Global head of sustainability data advisory

Watershed; New York (NY); On-site; USD 180,000 - 280,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading sustainability platform is seeking a Global Head of Sustainability Data Advisory in New York. In this role, you will lead a team of over 30 professionals to drive meaningful climate action through effective advisory services. The ideal candidate will have over 10 years of experience in professional services, a strong background in carbon accounting, and a passion for developing teams. This role involves regular travel and collaboration with various business units to deliver excellence in sustainability consulting.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of success leading professional services teams in consulting or B2B SaaS.
• Expertise in carbon accounting and sustainability-related contexts.
• Experience managing both individual contributors and managers.
• Customer-obsessed with high-quality delivery
• Strong operator with data-driven, structured problem-solving
• Experience leveraging AI to drive efficiency and impact
• Exceptional written and verbal communication
• Able to work cross-functionally to improve alignment
• Ownership mentality and bias to action in high-growth environments

Responsibilities

• Lead and develop a high-performing Sustainability Data Advisory team.
• Drive business impact by ensuring quality advisory services.
• Design and optimize team operations for efficiency and scalability.
• Connect with other leaders to shape overall Services strategy.
• Foster cross-functional collaboration with Customer Success, Product, and Methodology
• Model Watershed’s operating principles and motivate a high-performance culture

Skills

Leadership

Carbon accounting expertise

Customer focus

Data-driven decision making

Strong communication

Cross-functional collaboration

Cross-functional collaboration

Communication

Operational excellence

Job description

About Watershed

Watershed is the enterprise sustainability platform. Companies like Airbnb, Carlyle Group, FedEx, Visa, and Dr. Martens use Watershed to manage climate and ESG data, produce audit-ready metrics for voluntary and regulatory reporting including CSRD, and drive real decarbonization. We are looking for team members who love product-building, want to work hard at a mission-oriented startup, and will collaborate with us in shaping the culture of a growing team.

We have offices in San Francisco, New York, London, Paris, Berlin, Sydney, Mexico City, and remote team members across the US and Europe. We hope that you'll be interested in joining us!

The role

Watershed is on a mission to drive meaningful climate action, and our Sustainability Advisory & Services organization plays a key role in enabling our customers to advance their sustainability programs. The Services organization includes four global teams that offer professional services to Watershed’s customers, including advisory on measurement, reporting, target-setting, and decarbonization. Together, these teams help Watershed’s customers to adopt, utilize, and extract value from the Watershed platform.

As our Global Head of Sustainability Data Advisory, you’ll lead the team that advises Watershed’s customers on how to complete rigorous and actionable measurements in Watershed’s platform. This includes scoping measurements, supporting emissions verifications, and providing specialized advisory to help customers optimize their data and methodologies. As a trusted advisor to some of the world’s largest and most influential companies, including Walmart, BlackRock, and Fedex, the Sustainability Data Advisory team helps customers set the foundation needed to reach their sustainability goals and achieve real reductions.

In this role, you will lead a globally distributed team of >30 full time employees including four managers. You will set the team’s strategy, drive operational excellence, develop talented team members, and build the systems and culture to help the team achieve new levels of impact in our next phase of growth.

This role is based in New York (preferred) or San Francisco, with regular travel (up to 15%) to our global offices.

You will…

• Lead and scale a high-performing team. You’ll coach and develop a talented team of managers, while also driving strong frontline execution.

• Drive business impact. You’ll ensure the team delivers top-quality advisory and services to Watershed’s customers, bringing technical depth and business value to every interaction.

• Drive operational excellence. You’ll design, implement, and optimize the team’s operations to improve quality, efficiency, and scalability. You’ll shape future organizational plans by assessing factors such as role specialization and geographic distribution.

• Shape Services strategy. You’ll own the strategy for the Sustainability Data Advisory team, and you’ll partner with the Head of Sustainability Advisory & Services, as well as other leaders, to shape our overall strategy for the Services business at Watershed.

• Foster deep cross-functional collaboration. You’ll work closely with Customer Success, Support, Product, and Methodology leadership to align strategies and execution.

• Embody and champion Watershed’s operating principles. You’ll lead by example, setting the tone for a high-performance, customer-obsessed, and mission-driven team.

You’re a great fit for this role if…

• You bring 10+ years of demonstrated success leading professional services teams, either in a consulting environment or within B2B SaaS

• You bring expertise in carbon accounting and sustainability-related topics, built through direct experience in the field.

• You’ve managed both ICs and managers, and you’re energized by coaching, hiring, and developing high-performing teams.

• You are customer-obsessed. You know how to set a high bar for quality customer delivery and help your teams to reach that bar.

• You're a strong operator with a bias toward data-driven decision-making, structured problem-solving, and building repeatable systems in high-growth environments. You have experience leveraging AI to drive efficiency and customer impact.

• You’re an exceptional written and verbal communicator, able to clearly articulate a vision, inspire confidence within your team, and influence cross-functional peers.

• You love working cross-functionally to improve alignment and unlock results.

• You’ll thrive in a high-growth, fast-paced environment; you bring an ownership mentality, intellectual curiosity, and a bias to action in everything that you do.

Must be willing to work from an office 4 days per week (except for remote roles)

Watershed has hub offices in San Francisco, New York, London, and Mexico City and satellite offices in Sydney, Paris, and Berlin. Where we have offices, employees are expected to be in office for 4 days per week. Certain jobs are open to being remote and will be specifically noted on the jobs page and in the job description if so.

What’s the interview process like?

It starts the same for every candidate: getting to know the team members through 1 to 2 conversations about Watershed, your experience, and your interests. Next steps can vary by role, but usual next steps are a skill or experience interview (e.g. a coding interview for an engineer, a portfolio review for a designer, deeper experience call for other roles) which leads to a virtual or in person interview panel. We prioritize transparency and lack of surprise throughout the process.

What if I need accommodations for my interview?

At Watershed, we are dedicated to ensuring an inclusive recruitment process. We provide reasonable accommodations for candidates with disabilities, long-term conditions, mental health needs, religious observances, neurodivergence, or pregnancy-related support requirements. If you need assistance during your process, please contact your recruiter.