Drive Your Business Growth with a Green Skilled Workforce

Central London’s built environment sector is a major driver of the UK’s sustainability ambitions. Buildings are responsible for nearly 40% of global greenhouse gas emissions and 76% of emissions in London alone. Building retrofit is critical to our decarbonisation agenda, with 95% of emissions from the built environment over the next 30 years expected to come from existing buildings. Embracing sustainability not only makes sound business sense for the future but also brings significant advantages today.

The need for skilled workers is urgent; to achieve sustainability goals, an estimated 26,000 additional built environment workers will be needed in Greater London by 2026. However, the current workforce is neither sufficiently skilled nor expanding quickly enough to meet this demand. As an industry leader, your role in preparing your workforce for sustainability is sustainability is crucial.

This section provides insights and guidance on actively upskilling and reskilling your teams, and adopting a collaborative approach to training and recruitment. The time for action on green skills is now – and London needs sustainability leaders like you to play your crucial part.
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Drive Business Growth with a Green Skilled Workforce

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Unlocking Potential:
The Impact of Green Skills and Industry Adaptation

Top Six Essential Green Skills

Essential skills include carbon literacy, critical thinking, retrofitting, digital prowess, waste management, and ESG reporting.

Aging Workforce

Younger talent is desperately needed: with 19% of workers over 60, attracting younger talent is critical to addressing workforce shortages, while there is an opportunity to retrain and employ differently those willing to stay active longer.

The Sector Needs to Start Training its People

Only 52% of construction employers offer training, the lowest rate across industries, with only 48% of staff currently receiving training.

Reskilling Delivers Strong Financial Returns

McKinsey found that reskilling is profitable in 75% of cases, yet it’s rarely delivered systematically.

The Boost from Skills Action

Integrating digital tools increases productivity by 15% and reduces costs by 6%.

Investing in Apprenticeships to Close Skill Gaps

A 44% increase in apprenticeship starts is necessary to meet the current demand of work in London, providing vital training and career opportunities.

Adapting Skills for Sustainable Buildings:
Current Gaps and Future Needs

Current Skill Gaps and Future Needs in Sustainable Building

According to CITB, there are significant workforce shortages in construction: the total labour demand needed in commercial construction across Central London is 113,000 people. This represents more than 45% of the total construction labour demand in the 12 Central London boroughs (Haringey, Camden, Hackney, Islington, City of London, Westminster, Tower Hamlets, Kensington and Chelsea, Southwark, Lambeth, Wandsworth, Lewisham) area and over 27% of the construction demand in London.
We know that there are skills gaps across the built environment lifecycle. There is an annual demand of 16,320 non-construction professionals, technical, IT and other office-based staff in Central London.
Estimates of the three largest labour demands in 2023 for Central London’s commercial work are:
  1. Wood trades and interior fit-out trades: 10,900 people
  2. Electrical trades and installation trades: 8,100 people
  3. Plumbing and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning trades: 6,460 people
The sheer scale of skills gaps to decarbonise Central London’s offices demands immediate action from you and the wider sector, working in collaboration to recruit and train the talent we need.
Illustration of two professionals discussing sustainable building, with green certification icons and construction symbols in the background."

Adapting Roles and Skills for Green Building Innovations

In addition to existing skills gaps, the transition to sustainability is increasingly impacting certain roles that are becoming increasingly outdated, and will require upskilling or reskilling to meet the sustainability challenge:

Surveyors

Surveyors measure and map land, buildings, and construction sites, providing key data for exciting projects. Now, surveyors also train as retrofit coordinators, leading the charge in making homes and buildings greener. You’ll play a crucial role in upgrading properties with eco-friendly tech, reducing carbon footprints, and shaping a sustainable future. This career blends innovation with environmental impact—perfect for anyone wanting to make a real difference.
A career in electrical engineering within the built environment is key to creating sustainable, energy-efficient spaced. Electrical Engineers work on smart building systems, renewable energy integration, and eco-friendly power solutions that reduce carbon footprints. From energy-efficient lighting to electric vehicle charging stations, your work will help transform homes, offices, and cities into greener, smarter environments. If you’re passionate about technology and sustainability, electrical engineering in the built environment offers an exciting path to shaping a more eco-friendly future.
Roofers are essential to making buildings greener and more sustainable. As the construction industry shifts towards eco-friendly practices, roofers are adopting materials like solar tiles, green roofing systems, and reflective coatings to enhance energy efficiency. They also focus on reducing waste by using recyclable materials and ensuring proper insulation to lower energy consumption. Roofers can integrate renewable energy solutions, such as solar panels, and improve water management with rainwater harvesting systems. By embracing these sustainable methods, roofers help reduce carbon footprints, contribute to healthier cities, and lower long-term energy costs, aligning with the UK’s net-zero goals.
Sustainable architecture is no longer a nice-to have, it is a must-do. Architects must take a holistic approach to the building process, ensuring that sustainability is incorporated throughout the project. This includes, ensuring the use of regenerative and eco-friendly materials, eco-friendly energy use, and incorporation of plants and nature. Architects must not only craft buildings that are functional for clients, but they must also clearly inform clients what sustainable design work involves; the type of assessments and the frequency of them which often requires more than one assessment at the at end of a project stage, to really help inform the project’s design evolution.
Plumbers play a crucial role in ensuring the sustainability of a building. This is done by installing, maintaining, and repairing plumbing systems to conserve water and energy while reducing waste. To do this effectively, they must upskill their sustainability knowledge, to design, install and repair plumbing systems that meet the needs of a building and its occupants whilst reducing its environmental impact. Some emerging sustainable technologies and materials that will require additional training include water-efficient fixtures, Sustainable Pipe Insulation and Greywater systems.
Project Managers will be needed in both public and private sector buildings, delivering ‘decarbonisation’ and ‘transition to net zero’ projects, to ensure that they are delivered to the required timescales, are managed to the right specifications, and that budgets are met. This is an exciting career pathway, as opportunities for non-Construction project managers with transferable skillsets to work in the green sector will start to increase. Opening up new opportunities in the green construction sector will excite and attract PM’s from other sectors, who are motivated and committed to improving our climate – as it will give them the opportunity to work on projects they are truly passionate about.

Resources to Upgrade our Skills

Future Green Construction Jobs: skills and decent working conditions
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A comprehensive policy brief exploring the evolving landscape of green jobs in the construction sector,...
Every job is a sustainability job: what skills and knowledge are needed for the green transition?
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The UK Green Building Council presents its vision for the built environment, showing how every...
Green Careers Hub: Construction and the built environment
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An overview of how the greening of the built environment is changing all job roles...
UCEM – University College of Estate Management: Built Environment Careers
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The built environment has an incredibly diverse choice of career paths to offer, whether you’re...

Upskilling Your Workforce to Deliver Sustainability

Upskilling Your Workforce to Deliver Sustainability

  • 6 Steps to Invest in a Green Workforce for the Built Environment
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In today’s rapidly evolving market, integrating green skills into your workforce is crucial for achieving sustainability goals and staying ahead in the green built environment. This section outlines 6 essential steps for business leaders like you to incorporate these skills and transition towards sustainable practices. By following this guide, you’ll be equipped to drive meaningful change, enhance your team’s capabilities, and contribute to a more eco-friendly future.
01

Define Vision and Commitment

Ensure your business has a clear commitment to sustainability that informs all areas of work.
This commitment should be embedded in your company’s policies and processes to guide both internal and external operations.
02

Develop a Business Sustainability Strategy

Create an internal strategy for how your organisation will achieve its sustainability goals. This should include:
Staying updated with relevant regulations. Developing training programmes and upskilling opportunities focused on green skills. Continuously assessing and adapting strategies to keep pace with new sustainability challenges.
03

Provide Ongoing Green Skills Training

Implement a continuous training programme to ensure employees at all levels receive up-to-date training in essential green skills, such as waste management, energy efficiency, and understanding environmental regulations. This training should be adaptable to meet the changing needs of the business.
Ensure that both new employees and the existing workforce receive up-to-date training in green skills.
04

Incorporate Sustainability into Business Practices

Make sustainability part of your business’s day-to-day operations. From project planning to decision-making, ensure that green skills and knowledge are integrated into the core functions of the business, helping to drive a more sustainable approach at every level.
05

Focus on Both Green and Core Skills

Equip employees with a mix of green skills, alongside core skills such as communication and digital proficiency. This holistic approach will ensure your workforce is well-prepared to tackle the evolving demands of sustainability in the built environment.
06

Promote Diversity and Inclusion in Green Skills Development

Encourage diversity in your workforce to foster innovation.
A diverse environment can help your business find creative solutions to sustainability challenges while promoting inclusivity in green skills development.

Future Skyline Skills Commitment

Investing in the future of London's built environment workforce

The new Future Skyline Skills Commitment aims to encourage built environment employers to offer more employment and training opportunities for new entrants, including for young people aged 16-18+.
The Commitment will be self-monitored and will include three levels for businesses to opt into joining. The Skills for a Sustainable Skyline Taskforce is working at pace to encourage building clients and developers to give preferential supplier status to firms who sign up to the new commitment, in recognition of their work to recruit new entrants into the sector. The new ‘Future Skyline Skills Commitment will launch in September 2025 and will be hosted on the Hub when it goes live.
The new Future Skyline Skills Commitment aims to encourage built environment employers to offer more employment and training opportunities for new entrants, including for young people aged 16-18+.

To apply, please register your interest at:

Send Email
skillsforasustainableskyline@cityoflondon.gov.uk

Employer Testimonials

Impact of Green Skills and Sustainability

Stephen Cole, Senior Manager, London.

Stephen Cole, Senior Manager, London.

Construction is a significant contributor to carbon emissions in the UK.  We know that: 40% of UK...
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Shakirah Akinwale, Founder, Teqie

Shakirah Akinwale, Founder, Teqie

The Supply Chain Sustainability School’s recent UK Diversity Survey demonstrates the critical...
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Janey Douglas, Head of Sustainability for UK Capital Markets, JLL

Janey Douglas, Head of Sustainability for UK Capital Markets, JLL

For 9 years, I worked in JLL's capital markets team in Scotland, advising on commercial...
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Conor Storkey, Director of Sustainability, Brookfield Properties

Conor Storkey, Director of Sustainability, Brookfield Properties

“It’s impossible to reach Net Zero without a skilled, diverse workforce!” “One of our sector’s...
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Adapting Skills for Sustainable Buildings:
Current Gaps and Future Needs

Building owners are pivotal in driving sustainability within Central London’s commercial real estate sector, acting as catalysts for change. By meeting green building standards now, they can significantly reduce future costs associated with upcoming legislation. The UK’s green certifications provide clear frameworks to guide owners toward environmentally sound and cost-effective decisions.

Why join the ESG revolution?

01

Mounting costs from climate risks

including heatwaves, flooding, storms and droughts, are increasingly impacting urban areas – with big implications for building owners.
According to the non-domestic rating statistics produced by the Valuation Office Agency (2021), the 12 Central London boroughs (Haringey, Camden, Hackney, Islington, City of London, Westminster, Tower Hamlets, Kensington and Chelsea, Southwark, Lambeth, Wandsworth, Lewisham) account for 8.9% of all non-domestic premises in England. The rateable value of these premises’ totals £14,028,514,000, almost a quarter (22.0%) of the value of all such premises in England.

02

Rising demand for sustainable buildings

and spaces that support corporates’ low carbon goals and meet employees’ rising expectations will change lease markets at scale.
+11.6% Average rental premium for green-certified, office stock in London.
According to the non-domestic rating statistics produced by the Valuation Office Agency (2021), the 12 Central London boroughs (Haringey, Camden, Hackney, Islington, City of London, Westminster, Tower Hamlets, Kensington and Chelsea, Southwark, Lambeth, Wandsworth, Lewisham) account for 8.9% of all non-domestic premises in England. The rateable value of these premises’ totals £14,028,514,000, almost a quarter (22.0%) of the value of all such premises in England.
Across 20 major global office markets, only 34% of future demand for low carbon workspace will be met in the next several years, JLL research shows. In other words, for every 3 square meters of demand, only 1 square meter is in the current pipeline.
According to the Social Market Foundation, maximising social value in real estate can lead to a 5% uplift in the market value of an asset.
UKGBC research highlights that a flight to quality for ‘green’ high-spec office space is underway among many organisations. These buildings may see shorter marketing periods and stronger yields.

03

More restrictive finance and tougher regulation 

are coming down the line. Companies face more stringent building performance standards and corporate disclosure mandates.
From 1st April 2024, commercial buildings were required to achieve an energy rating of E, with an eventual target of them all rating C and B by 2027 and 2030 respectively. This currently puts 70 per cent of the commercial building stock at risk according to a recent report by Knight Frank and “to meet the target, the current retrofit rate will need to quadruple in the intervening years”.
As decarbonising operations and retrofitting buildings involves extended timescales, acting sooner rather than waiting for additional new UK regulations to be announced by the new Government will help companies stay ahead.

Case studies

What does best practice look like in business?

Explore all case studies

Making construction a great place to work: can flexible working help?

In a programme co-designed with Build UK, Timewise piloted flexible working in site-based teams at four leading construction firms. The results have proved that flexibility can be implemented successfully, despite the sector’s significant operational barriers.

Site-based construction work is a particularly tough nut to crack for flexible working. With its location-based work, inter-dependent team roles, and a long hours’ culture

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The National Retrofit Hub

The National Retrofit Hub (the Hub) is a nonprofit collaborative organisation working with the industry to enable the delivery of housing retrofit across the UK.

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The ESG Academy, a JLL sustainability training programme

The ESG Academy, run by JLL, provides sustainability training to help businesses meet environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards. The programme equips teams with the knowledge to integrate sustainability into projects and decision-making, ensuring that companies can meet their ESG commitments and reduce their environmental impact.

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Baily Garner’s Growing Our Own programme

Baily Garner’s “Growing Our Own” programme focuses on nurturing and developing young talent within the organisation. By investing in apprenticeships and supporting career development, the programme helps individuals achieve professional qualifications and build long-term careers. Over half of the firm’s equity partners began their careers with Baily Garner, illustrating the programme’s success in fostering talent and promoting career progression in

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Diversity and inclusivity

Become a Leader for Diversity and Inclusion in for Your Workforce

The built environment offers a range of accessible, rewarding and inclusive career opportunities with significant potential for growth. We encourage businesses to highlight these pathways to a broader audience. By tapping into a more diverse workforce, your business will find a diverse range of thought and skills needed to lead innovation and revenue.
Businesses can play a key role in showcasing role models, considering career changes, and supporting alternative entry routes such as apprenticeships, traineeships, and work placements. Together, we can build a more inclusive and dynamic future for the built environment.

Six in ten construction businesses found it difficult to fill vacancies in 2021, up from 30% in 2018.

750,000 construction workers will either be retired or on the verge of retirement in the next 15 years.

Only 8% of young people said they are very likely to consider Construction and the Built Environment as a future career.

In 2021, only 36% of construction employers funded or arranged any training for their workforce

Only 13% of the sector is made up of women, and 3.4% of construction managers are from ethnic minorities

In a 2019 survey of over 4,000 women in construction, nearly 75% said that they experienced gender-based discrimination. 

Graham Dundas, Chief Executive of Willmott Dixon

We are delighted to be named as one of the UK’s best companies for workplace equality. Enhancing diversity at Willmott Dixon is a long-held company value. Our future growth and success depend on recruiting the very best people from a wide pool of talent across all sections of society. Our drive towards achieving gender parity by 2030 across all management levels is an important element of this.
   
Therefore, appearing in The Times Top 50 Employers for Gender Equality provides a key benchmark for the progress we are making, as well as underlining our strong commitment that people from all backgrounds should enjoy a rewarding and successful career working for us, a ‘career of a lifetime’ as we refer to it.

Cathryn Greville, Head of Fairness, Inclusion and Respect at Supply Chain Sustainability School

The Supply Chain Sustainability School’s recent UK Diversity Survey demonstrates the critical importance of quality data in addressing equity, diversity and inclusion issues across the built environment sector.    
Without relevant data, organisations simply cannot identify, understand and address the real issues they face in their businesses and supply chains, and they cannot track the success of any initiatives put in place to make the workplace more inclusive and successful.

Paul Raby, Balfour Beatty Group HR Director

Becoming a truly diverse and inclusive company is one of Balfour Beatty’s greatest focus areas. Whilst we have made significant progress since we first introduced our strategy in 2018, we recognise that there is still more work to do.
   
Since then, the passion of our people has been instrumental in driving tangible change through focused action, spearheaded by our employee-led Affinity Networks. With our 2030 targets and a refreshed strategy, we will continue to work towards becoming a more inclusive and diverse organisation where everyone is supported to reach their full potential.

Janey Douglas, Head of Sustainability for UK Capital Markets, JLL

For 9 years, I worked in JLL’s capital markets team in Scotland, advising on commercial transactions. As sustainability became increasingly important to investors, I sought guidance from our business’s sustainability specialist teams and experts to provide the right advice.

   
Recognising the need for a dedicated role integrating sustainability and investment expertise, I expanded my knowledge by learning from colleagues, speaking to ESG experts, and staying attuned to client needs. In 2022, I transitioned into a specialist sustainability role within the capital markets team, advising clients on market trends, asset protection, leveraging opportunities, and integrating ESG in transactions ensuring each team has a specific ESG champion for tailored sector and geographic advice.

Andrea Ruckstuhl, Group Executive International, Lendlease

As a responsible business, Lendlease is deeply committed to fostering a sustainable and inclusive workplace. We believe that businesses have a responsibility to thrive while positively impacting the people and communities around them. This commitment is at the core of our operations. Our success depends on our ability to nurture a workforce equipped with the skills needed for today and tomorrow. We are dedicated to providing continuous learning and development opportunities, fostering innovation and ensuring our teams have access to the latest knowledge and capabilities, particularly in the context of the green transformation of the economy.
   
Our goal is to ensure that our actions today lay the foundation for a more sustainable and inclusive future. At Lendlease, we believe that by supporting both sustainable skills and fostering innovation and diverse talent, we can deliver lasting value—not only for our business but for society as a whole.

Resources to Develop your Diversity Practices

The Employer Standards for Careers Education
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The Employer Standards for Careers Education helps employers to align with schools and colleges around...
Supply Chain Sustainability School’s UK Diversity Survey
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The Sustainability Tool, in collaboration with the Supply Chain Sustainability School’s Fairness, Inclusion and Respect...
CITB’s Apprenticeship Toolkit
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Apprentices learn valuable skills and knowledge while they earn on the job, through a mix...
Emerging Talent Programme: Increasing ethnic diversity in the built environment
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Future of London is working with major employers in the public and private sector to...

General resources

Empowering Your Journey: Essential Resources

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Resources-Employers
UKGBC’s Commercial Playbook
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The Commercial Playbook includes guidelines to help Local Authorities drive up the sustainability of new...
City & Guilds’ Green skills and Sustainability
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City & Guilds are committed to playing our part in connecting the right people to...
Green Jobs Foundation’s ‘Green Jobs: State of the Nation’ report
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As the world strives towards net zero goals, education providers and businesses are prioritising the...
London South Bank University’s Net Zero Built Environment courses
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Net Zero Built Environment courses developed by London South Bank University and on-site assessment approaches...
Employers
Explore Our Glossary of Terms
The built environment can be confusing, especially with all the new words and phrases that come with sustainability and green skills. Our glossary is here to help.
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