Highlights: TotalEnergies is celebrating its 100th anniversary in a context of widespread distrust of the French major. This double discourse is poorly received, particularly among the younger generation. Graduates of major business or engineering schools are increasing their actions and speaking out against the energy giant. For many of these young graduates, the expectations of their future employers also correspond to a quest for meaning.. 86% of students in these establishments are primarily looking for work in line with their values and that half of them would accept a job less well paid if it had meaning.

TotalEnergies is celebrating its 100th anniversary in a context of widespread mistrust of the French major which continues to invest massively in hydrocarbons, despite a communication…

“A desire to change things”: the distrust of graduates of grandes écoles towards TotalEnergies

TotalEnergies is celebrating its 100th anniversary in a context of widespread distrust of the French major which continues to invest massively in hydrocarbons, despite communication very focused on its ambition of carbon neutrality. This double discourse is poorly received, particularly among the younger generation. Thus, graduates of major business or engineering schools are increasing their actions and speaking out against the energy giant.

Greenpeace activists hold up a banner in front of the TotalEnergies headquarters, in the La Défense business district, west of Paris, on February 5, 2024. AFP - DIMITAR DILKOFF

By: Anne Verdaguer Follow

It was a little less than a year ago on the HEC campus in Jouy-en-Josas, near

Paris

. A group of students interrupts a round table in which representatives of TotalEnergies, Shell and Société Générale are participating.

For two years, actions of this type have multiplied in major schools. At their head, “forkers”, these young graduates who decide to get off the beaten track and choose careers compatible with their convictions. Victoria Constantini, a former student of Mines in Paris, was at the origin of an action against

the EACOP project in Uganda by TotalEnergies

. She explains that she wanted to get involved because she did not find it coherent to “

stay idly while there is a climate emergency

.”

TotalEnergies finances the programs of the Grandes Écoles

Launched with another student from the École des Ponts et Chaussées, Lucie Sarthre, the action brings together students from around fifteen major schools. For Victoria Constantini,

“Total finances the programs of many major schools and in exchange for this funding, the company requires a certain amount of publicity. This plays a role because we don’t want to let them do or say anything.”

She denounces in particular the double talk of the energy giant, which according to her

“spoils the public debate because the company gives false figures”

“For students from major scientific schools

,” she adds,

“it is unbearable because we cannot have a proper debate when the truth is not revealed.”

Quest for meaning...

Victoria is not an isolated case. And for many of these young graduates, the expectations of their future employers also correspond to a quest for meaning. This has been demonstrated in numerous studies including that of the Conference of Grandes Écoles in 2023 which estimates that 86% of students in these establishments are primarily looking for work in line with their values and that half of them would accept a job less well paid if it had meaning.

For Mathieu Mazières, director of studies at the École des Mines de Paris, the first shift took place at the beginning of the 2010s:

“More and more students moved towards small structures such as SMEs, PMIs and a few Years later, there was another shift with students seeking positions in companies in search of meaning with more environmentally friendly missions with a desire to change things

. A desire to act which also translates, according to Mathieu Mazières, into more and more requests to work in the public sector,

"they have the feeling and the awareness that there are also many things at stake in this level there

“A desire to change things”: the distrust of graduates of grandes écoles towards TotalEnergies

“A desire to change things”: the distrust of graduates of grandes écoles towards TotalEnergies

TotalEnergies finances the programs of the Grandes Écoles

Quest for meaning...

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