Green job success story - from high tech to eco webtailer

Note: This article is part of the success in green jobs series I'll be publishing periodically. 

The primary reason I coach in the green jobs field and write this column is to clarify all the clutter surrounding the green jobs hype out there. I hear things like 'green jobs are hot' and that working in the green sector is your meal ticket to job security and growth in the recession we are living in.  Obviously, this is a bunch of hogwash to invoke a technical term.  However, there are glimmers of hope - people with real stories of perseverance, marketing, training, sweating and in some cases just being in the right place at the right time.  The point is that its real out there, things can happen if you believe in yourself and never give up.

Take Holly Hamner for example.

For the better part of 15 years, Holly rode the high tech wave (think 90s) of the sales and marketing roles in the Bay Area.  While the dot com boom was a consistently aggressive growth cycle, it pales in comparison to the abrupt crash and confusion the dot com bust provided.  In 2003, Holly had a real career decision to make - what now? Holly explains "At that point in time, I decided to reevaluate. I realized that I had zero passion for selling application servers to Fortune 500 companies. I was 35 and single with no kids and no mortgage. I started looking for a new career.

Holly put her passion before her pocketbook at that point and dove into multiple freelance opportunities, all with the end goal of doing something that makes her happy.  Holly's green experience began when she landed a role with an organics product manufacturer.  While the company itself did not survive, Holly knew that the organic products industry is where she was the most comfortable, the most driven and the happiest.

Evidently Karma was paying attention as the panic of unemployment did not last long.  One of Holly's customers was starting up an eco good web retail site called Nubius Organics.  Holly describes her strategy for getting a job at Nubius

"I was really impressed with her knowledge about environmental issues and her passion for her little company. I wanted to work for her, and I spent the next 6 months on a campaign to get a job at her company. I took her to lunch and called her, wanting to know when she'd be ready to hire me. Told her all the great things I could do for her company. I never let up. She finally took a chance on me and hired me to work the greenfestival in San Francisco in November 2008. We ended up coming home with over 700 hundred leads. She was very pleased. I started doing some other sales and marketing consulting work for her, attending more tradeshows and doing some graphics work. I was hired this past May"

Holly has been able to develop many strategic marketing initiatives for this young company.  She is able to rely on life experiences from her high tech days to the hard knocks of green startups in her role with Nubius.  Holly has lived through a 5 year process and endured a few company collapses to get to where she is in the green job world.  Her story is of course unique but some might say unique is what she is most qualified for.

To learn more about Nubius Organics visit www.nubiusorganics.com

If you have a green jobs success story I'd love to hear from you.  Send me an email at mark@greenmanalliance.com

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