Date published: 04 February 2025
Emily Stockford (née Batchford), Stonewater’s Environmental and Sustainability Business Partner has joined the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) Futures Board meeting with new members for the first time at the end of January.
Having joined a graduate scheme, Emily has spent the last five years developing her career in sustainability. In her role, Emily sets the Customer Experience sustainability strategy, while ensuring that customers are engaged and involved in environmental goals.
As part of her appointment, she will work to help build on the four key foundations outlined by the CIH Futures Board: commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI), increasing membership, housing as a career of choice and building partnerships and relationships.
Aside from sustainability and protecting the environment, Emily’s other main passion is EDI. She chaired Spectrum, Stonewater’s LGBTQ+ forum, for three years. She sees the Futures Board as the perfect place to continue to develop improvements in both EDI and sustainability across the sector.
In addition to Spectrum, Stonewater recently launched an additional EDI initiative, People Like Me. The campaign was created to celebrate its diverse team members and recognise how they contribute to the organisations’ achievements. Personal stories, videos, blogs and thought leadership features will showcase the hard work and experiences of employees across a variety of teams at Stonewater.
Emily said: “The CIH Futures Board will be the perfect place to develop my impact on sustainability and EDI on a wider scale. Despite Stonewater being at the forefront of developments in both areas, we know we can’t change or improve things in isolation. This appointment will give me the opportunity to influence the wider housing sector by collaborating with like-minded people at the CIH and beyond.”
Adam Masters, Assistant Director, Environment & Sustainability at Stonewater, said: “Emily will be a fantastic addition to the CIH Futures Board and thoroughly deserves this recognition of her work. Here at Stonewater, she has shown real passion in her leadership of the sustainability agenda and desire to improve things for colleagues and customers, so I’ve no doubt she will be just as impactful in this new role. We wish her all the best and will support Emily and the work of the Board however we can.”