Pénélope Laigo, FM Logistic’s Director of Sustainable Development and QHSE: “Sustainable development in logistics is not a pipe dream”

“The agility readily associated with the logistics sector is also reflected in the career paths of the people who work in it,” observes Pénélope Laigo, FM Logistic’s Director of Sustainable Development and QHSE (quality, hygiene, safety and environment). Nearly seven years after joining the transport and logistics group, Pénélope Laigo has in fact changed roles three times. “My first position was on the corporate Sustainable Development team, at international headquarters, where I helped implement an environmental strategy at group level and prepare the first non-financial reporting,” she explains. “The second was on the France Executive Committee, as Director of Sustainable Development and QHSE. At that point, I had the opportunity to take on a highly operational assignment at a site.” According to her, it was during this experience that she learned the most about the logistics world and the concrete implementation of CSR strategies. In 2023, she returned to corporate headquarters to take up her current role as Director of Sustainable Development and QHSE for all European countries where FM Logistic operates, as well as Brazil, India and Vietnam. “This professional mobility, which is particularly dynamic and enriching, seems to me to be a distinctive feature of the logistics sector,” she comments.

On a day-to-day basis, Pénélope Laigo ensures effective coordination among the various teams around the world on all CSR-related matters. “We must be ready for regulatory changes and market expectations. We must constantly challenge ourselves in order, for example, to find the right energy model for the company.” This role entails a great deal of management, but “it is essential to understand the teams’ challenges and to build good relationships,” she stresses. “In addition to internal communication, I also have an external representation role, taking part in conferences, training courses and information meetings to raise awareness of sustainable-development issues, as well as supporting our clients in greening their supply chains.” As part of the CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive), concerning companies’ disclosure of sustainability information, Pénélope Laigo must also ensure that everyone in the company understands what it is and why it is being done.

To work on sustainable-development issues, Pénélope Laigo initially considered pursuing an engineering degree before ultimately choosing an HEC preparatory program. This step enabled her to join a business school, where she developed her skills and interpersonal abilities, and then to join EY as a sustainable-development strategy expert. Still motivated to pursue a career that would allow her to have a social and environmental impact, she seized the opportunity to take action by joining a sector with significant potential for improvement in sustainable development: transport and logistics. “It is more interesting to try to help those for whom transformation is difficult than those who have already set everything in motion,” she says wryly, while noting that it is a sector that leaves no one indifferent. “You either love it or hate it, and once you start to like it, you quickly become addicted!”

Among her greatest professional achievements, apart from holding a Sustainable Development and QHSE management position at age 28, managing around one hundred people, is the company’s 2023 EVE Trophy (Voluntary Environmental Commitments) award for reducing CO2 emissions from its transport operations in France by 64 % as part of its commitment to the Ademe-supported Objectif CO2 program. “This award proves that sustainable development in logistics is not a pipe dream, and that it is still possible to do a great deal,” she says proudly. In the same vein, a program internally dubbed “Weight Watchers” reduced CO2 emissions from FM Logistic’s Scope 1 and 2 activities by 47 %. “We listed 75 actions to implement, then submitted them to our various sites around the world,” Pénélope Laigo explains. “The energy savings thus generated at the sites also enable us to finance the choice of green electricity for all our buildings.” She is so focused on the success of her industry and her company, “with genuine family values,” that she finds it difficult to speak of achievements other than collective ones. “In logistics, work is done as a team, and experience and the desire to do things well are more readily respected than degrees,” she says. “You can succeed regardless of your background or origins. The only thing to do is know how to seize opportunities and dare!”