Global Trends in Hospitality Sustainability Performance

Jeanne Varney serves as the Arthur Adler ’78 & Karen Adler ’78 Director of the Center for Real Estate and Finance and is a Senior Lecturer at the Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel Administration, Cornell University. Jeanne is based in the Properties Development and Management department, where she is responsible for the curriculum in Fundamentals of Hotel Development and Management, Hospitality Asset Management, Sustainable Development, and Introduction to Sustainable Tourism.

Jeanne has chaired/co-chaired multiple industry roundtables, chairs several Nolan internal committees, and has led multiple student industry competitions. She is a current member of the Hospitality Asset Manager Association (HAMA) Education Committee and an International Past President for NEWH, Inc.

Jeanne holds an MBA from The George Washington University and a B.S. in Hotel Administration from Cornell University.

Aaron Adalja is an Associate Professor of Applied Economics and Policy at the Cornell Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel Administration in the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business. Professor Adalja earned his Ph.D. in Agricultural and Resource Economics from the University of Maryland, College Park. His research interests cover a range of topics in food and agricultural economics, where he combines consumer theory, industrial organization, and marketing to tackle empirical questions in food labeling, food safety, marketing policy, and agri-food supply chain sustainability.

Before entering academe, Professor Adalja worked as a chef de partie at Per Se, the New York City flagship of the Thomas Keller Restaurant Group, an experience that catalyzed his passion for hospitality and food economics. He draws on this background to teach courses in the Nolan School’s Food and Beverage Management curriculum, enriching the classroom with practical insights from the restaurant industry.

Rehmaashini Jagarajan is a Senior Manager at Greenview with a primary role in data management and measurement, data platform enhancements, program development and implementation, and reporting and research services in the areas of corporate responsibility and sustainability. Rehma also sets up and manages the company’s related processes and data flows as well as team collaboration and productivity.

Rehma is an expert in processing, manipulating, analyzing, and interpreting large datasets to identify trends and patterns then communicating the findings efficiently. She leads the continuous development of Greenview’s sustainability data management system, its portal and data analytic tool, and its hotel footprinting tool, including their use with clients.

Rehma also performs benchmarking studies on sustainability programs, goals, disclosures, performance, and rankings. She leads two industry-led global data collection and benchmarking initiatives: the Cornell Hotel Sustainability Benchmarking Index (CHSB), published by Cornell’s School of Hospitality Research; and the Green Lodging Trends Report (GLTR), the global benchmarking study on sustainability best practices in hotels. In addition, Rehma is familiar with ESG reporting frameworks and leads the data workstreams.

Ying Xin Tan leads Greenview’s research and advisory work on ESG policy and trends, supporting hospitality clients’ compliance as regulatory expectations continue to evolve. Ying Xin’s work focuses on helping hotels benchmark sustainability performance, assess the adoption of sustainable practices, and understand how they compare against peers and competitors.

Ying Xin also supports clients in setting science-based emissions reduction targets in line with the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) framework. In addition, she facilitates industry-wide collaboration to develop shared sustainability criteria and aligned approaches.