New Book Release
Green Wisdom
A Guide for Anyone to Start, Engage and Energize a Sustainability Team
Featuring
ALASKA AIRLINES
INTERFACE
ALTER ECO
MOUNTAIN ROSE HERBS
BAGDER BALM
NEW RESOURCE BANK
BETTER WORLD BOOKS
NUTIVA
DR. BRONNER’S
SALESFORCE
GENENTECH
SELF-HELP CREDIT UNION

What can you do to inspire and lead a team to design regenerative strategies and systemic solutions – and also have a lot of fun?
Throughout the business world, Sustainability Teams are helping their companies make more than soaps, servers, and non-stop flights. With every dumpster dive, lunch and learn, community-powered river restoration project, and donated book, they are changing the way business works.
This book explores how more than ten companies have leveraged the work of their Sustainability Team and integrated the group’s initiatives into their operations. They provide leadership to their company’s ISO 14001 strategy, B Corp application process, or Global Reporting Initiative programs, building valuable brand awareness and tapping new corners of the market.
Sustainability Team leaders share their Green Wisdom—how their teams originated, how they embed their work into the corporate business model, how they re-inspire members when momentum decreases, and the best practices they use to promote team unity.
The leaders who compose the teams aren’t external consultants or Silicon Valley fixers. They are comprised of warehouse workers and flight attendants, CEOs and salespeople. The diversity of their roles matches the diversity of the problems that face them and the solutions they create.
Companies featured include Alaska Airlines, Alter Eco, B Corp, Badger Balm, Better World Books, Dr. Bronner’s, Genentech, Interface, New Resource Bank, Nutiva, Mountain Rose Herbs, Salesforce, and Self-Help Credit Union.
Green Wisdom: A Guide for Anyone to Start, Engage and Energize a Sustainability Team inspires sustainability leaders to do good, to create valuable and engaging initiatives for employees, and to show the same level of commitment to their company’s social and environmental values as they dedicate to making a profit.

Nikki Pava
My sustainability journey began 5,000 miles from home. While working for the Japan Times, I had the unique opportunity to live in major business hubs across the globe—Berlin, Bangkok, Dubai—and interview the CEOs and managing directors of some of the biggest companies in the world.
In each, I asked about their companies’ business model, their customers, and the next new exciting product they were launching. I also always asked about their companies’ social and environmental initiatives.
More often than not, my interviewee’s face would turn blank and a rapid shift in conversation topic was sure to follow.
Almost none of these industry leaders had made climate change awareness a legitimate factor of their business model or developed a “green” strategy for the future.
Knowing the monumental influence of business on people, cultures, and societies, I realized that the world was in need of a global transformation of “business as usual.”
In 2008, I completed a degree at the Presidio School of Management and earned an MBA in Sustainable Business. The year before I co-founded EcoTuesday, a national networking forum that facilitated vital connections and essential change in the business community. EcoTuesday hosted more than 300 events in 12 cities across the country and brought together hundreds of sustainability professionals, making a positive impact in each city.
Since then, I have had the honor to work with companies big and small, and I love working with businesses to start, engage, and energize their Sustainability Teams.
Please go to Alegria Partners for more information about my career highlights.
Alegria Partners Blog
Video blog posts featuring summaries of the interviews from leaders showcased in Green Wisdom:
Media
Published Articles
How Genentech, Badger Balm and Dr. Bronner’s use sustainability to improve their environment and company culture (Greenbiz)
Press
Network Your Way to a Thriving Green Business, Triple Pundit
How to Network Your Way to a Sustainable Consulting Business, Green Business Entrepreneurs
Top 10 Women of Sustainability, Cleantechies
Influential Women in Cleantech: Top 10 Women in Sustainability, Renewable Energy News
Influential Women in Cleantech: Top 10 Women in Sustainability, Renewable Energy News
EcoTuesday Uses Online Network to Forge In Person Links, Medill Reports
Interviews
Green is Good, Radio show
Business Adventures, Online radio show with Phil Cisneros
Rich, Hot & Green, Book profiling 50 women who are saving the planet, by Rebecca Harrell-Tickell
New Consciousness Entrepreneurs Network, Telesummit
Speaking
My customized programs cover topics such as:
- How an employee engagement program can impact your company
- Women’s leadership in sustainability
- Powerfully creating a vision for your sustainability team
- and more…
I am available to speak at your organization, workshop, conference or panel. See below for past speaking events.
The Sustainable Business Leaders Networking Forum – over 400 events in 5 years | EcoTuesday |
Envision Festival 2018 | Costa Rica | Harvard Undergraduate Women in Business Conference | Harvard University |
Speaker/Panelist, Women in Green Forum | Women in Green Forum |
The Secret to Creating a Vision to Fuel Your Work & Life/October 2013 | FEM Talks |
”When Leaders Have “A-ha” Moments and Change Their Paths” | Un Noche de Soluciones (Costa Rica) |
The Rise of Women in Sustainability | New Living Expo (San Francisco) |
“Women In Energy” | Connectivity Week |
Energy, Climate, and Sustainability: Going Green | San Francisco Small Business Week |
The Rise of Women in Sustainability | Women in Cleantech and Sustainability |
The Rise of Sustainable Business Practices & How Companies Can Embrace the Triple Bottom Line | San Francisco Chamber of Commerce |
Shifts In Your Mindset To Attract A Dream Career | The Big Shift Experience |
The Sustainable Business Leaders Networking Forum – over 400 events in 5 years | San Francisco Chamber of Commerce |
The Rise of Sustainable Business Practices & How Companies Can Embrace the Triple Bottom Line | San Francisco Small Business Association |
The benefits of networking and how social media can impact your business and career | 415 Mixer |
Greening Your Business Boot Camp | Women’s Initiative Conference |
Green The City | San Francisco Planning and Urban Research (SPUR) |
Let’s Connect
Contact me about media inquiries, speaking, guest lectures, or to discuss a discounted bulk purchase of Green Wisdom.
I look forward to talking with you!