The Importance of Sustainability Conversations in 2017
Happy New(-ish) Year from Terra Infirma!
I write this from a ward of Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infirmary after surgery on the little finger upon which I cleverly landed when out running/dancing-on-ice exactly a year ago. Not the most auspicious start to the year, but the enforced time out is giving me a chance to reflect on the last year or two and plan the year ahead.
One thing I have concluded is that our non-project delivery mechanisms often deliver much more value to our clients than the traditional consultancy project. A project is tightly defined and the client gets what they asked for. But in Sustainability it is often the stuff that people don’t know that they don’t know where major breakthroughs lie – those crucial issues take conversation to uncover, not phases and milestones and deliverables.
We have three main non-project delivery mechanisms (in increasing level of conversation richness):
- Green Academy: our annual series of 10 sustainability webinars – the additional free taster session – 17 Kick Ass Sustainability Ideas for 2017 is on 18 January if you’d like to give it a go.
- Corporate Sustainability Mastermind Group: a small Group of sustainability managers from leading organisations learning from each other through facilitated discussions.
- Coaching/Mentoring: One-to-one in depth sessions to tackle Sustainability problems.
But shameless plugs aside, with whom are you going to (or do you need to) have conversations about Sustainability in 2017? Is it everybody, or, more likely, key influencers? How will you start that conversation? What language will you use? What format will it take? And how will you work with the results?
And, as that last paragraph demonstrates, one of the best ways to kick off a conversation is with a question.
Here’s to a successful and more sustainable 2017, full of rich conversation!