Rachael has worked at Jaguar Land Rover for five years, starting her career in an operational role, where she was responsible for nine different sites’ waste streams. When she moved to the Corporate Sustainability role, her aim was to build a tool or framework to help transform the way our business manages and reduces waste.
After extensive research, Rachael and the team created a 14 step tool. “The idea was to make it as simple as possible, so anyone across the business in any department can pick it up and apply it,” says Rachael. “It’s not about having environmental knowledge, it’s about having drive and a determination to change something for the better. For me, circular economy is all about looking at a resource before it’s a thought in someone’s mind – it’s about preventing resource depletion.”
The team chose polyurethane as their sample waste stream, and after speaking to over 50 different companies, the ‘Waste to Wave’ project was born. “Waste to Wave was such an amazing project to showcase how the tool can be used to achieve zero waste, but in my mind we have to keep thinking about preventing resources being used in the first place”.
For Rachael, winning the 2018 Rising Star award was a complete shock, as she never expected it. “At the awards after I read about the other two nominees, I honestly never believed I would win – they were both really deserving. I am so grateful. I am so excited about the platform the award has given the tool. Since Innovista people from all areas of the business, all over the globe have contacted me about their projects, to get support and training. I’ve genuinely been passionate about the environment since I was a child, and everything I’ve done has been based around it. I feel like it’s going to really start happening now, and we’ll start changing the way we work!” she said.
