Emily joined mySociety as the Delivery Manager for our Climate programme in 2021.

She says, “My role is to help ensure the Climate programme really delivers. Now is such a critical time for climate and people, and there’s huge potential for this area of work to make a difference.”

Over time, Emily’s had a wide range of roles across the voluntary sector, all with a focus on achieving societal change with environmental and community action — including project managing Friends of the Earth’s Clean Air Campaign. She’s also worked in local government chief executive offices, so is ideally placed for our work around councils and the climate.

She holds an MSc in Organisational Change and Development. “This gave me a good insight into delivering change across a range of cultures,” says Emily, who’s also spent time as a VSO volunteer in Zambia and working on organic farms.

And while she might have started off on a different path, her true vocation was clearly showing itself from the start: “My first degree was in Fine Art. I scraped my way to a pass, partly as I decided to focus on ecological art rather than painting…”

As well as working to save the environment, Emily likes to be out enjoying it. “I run (slowly). I love it. I’m rather proud to have stroked a boat to victory at Henley Women’s Regatta in 2010… I was lucky that it was a good strong boat!”

And if you’re wondering how she keeps an optimistic outlook in the face of the climate emergency, perhaps this is the answer: “I’ve had my life saved three times. My motto is now ‘this life is a gift’.”

Emily is fluent in: wisecracks, and juggling (“both literally and metaphorically!”).