Freya Williams

“Was a concern with sustainability always paramount in your work and your life, or was there a moment when things shifted?”

 Freya Williams—author, activist, mother, consultant—has a storied professional career, from WPP to Ogilvy Earth, Edelman to Futerra. When I asked her the above, she didn’t hesitate.

 “It was 2006 and I was in upstate New York and I had my brand new child on my hip and I was in a grocery store and couldn’t find recycled toilet paper, and I realized in that moment that we had to do more to take care of the planet for the next generation.”

 After a degree from the University of Nottingham in the UK and a long sojourn in and out of the agency world, as well as publishing the well-received “Green Giants,” Freya Williams has authored a remarkable career (so far) in helping big corporates and non-profits alike put purpose and sustainability front and center in a way that drives progress and profits.

 A researcher at heart, she is precise with her insights, her framing, and her phrasing, and continues to show how language and approach can help shift minds and enable fractious parties to come to the table to find common ground.

 We sat down to talk about the importance of language, optimism (“The best antidote to anxiety is action”), and the common occurrence of parenthood shifting the sensibilities of the C-suite.