The green ceiling for NRM careers in public service

Jesse Kenny and Natalie Osborne

Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 2025, vol. 68, issue 10, 2418-2437

Abstract: Actors involved in environmental decision-making bring personal values that extend into the professional sphere, to varied effect. NRM professionals are encouraged to set aside personal values in the workplace. Using semi-structured interviews, this research investigated how ecocentric values are contested in public service NRM in local government in South-East Queensland, Australia. Eight participants described challenges advocating from their disciplinary expertise, communication tactics they found necessary to find purchase within their organisations, and how they felt disciplinary contestations and their workplace identity affected their career. From personal accounts, we theorise and describe a ‘green ceiling’, acting as both a social barrier and structural force limiting the expression of ecocentric values and constrains the influence of those perceived to be ecocentric in public service NRM. The green ceiling presents a framework for understanding how NRM professionals who espouse ecocentric qualities, experience slowed career progress, low job security, career interruption and workplace grief.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/09640568.2024.2314170

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