“The peasant ecological transition in Lyon, it cannot only be engineers who become”
Wafae Kerzazi, a resident of Écully, near Lyon, chose to change her life, while her salary at the international consulting firm Accenture reached nearly 5,000 euros. At 38, she now accompanies “positive impact” projects in Lyon, in connection with ecological and social transition. And wants to show that there is not just one way to “fork”.
Wafae Kerzazi worked a third of her life at Accenture, a global consulting firm. At the height of her career, she pocketed nearly 5,000 euros per month, “excluding bonuses”, specifies this mother of two children, an infusion of raspberry-blackcurrant rooibos in her hand. But that period is behind her. Today, on her LinkedIn profile as in real life, Wafae presents herself as “artisan of the ecological and solidarity transition”.
What happened ? She makes an appointment at Sans Filtre, a tea room in downtown Écully, to talk about it.
“I have my habits there when I telework. And then I like the approach, they offer local and organic products”, she explains, apologizing for possibly passing for a “bobo”.
“The metro, work, sleep was quite realistic at the time”
When she and her husband moved to Écully in 2018, Wafae still worked for Accenture, where she started in 2006. With two children, the two parents dreamed of a larger surface area than the apartments allow. Paris and arriving in the Lyon region following a transfer of the spouse.
“The expression métro-boulot-dodo was quite realistic at the time. I worked a lot, in the evening until at least 8 p.m., with overtime. But I gradually felt that I was at the end of something, especially in 2016, when I returned from my second maternity leave. I am paid for a skills assessment. I felt less and less legitimate to earn so much money. It wasn’t real life. »
The conventional break finally arrives in July 2019.
“From then on, I no longer had any excuses for not getting involved. The interest in ecology had gained me little by little, first through the prism of consumption. The question of social justice was anchored from a very young age. »
Since his birth in Morocco, Wafae has been immersed in political discussions. Both of his parents are engaged on the left and belong to the middle class. His father, who died two years ago, was a union member and a member of the PPS, the Party of Progress and Socialism.
Their daughter gradually expresses the wish to come and study in France and finally arrives in Amiens for two years of scientific preparation. She will have the certainty of being hired by Accenture even before completing her course.
This is why Wafae evokes a “path of no choice”:
“A good student, good grades, preparation, a well-paid job… It’s as if at no time had I asked myself what I really wanted to do with my life. »
Training in Lyon to engage in the ecological transition
In Écully, she first became involved with the Imagineo education association, of which she became president. The ex-employee of Accenture also discovers the incubator of initiatives of Anciela, which acts for a more ecological and united society. During confinement, she follows the webinars of the Transitions Institute, a training organization co-founded by Anciela. This is where she calls herself bingo.
“I didn’t want a diploma course, rather to dig into different fields. On the title of a training course at the Transitions Institute, I found this expression, “path of no choice”. I thought to myself OK, we are talking about me. Especially since there was no selection, but exchanges with the managers to find out if it was the right format for me. I liked it. »
For a year, in parallel with his associative commitments, Wafae follows courses two days a week, like about fifty other people who will constitute the first class of the training institute. She pays for it 4800 euros.
And since last May, with training in hand and a new start in sight, she has been working for a new employer, Centsept, in accordance with his desire for change and his quest for meaning. Both an association and a “social innovation laboratory”, this place in the 7th arrondissement of Lyon supports various projects with positive impacts. As a new project manager, Wafae is moving forward on the subject of recycling professional clothing.
“Ecology is also very concrete subjects,” she explains with a sincere smile and undisguised joy. I can reuse some skills from my previous job. But it’s much more virtuous than what I was doing before. »
The ecological transition, a multitude of professions to invent
With this new job, his salary level takes a big hit, even if Wafae continues to earn more than the French median salary which is around 1800 euros net.
“Basically, I halved my salary. But when my partner and I moved, we already had in mind to live with less. In addition, I have evolved a lot in my consumption habits. Previously, at each promotion, I bought myself a big brand handbag. Today, it no longer interests me. »
From now on, the project manager mainly buys second-hand. For the holidays, her two children never ask for more than one gift, which makes her proud. But she wants to debunk a received idea, linked according to her to the imagination around punitive ecology.
“When you change jobs to become an actor or actress in the ecological transition, it is not necessarily to earn a minimum wage and overtime. There is real work to be done around desirability. Especially since there are plenty of jobs to imagine, we must give everyone the opportunity to create it. »
And to complete:
“The ecological transition cannot only be engineers who become farmers. And then, not everything has to be commercial. I want proof of this in my associative commitments, it is also a source of fulfilment. »
Not really optimistic about the ability of many countries to cope with the effort required to fight against climate change, Wafae nevertheless salutes “all these voices that are raised in sectors that make the capitalist system work in which one lives on”.
Latest examples, AgroParisTech students and their call to “desert” and “fork out” last May, seen millions of times, or more recently this HEC graduate (video to see below). So many possible ways to lead the ecological and social transition, wants to believe Wafae.