Emily Hansroth
Nominated for: 30 Over 30 Award
Title: Director, Sustainability
Company: Lockheed Martin Corporation
Years in Profession: 18
Nominator: Heather Daniels, VP, Environment, Safety, Health and Sustainability, Lockheed Martin Corporation, leader/manager of Emily.
Tell us why this person deserves recognition for making a difference in the practice of EHS & Sustainability management. (500 words max.)*
Emily has dedicated her career, education and hobbies to making a difference for the environment and promoting sustainable practices. Emily has advanced from junior days in environmental consulting, taking on “dumpster diving” to assist her clients with pollution prevention opportunities, to her current role as Sustainability Director for Lockheed Martin where she is reshaping both our team and approach to the advancement of environmental, social and governance (ESG) programs. In between, she has stretched both herself and the organizations she served in the implementation of a wide array of EHS and sustainability programs. As she has assumed leadership roles of increasing responsibility, Emily maintains focus on the development, engagement and advancement of those she leads. Through her continued education and commitment to community action, Emily demonstrates the personal motivation behind the work she performs. Emily truly exemplifies a professional making a positive difference and, at Lockheed Martin, we are grateful for Emily’s contributions and leadership. As our Sustainability Director, Emily currently leads a broad team that brings together Lockheed Martin’s sustainability programs; environmental stewardship initiatives; monitoring of emerging regulatory issues; implementation of digital transformation-aligned common tools; and disclosures and reporting of our sustainability and EHS commitments and performance to public stakeholders.
During her 13-year career at Lockheed Martin, Emily developed her professional experience in the roles across environmental compliance, safety & health, climate change and ESG issues. Emily has extensive experience with sustainability and ESG strategy development, reporting, communications and outreach, research and data analysis and served as the lead for Lockheed Martin’s Sustainability Report and CDP climate change disclosures. She also led the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Management and ISO 14001 working groups of the International Aerospace Environmental Group (IAEG), an external industry organization focused on advancing innovative environmental solutions for the aerospace industry.
Emily has 18 years of experience in the fields of environmental compliance, environmental management systems, sustainability, and climate change. Emily started her career with URS Corporation, where she led remediation projects and environmental compliance assessment teams primarily supporting the Department of Defense.
A Maryland native, Emily attended Virginia Tech where she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Science. She also earned a Masters in Natural Resources from the Virginia Tech Center for Leadership in Global Sustainability. She is a committee member of the National Safety Council and held leadership roles within the IAEG. She promotes Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) in local schools through Girls Inc. and Junior Achievement.
Describe a situation or initiative where the nominee was directly responsible for a significant achievement and/or advancement in the practice of EHS & Sustainability management. Include metrics and KPIs if available. (500 words max.)*
Emily successfully led the EHS function through the completion of a major, multi-year digital transformation initiative of Lockheed Martin’s enterprise-wide environment, safety and health management information system. The objectives for this project included driving common processes to address functional compliance and risk management, reduce redundant systems, provide better enterprise and business area level visibility to critical EHS data and support talent development and continuity between employees working across various Lockheed Martin sites. The project was established with governance through common systems, consistent data definitions and corporate-level command media/policy.
Over the five year duration of this project, Emily led the team through the design, development, testing, implementation and user change management for 14 unique and integrated modules ranging from incident management and job hazard assessments to inspection, audit and environmental performance data tracking. The users for these tools span all five Lockheed Martin business areas and go beyond the EHS function. For example, all leaders have access to the platform to view and management incidents related to their employees or facilities and the Quality and Facilities function utilize the Inspections module to complete digitized, easy to access forms directly in the field. This eliminates the need to translate information from hand-written forms and creates more opportunity to synthesize the information collected to drive meaningful action and improvements where needed.
During the project, Emily also led the team through three full platform upgrades, all while continuing progress with the development of new tool functionality. This enabled the team to take advantage of the latest system capabilities and provide requested features to our employees quickly to address their needs.
As a result of this initiative, the team was able to retire more than 20 business area and site specific systems reducing cost to the business and driving efficiency. Emily delivered this project on time and within the original budget and project scope. Today, this centralized system helps employees manage more than 850 permits, 68 hazardous waste generators and 2,600+ job hazard assessments. Since inception, the toolset has facilitated 26,000+ compliance tasks, 28,000+ total inspections, 26,000+ incidents and over 35,500 corrective actions.
In your opinion, what are the predominant skills and attributes that directly contribute to the nominee’s effectiveness and success? (500 words max.)*
The combination of Emily’s passion and dedication to the EHS and Sustainability field coupled with her technical understanding of the subject makes her effective and successful in her career. She has a strong background, both educationally with a B.S. in Environmental Science and a M.S. in Leadership in Sustainability, as well as 18 years of practical experience ranging from remediation, environmental compliance, Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting, sustainability strategy, digital transformation and training, to EHS management systems development and implementation.
Emily approaches her work with a growth mindset where she seeks to act and lead with conviction and believes that her talents and skills, along with her team members and partners, can be constantly developed and enhanced. She demonstrates this by being open to new business models and embracing new business processes and approaches to drive agility and efficiency. Emily exudes positivity and generates a collaborative energy with her colleagues. She energizes her team and positions them for success.
EHS and Sustainability is more than a job to Emily, it is a way of life. Outside of work, she recently became a certified master naturalist and shares that knowledge within her community. With her family and friends, she strives to have a positive impact on the environment by giving experiences rather than gifts. Her fiancé even selected a sustainable diamond for her engagement ring because he knew that was important to her.
Share the ways this nominee has positively influenced you, both personally and professionally. You may also include reflections and quotes from others including executives, direct reports, colleagues, suppliers, and clients. (500 words max.)*
The following are a few testimonials gathered from Emily’s associates.
Emily has held a series of roles of increasing responsibility, starting as an individual contributor focused on sustainability reporting, communications and outreach, climate change, greenhouse gas accounting, research, and data analysis. She sought challenging opportunities to make a difference in the EHS organization and began to lead teams such as one focused on Learning Solutions. She then took on the more complex role in managing the Common Systems team, implementing our EHS data management system. Based on her outstanding accomplishments, innovative strategies, and collaborative abilities, she recently earned a directorship over the Sustainability, Advocacy and Common Systems team. Lockheed Martin has benefited from her talent and her ability to make a difference driving success! (colleague) Emily’s passion for sustainability and environmental conservation ripples through her team – it is clear that she is doing what she was meant to do, and that she will do all that she can to drive her team to be successful to protect people and the planet for future generations. (NGO partner)
I am proud to work for a leader like Emily who embodies the purpose of sustainability – from leading from the heart, to empowering her team and encouraging open and diverse dialogue with a spirit of true continuous improvement. (team member) Emily encourages her team to identify and implement programs to promote sustainable practices with outstanding results. One such effort was the Zero Waste Challenge, a corporate-wide contest for individuals and teams to be recognized for waste reduction ideas and projects that positively impact waste generated or recycling rate. All employees can vote for their favorite projects. This year, 34 submissions were received that have been shared broadly to maximize impact. To create employee engagement, Emily and her team sponsored a scavenger hunt during energy action month. This contest focused on reducing energy demand and waste. Each year, earth day provides opportunities for Emily and her team to engage with employees across the corporation. The Green Life Hacks project encouraged employees to submit ways they save energy and water to avoid waste at home or work. Over 75 ideas were shared employee use. (colleague)
Provide one or more examples of nominee’s commitment to environmental stewardship within their organization and/or the community. (500 words max.)*
Emily is a certified Maryland Master Naturalist and spends her free time volunteering to promote environmental conservation and awareness by leading guided canoe trips through the Parker’s Creek watershed adjacent to the Chesapeake Bay, collecting water and macroinvertebrate samples to measure water and ecosystem health, and promoting native plants through her work in the local Food Forest and leadership of the Southern Maryland Native Plant People group. She has been an active volunteer with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation for most of her life, beginning as a child, and shares her enthusiasm with her local community and coworkers. This year she coordinated her staff meeting at the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge with her entire Sustainability organization so they could see first-hand examples of how climate change is impacting the wetlands and coastal habitats of the Maryland Eastern Shore and understand the benefits of their corporate-sponsored project with The Nature Conservancy focused on protecting this habitat for the local communities and the critical Navy training activities that occur in this area. Emily is also working on a wildlife management project on her 150-acre property in West Virginia. She has partnered with the US Department of Agriculture to actively manage the property with the objective of promoting healthy habitat through forest management which includes targeted timbering, the removal of invasive plants, and the creation of meadows and corridors of native plantings to support wildlife migration, food sources and an overall more sustainable and integrated ecosystem.
Emily’s commitment to sustainability is evident in her personal life and that translates directly into the passion she brings to work every day.