Well Gosh, it’s been a while.
Sometimes an absence is a sign that something has stopped, that someone has given up or that stuff just got hard.
Not this time!
I’ve been pretty busy lately with so many different things that sometimes felt unrelated but I always trust that the right path will become clearer in the end.
By the end of next week I’ll have completed the seventh module of the One Planet MBA, a journey that is proving to be incredibly challenging, amazingly inspirational and every bit as exciting as I hoped it would be.
I’ve learnt about Economics in a Sustainable World, Human Factors in a Sustainable Organisation, Leadership, Finance and Responsible Investment, Collaborating and Partnering and The Changing Business Environment already. Next week I’ll learn about Biomimicry, something that really excites me as I believe that this is an area that every organisation, every individual will be able to learn from.
See, here’s the thing.
We need to change. We individuals need to change. We business people need to change. We society members need to change.
We still work with outdated models, structured organisations that follow patterns we recognise and paths we have come to depend on. We’ve tied ourselves in knots with arrangements that have become so intertwined that to undo them is painful. But undo them we must.
Today I chaired a very exciting meeting for the Business to Business Group of the West Sussex Environment and Climate Change Board. Around the table were business leaders in water, renewables, food retail, transport and social enterprise all enabled by local government.
We are working together to consider how we can challenge the way things are. What’s really exciting is that we know that we’re not alone in that. Over the last few weeks I have met more and more groups of individuals all aiming for the same thing. The big question that keeps coming up is:
How?
We break it down into a myriad range of different versions, how do we influence, how do we justify, how do we make the business case, how do we make the change permanent?
The more I think about it, the more I network, the more I realise that there really is one answer.
Together. That’s how.
We need to stop looking for inspiration and start acting on the inspiration we already know is available. Take the bull by the horns and take one action today. Follow it up tomorrow with another. Maybe by the next day you’ll have become the inspiration and others will join you. Take another action. If they do the same, maybe more will join. Before you know it, you’ll not only have changed what you do but you’ll have influenced others too.
You and I are changemakers. If you aren’t already – well you can change that too!
It was Lao Tzu who said ‘every journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step’. Let’s start the journey.
Ghandi said ‘be the change you want to see in the world’. He wasn’t kidding you know.
I’ve always said if something’s difficult to do, it’s probably worth doing. This is about as difficult as it gets but boy, it’ll be worth all the effort in the end.
