people to you, you know, like, you're going to be batting potential clients away like, Oh, I'm so busy, you know, but you learned within about 40 minutes that's not the case. It's exactly the opposite. You need to knock on doors, knock on doors. Hi. Do you need any help? You know, Hi is there anything I can do for you. You need to call on your existing clients, even if you only have three of them to say good things about you. You need to use all of that. I think about a third of the time on the sole proprietor is spent in marketing themselves. And so I knew some people through my previous work before 2007 throughout the higher education community and including some people at Yale and I just knocked on some doors and got a yes on that particular project.

Nic 
Heck yeah, that's great. Do you miss the marketing side or any other aspects of consulting?

Kevin Doyle 
I miss the work itself. I miss the final projects after you finally get a yes. Like, yes, we'd like you to write our strategic plan. Yes, we'd like you to lead a stakeholder engagement fascilitation. Yes, we'd like you to you know, do an examination of whether our efforts to recruit new people for our wind energy company are aligned with what people want. Yes, we'd like you to come to our university and give a talk in a leader week long workshop. I mistake what happens after the Yes, but I don't miss any of the rest of it. For me, sending invoices that never get paid. I don't miss any of that marketing, but the work itself and the ability to come in and help somebody as an independent consultant. And then have their say when you're leaving that, you know, thumbs up. Thank you so much. I really miss that.

Nic 
Yeah. So I mean, genuinely that's the work is really rewarding. Then it keeps you going, I guess for so long.

Kevin Doyle 
Yeah. The students here I think almost everyone in the world of higher education, career development, especially at the graduate level. The ones who decide that they really like it, almost to a person saying it's because of the students. Many of these students are going to be fine without somebody like me. They're really they're brilliant. They're hard working, they're passionate, they're curious. They're incredibly skilled. And so working with people like that every day on things like ecosystems management, biodiversity, climate change mitigation, business and the environment. ESG. Doing that every day. It's like a candy store. It's just a fantastic job. And I think my counterparts in places like Duke and Bryn and Michigan and Columbia would probably say the same thing.

Laura  
That's awesome. You can hear your passion for it and I know you've been doing careers, environmental careers for a long time. Literally wrote the book on it. Twice.

Kevin Doyle 
Exactly. Thank you.

Laura 
If you can, like after all these years and like you said most students will they'll figure something out. But what is maybe the top piece of advice or advice or one thing that rises up that you find yourself saying over and over again.

Kevin Doyle 
Thanks for that question, because it gives me a chance to say I had a feeling that you might ask a question sort of like that. So I really wanted to prepare to make sure that what I'm about to say doesn't come across as you know, oh, gassy rhetoric or follow your passion and you can do it, you know, etc. But I'm going to say exactly that. That if you care deeply about achieving an outcome in the world, hold on to that. Because ultimately, that's what employers really want. They want somebody who wants to solve problems, not diagnose them, not contribute to some granular assistance for it. But people who want to make an impact in the world through their work together with other people. And if you know what that thing is, if you know what that outcome in the world that you want to achieve is where you finally end up whether it's in the private sector, the public sector, the nonprofit sector, the academic sector, or what the job box is, whether it's called the analyst or program manager, or whatever, that's going to turn out over the course of a long career to be less, less important than whether you can measure the success of your work by the outcome for people in the environment. That's why we do this work, not to get a job, not to get advance not even although the money is very important. And we talk about that a lot that you know, own your desire for to make a living. We don't want you to sacrifice that part of yourself more than you need to. But really, when it comes to the end of that kind of obituary moment, what you're going to ask yourself is, did it make a difference? Did it matter? Can I say that because I was on the planet and I did this work, something got better for people, for ecosystems for wildlife conservation, for environmental protection. So that's my advice. Find out what that thing is you want to do that is an outcome and you'll be well.

Laura 
Love it. That's perfect. Okay, I think we're done here.

Nic 

We're gonna go do some stuff now.

[The Future of Environmental Careers]

Laura 
So Global Environmental Careers, that is a book that was published a long time ago and then republished, how did you come up with the idea for that and then make it come to life? That's kind of a big deal.

Kevin Doyle 

Yeah, so it was not my idea. But you know, I like to believe that my contribution to it was you know, a significant one. So years ago, I was the National Director of program development done a national nonprofit that doesn't exist anymore was called the Environmental Careers organization. And we organized employer paid internships and fellowships for environmental college students around the country. We had offices all over the country. And so one of the things that we decided that we wanted to do environmental careers organization was also do things like conferences, workshops, and a book. So we approached Island Press in Washington, DC, which was a well known environmental press, and they liked the idea. And so as an organization, we created the first book, The Complete Guide to environmental careers, and then over the course of time, I inherited the management of that projects in my role as national director program development. And we produced a second one called, you know, appropriately, the New, Complete Guide to Environmental Careers and then we did several others. We did four in a row. And I think that it's probably time for another one. And I'm hopeful that if there is going to be another one through Island Press editorials, that I might be able to contribute to either ending it or producing it or at least contributing to add because it is definitely time in 2022 for a new Complete Guide to Environmental Careers.

Laura  
Yeah, things have changed a bit I think since the last one that came out.

Nic 

I'm going to steal the spotlight from wire for a second because I think that the lens to one of our questions later on, as well, but I think you're right, I think there is a really that's a good reason to start a new book now. But you know, where do you see because I think there's a lot of different stuff coming up and you know, wind energy is really starting to take off, PFAS/ PFOA stuff is starting to really get into the national spotlight. So what are you seeing is those possible future job trends within the environmental field?

Kevin Doyle 
So in keeping with the answer to the advice question, environmental careers are driven by four things. One of them, they're driven by the existing system. So for example, you know, you know, at the US Environmental Protection Agency, we have Office of Water, we have offices for toxics, for waste management, for air quality. And there's a National Park Service and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Army Corps etc. and so baked into the cake are the already existing regulations, systems, permitting, you know all of that. And that system needs to be staffed and managed etc. in its current responsibilities. So that's one place that environmental jobs and careers trends come from. So the second thing, the place they come from is people who want to go above and beyond the minimum. They want to go beyond whatever regulations requirements, you know, the permits. They want to say, how can we be better than the norm, better than the average better than the you know, the bar, that's the limit, and new jobs come out of that as well. And so one of the things I think happening, you know, in that second space, are things like, what's going to happen with environment, social and governance, with ESG? Is that going to be greenwashing? Is it going to be the new thing? Is it going to be a source of amazing advancement beyond the norm, or is it going to be something other than that? What about new definitions of sustainability? where's that going to come from? What about the decision we're going to make as a globe and if different organizations and countries and cities and counties about whether we're going to shift from a focus on climate change mitigation under kind of a despair idea towards you know, we're gonna give up we're gonna move forward adaptation only. Where's the balance between mitigation and adaptation? Where's that gonna go? So that's the second thing. So the third thing is we're new things come from is people who want to go even beyond that. They want to envision an entirely new system of what, a new system of capitalism, a new system of social democracies, an entirely new clean energy economy that goes beyond you know, the current structure and even the kind of first out of the box new ideas. Just totally transformational, you know, thinking. So that, as you can probably imagine is where a lot of people would like to find a job. Right? They're already could imagine that new transformation but as you can imagine, there's not burning jobs to do that, because the money isn't flowing to that. Yeah. And then finally, there's a fourth category that I think a lot of us in the environmental world are not engaged enough about. And that is transformation that comes only through transformations in technology. Technology sometimes makes things possible, that very quickly become something that could become a norm. If only the people who were environmental professionals could even begin to grasp what kind of technology can do for them. And so I think, for example, as we learn what drone technology could do for environmental assessment of environmental problems where they are, drones can do something so cheaply and so you know, quickly, that I think now we have availability to have data, that if only the first three parts of the system could know how to use that data, we can advance more quickly. So when I try to tell people it's that if those are the four drivers where jobs come from, and if you want to work in section number three, or section number four, you still need to get a job in section number one or section number two. So here's where all of that long story leads. You need to be able to live simultaneously in the world as it is, and be a change agent to make the world as it is move to the world that we need to be. You can't necessarily think you're going to be at a job to do what the world really needs, you know in this transformational future. So join the system, somewhere in the system sustainability offices, federal government agencies, state local nonprofits, you know, get into the game somewhere because those future needs are going to eventually end up on the task list of the current system. And if you're there instead of someone else, you can make that transformation happen more quickly.

Nic  
Yeah, I 100% agree with that. And I think having that, that institutional knowledge that's what you're gonna get from being in the system. You understand how the system works. It's almost like,

Kevin Doyle
Or how it doesn't work.

Nic
Yeah, exactly. And you can see the parts that work. You can see where there's been needs for improvement, and then you can go to that next spot. That's a really good, really good way of putting that. So of course, another seamless segue to another fun fact about you, you and your wife likes to sing in groups. So as someone who loves to sing randomly for no reason whatsoever, totally on board with this. So what kind of singing or songs do you guys do? Like what are the

Kevin Doyle 

Sorry, I don't know if I understand the question. Oh, my singing .

Nic
Yeah, you're singing. I should have sung this question.

Kevin Doyle
Both my wife and I, we love singing and We especially love group singing. There's something about joining other people in song that is just so uniquely human I mean, something happens when people sing together, and especially if they have a really good leader who knows how to help amateurs who did not have to audition and are not necessarily the best singers in the world. But knows what kind of things that can bring out. I think when people sing together, they just experienced joy. And hopefully the audience will come along with that. Even if the sound emerging from the stage is not always the most and melodious as you might expect. My wife, Deb Mapes, and I we love that.

Nic 
Yeah, so is it just sort of what are you singing? Is it just random stuff is it

Kevin Doyle  
We join based on what's available so they don't always say exactly the songs that we would choose for ourselves. But we've joined groups that are more pop music, folk music, Broadway show tunes, and we've also joined groups that are more about sacred music and music that's specifically written for choral amateur groups. We've been involved in the whole staff room.

Nic 
I guess it really is.

Laura
I mean, I don't know Nic, could you imagine you Lauren going out singing together?

Nic

No. We'd never do it. Not in a million,

Laura 
I mean, that's pretty special. I mean, me either like, no.

Nic 

I'd love to. I'm I'm ready to join this group right now. I'll do that. That's no problem.

Kevin Doyle 

Well, I can guarantee you that if you know, whatever geographic area you live in whatever city or region you live in, if you just go into Google and put group singing or corrals or choruses requires just a huge number are available everywhere. So here in southern Connecticut, there's a whole bunch of them.

Nic 
That's really fun. Do you have a song that kind of like, you looked at it and you were like, this? No, no, not this song. But then you just sang it. And you were like, Oh my gosh, I love this.

Kevin Doyle 
Yeah. So this one is not going to be a popularly available. I don't think you say a song title that people will go Oh, I heard that on the radio or you know whatever song called, Sing Gently. And we sang it in the in the shoreline chorale. You know, at our last concert, and at first, I didn't like it at all, but hearing a group of you know, tenors and basses and altos and sopranos singing together. It was beautiful.

Nic 
Yeah, that's the joy.

Kevin Doyle
Yeah, it's called Sing Gently.

Nic
Yeah, sing gently, that's the joy.

Laura 
How many of you are there?

Kevin Doyle  
What's that? How many in the group at any time, the group that when when Deb and I lived in the greater Boston area, which we lived in for a long, long time. We sang in a group that had 200 people in it, and our group that we have now is about 60.

Nic 
That's still that's a lot. Yeah. Yeah. Does that help you hide some of the let's say less talented?

Kevin Doyle 
Which I am. Yes, you can definitely the more voices there are the more you can assure that the overall quality of their sound will be you know, will be good. And those of us who are maybe a little off key are not hurt as well.

Nic 
It's brilliant.  It's a brilliant strategy. I love that. So do you guys do you have anything fun trips or anything environmentally fun you guys are doing for the summer, are planning for the future.

Kevin Doyle 
So unfortunately, actually, this is a sore spot right now because a bunch on people on my team here at you know, one retired one is leaving to take another job and one is on medical leave. So unfortunately, vacation time is not great this summer. However, Deb and I live in Old Saybrook, Connecticut, which is right on the Long Island shoreline and so we kind of live in a vacation town. So we're a 10 minute walk from our house to the Long Island Sound and to the beaches and so I have nothing to complain about. We, we live in vacation land.

Nic 
That's really great. So I mean, we're coming to close to the end of the show, and we always like to make sure that you know is there anything else you'd like to talk about that we didn't ask you?

Kevin Doyle 
I think the one thing I'd like to leave people with is this, is a moment of real self searching for the whole environmental professional community. And I know that it's a cliche to say we're at a turning point. Probably people said that in the 70s people. They said that in the 1890s. People always believe that this moment is different than the previous moments. You know, we need to make choices. But it just feels to me like our scientific knowledge of the speed and scale of activity for protecting natural ecosystems and for reversing the trends of global climate change require us to ask whether our current work or current systems or current structures or current organizations for environmental protections, many of which were set up, you know, 80 years ago, 50 years ago, 40 years ago, whether they're really up to the challenge, and if they're not, can we admit that and do something about it fast enough, and on a scale globally, that meets the challenge, or are we going to 10 years from now be just simply diagnosing what we lost? While we failed to ask ourselves that question. And I think universities like the major graduate schools like like the one here at Yale, we're trying to give our students or graduate students the space to prepare themselves for the jobs as they actually are. But to engage with the current leaders about this question, and I think the jury's out on whether we're going to meet the challenge. But I don't think there's anyone in the leadership of the environmental community that consulting firms and state and local and federal agencies and a global institutions like the UN and the World Bank, I don't think any of those people left to their own devices when the door is closed and they they don't have to be cheery bright for the for the cameras. I don't think there's any that are not seriously wondering. Will we do it? Will we meet the challenge? And I like to think the answer is yes. And I like to think especially that organizations like the National Association of Environmental Professionals are a forum for asking and answering that question.

Laura 
Yeah, good stuff. I think it's always good to have a call to action. Right? Okay, well, if anybody wants to chat with you about careers, or how to change the world, how do they get in touch with you?

Kevin Doyle 
So I think the best way is by email, as much as I love LinkedIn and my what, you know, 3700 people that are linked to the LinkedIn, I think direct email is probably easiest. I'm kevin.doyle@yale.edu.

Laura
Awesome. Thank you.

Kevin Doyle
Thank you. This has been great.

[Outro]

Nic 
That's our show. Thank you, Kevin, for joining us today. Please be sure to check us out each and every Friday. Don't forget to subscribe, rate and review. See you everybody.

Laura
Bye.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai


Nic & Laura Segment: Getting the Most out of a Mentor Relationship
Interview with Kevin Doyle Starts
Mentorship
Career Development
Future of Environmental Careers