Quebec Sustainable Workforce Initiative: Shaping a Financial Sector for Lasting Systemic Change

Quebec’s sustainable finance roadmap, which the government of Quebec had mandated Finance Montréal to develop, was drawn up with the aim of positioning Montreal as the leader in sustainable finance in North America. Notably, upskilling the workforce on ESG topics was identified as one of the key pillars of success and that’s when the Quebec Sustainable Workforce Initiative went to work—hard, but thoughtfully.

The Quebec Sustainable Workforce Initiative team began by defining their goals and identifying their target learners. Understanding what they wanted to teach and who they wanted to teach it to were key to the program’s success.

The team created a governance structure and a business model designed to most effectively get the tasks they’d set themselves done and their ambitious goals were ultimately reached in three projects.

Launched in 2021, Project 1 involved upskilling those entering the financial realm. Engaging students, recent graduates and professors was obviously an important aspect of this but people transitioning to new careers and recent immigrants also have a role to play in the new green economy. The project’s scope needed to include them as well.

Preparing university students studying business for the challenges of sustainable finance is crucial because it equips the future workforce with the knowledge and skills needed to integrate Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) considerations into financial decision-making. Initiating this new flow of workforce, providing a stream of graduates able to bring fresh perspectives and innovative approaches to ESG challenges, will help financial institutions accelerate their transition towards more sustainable practices. This fosters a culture of sustainability within the financial sector, driving faster and more effective adoption of sustainable finance principles.

By reducing barriers between universities and engaging professors, career advisors and other stakeholders the team was able to make the program available without delays and unnecessary red tape. Certainly, being open and welcoming to individuals who might otherwise not be able to afford programs that cost $1000+ and require 100+ hours of studying is part of what gives the program such promise.

Throughout, the program has relied on university professors and career advisors as well as student associations to help spread the word about this free program for students – word has spread fast and far. To date, 5 Quebec universities have educated 500 individuals about the value, the values, and the processes of sustainable finance.

Project 2, launched in 2022, aimed to upskill the existing financial workforce. After the consultation with 13 institutions in Quebec, the team identified the need to effectively onboard employees to sustainable finance across the organization. As a result, ED4S built modular training solutions that organizations such as Desjardins, National Bank, Promutuel, and Laurentian Bank have used to create a common language and align their employees when it comes to ESG and sustainability. This solution is also available for financial institutions globally and can be deployed in white label in English, French and Spanish, yet again demonstrating the Initiative’s scalability.

Upskilling SME leaders was the focus of Project 3, and the initiative includes a dozen other subject matter contributors and offers a one-stop shop for business leaders when it comes to their climate and transition capacity building and carbon footprint measurement. Here again, ED4S built a unique platform that is now administered by Finance Montreal and contains on-demand training as well as course registration for masterclass and climate leadership programs.

Collaboration has been crucial to getting all this work done right and done on time. ED4S brought their sustainable finance expertise, instructional design, and technology capabilities to design and build customized on-demand training programs suitable for a variety of stakeholders. Funding from Finance Montreal allowed the Quebec Sustainable Workforce Education Initiative to develop a French version of the courses, sponsor courses for future workforce and open the doors to financial institutions that have successfully deployed their training. Finance Montreal also brought together the ecosystem of local experts to take small and medium sized enterprises to the next level in their sustainability transition journey.

Keeping the training simple and accessible and designing it for visual learners is part of what’s behind this success, and all along the impact of the initiative has been carefully measured, showing impressive results. There has been outstanding learner feedback, earning the program an impressive 9.2/10 grade. As well, individual success stories of the program’s graduates championing sustainable finance in their organizations, demonstrating the initiative’s real-world impact, have made the whole thing even more worthwhile.

The Quebec Sustainable Workforce Initiative is proving that the right kind of education can take students, business, financial institutions and all of us beyond sustainability as a side project to embedded sustainability across the organization.