Amy Skoczlas Cole, Director Designate
Over the course of a 30-year career advancing sustainable business, Amy Skoczlas Cole has worked to reimagine the economic systems that provide sustainable food, clean energy, and strong communities. From executive positions across leading companies, non-profits, and foundations, she has helped hundreds of companies and organizations design and execute sustainability work that unlocks growth and profitability, accesses new markets, enhances productivity, and reduces shareholder risk.
Skoczlas Cole has pioneered novel solutions to harness the power of private sector innovation through data-driven insights. Most recently, she served as President of Intelligence and Influence at the Farm Journal, US agriculture’s leading business intelligence company. There, she led triple-digit growth by harnessing the company’s unparalleled agriculture data to create predictive products and services which bridge the gaps in the sustainable agricultural-food-energy supply chain. Along the way, she secured over $50M in federal grant funding, and created one of the largest and most diverse public-private partnerships in sustainable agriculture. While serving as the first global Head of Sustainability for eBay Inc., Skoczlas Cole launched multiple award-winning data-driven consumer nudge marketing campaigns that doubled consumer loyalty with the brand, including one of the first “preloved is better than new” campaigns with Patagonia. As Vice President, Sustainability for Pentair, a 100+ year old F500 manufacturing company, she uncovered growth in new sustainability markets based on rigorous analysis of global manufacturing macro trends.
Skoczlas Cole works frequently at the intersection of quantitative business analysis, human behavior, and change management. At Farm Journal, she pioneered the “Human Dimensions of Change” work with Farm Journal data, earning the company a Fast Company “Most Innovative Award” in 2024. As the Managing Director of a social impact enterprise at American Public Media Group, she successfully developed a novel approach to measurably changing American attitudes towards the natural resources upon which we all depend. Before joining APMG, she served as the founding Chair of the Sustainable Growth Coalition, a group of over 30 global businesses and organizations in Minnesota creating a roadmap for a profitable circular economy.
Skoczlas Cole started her career at Conservation International, where she forged some of the earliest collaborations between environmentalists and consumer goods companies – and saw firsthand that good business is good for business. Over the course of 13 years, Amy was a leader in CI’s efforts to design and build best environmental and social practices across key industrial sectors, including global agriculture, forestry, energy, mining, and the built environment. This work took her to threatened ecosystems around the world, from the cloud forests of Mexico to the savannahs of Africa and included three years living in Brazil while working with the forestry, agriculture and mining industries.
Skoczlas Cole a frequent speaker and presenter, and is the author of numerous articles and blog posts on regenerative ag, carbon markets, the science of behavioral change, and sustainable development, including co-editor of Footprints in the Jungle, published by Oxford University Press. Skoczlas Cole holds an MBA from George Washington University and a BA in public policy with a specialization in environment from Vanderbilt University.