Change the Change

Change the Change,

a look at who and how we change (or not).

This article first appeared here at FMP&E Global Business Events Blog;

http://fmandproperty.wordpress.com/

 Who is it that wants to be a part of a “behavioural change program”? Not me. A lab rat maybe. How about some “employee engagement”? That sounds great doesn’t it? “Engaging with employees” like engaging with the enemy!

It may be that we do get some behavioural change by driving our program, no doubt a desirable outcome and a strategic objective achieved.

People are people and that’s all they can be. I know many that are sick and tired of going through yet another change management initiative. Without change there would be no change for sure, but how about we don’t change if that change would only actually do nothing to improve things? Just mess everyone around a bit.

My 96 year old mother in law said to me on hearing about another change strategy happening in my work place, “Change? I abhor change, even change for the better” and I sort of know what she means. How often looking back at any change program do we honestly believe that people truly did change and they actually now do anything different at all? Better to have concentrated on the good aspects of what goes on and evolve or squeeze out the bad and the poor practices in a way that people hardly even notice.

Take getting carbon reduction, energy saving, minimising our environmental impact systemic within an organisation through our beloved behavioural change program. All too often we depend on trying to establish a change program that people simply don’t feel comfortable with, or at least feel as though it may be desirable but there are far too many things to do first.

The CSR manager, the energy manager, the carbon manager all have a desperate job of balancing advisory and capacity building work on the one hand and watchdog work on the other. Truth is, many company directors, finance directors and indeed many company staff at all levels are particularly hostile to the concept of sustainable development and dogmatically defend the Thatcherite model of consumption driven economic growth, regardless of the costs that growth generates.

With tough economic times come tough decisions and matters like “sustainable development” become no more than environmentalism by another name. Climate change and policies to alleviate it increasingly are seen as distractions and a waste of time, money or both. Scepticism and denial take over. Climate change commentators keep their heads down, sustainability can only be presented as a cost saving and it better be pretty significant.

Here are the tough times and organisations look to sort through their data on a “confirmation basis” – the tendency to look for and find confirmatory evidence for pre-existing beliefs and ignore or dismiss the rest. Minimising environmental impact as a desirable outcome is relegated to the bottom division and can only be muttered quietly for fear of being mocked.

But wait. What about all those people whose behaviour we were trying to change? How did they all get ignored once the money got tight? It is in people that we have hope and in hope we have a way forward. People love to be involved and considered. Here are the changes that can happen imperceptivity. Talking, discussing, airing views and opinions. Giving arguments proper scrutiny to see how they stand up. Examine the evidence and consider its interpretation. Bring it all out into the light, share it and listen to how people respond and want to be apart of it. Share it, develop it, maintain the good bits, chuck out the bad. Talk by the water cooler, speak up in the meeting, ask what they all think and listen to what they say. Do all that and guess what? Change happened and behaviours improved and you didn’t even know it.

Truth Will Out, rather than Out With Truth!

Yes, yes after a little while I am back, and very pleased to have been goaded and pressed by many (yes actually, many) to put fingers to key board and continue this blog, thank you.
Much has been going on and I'd like to consider the state of climate change understanding and action. The last few months have seen two big and worrying events; the feeble conclusions of the Copenhagen summit and the severe undermining of opinion regarding the facts behind climate change by the revealing of clumsy, thoughtless and silly pieces of climate scientist's emails as well as ill considered. yet quoted "facts". regarding glacial melt by high ranking IPCC representatives.
You may have noticed then that it has all gone a bit quiet. Scientists and climate change commentators have kept their heads down, have shut up and clearly hope all the nasty deniers and sceptics and reporters go away and it will be alright in the end.
A rigorous appraisal of climate research is under way and scrutiny of results and conclusions is intense and merciless in it's thoroughness. Will this be enough? Will the scientists and advocates of action to mitigate climate change be able to rely on the gradual acceptance that there is a burning issue with global warming?
I am a sceptic, but not a denier. The two could not be more different. A climate sceptic examines specific claims one by one, carefully considers the evidence for each, and is willing to follow the facts where they lead.
A climate denier has a position staked out in advance, and sorts through the data employing "confirmation bias" - the tendency to look for and find confirmatory evidence for pre-existing beliefs and ignore or dismiss the rest. Denial is typically driven by ideology or religious belief, where the belief takes precedence over evidence. They will often see themselves as underdogs fighting a corrupt elite.
No wonder it's all gone quiet out there.
Denialist movements can be beaten. Patient rebuttal is a powerful weapon. Let them be heard, examine their evidence, consider their interpretation. If they have anything of substance to say, then the truth will out.
Climate deniers wield considerable influence. There are many for whom it would be most beneficial for evidence of climate change, and especially "man made" climate change, to be wrong.
Eternal vigilance is the price we must pay for truth. Those who are in possession of the facts have a duty to stand up to the deniers and debunk them repeatedly and everywhere until they can take a proper sceptical view of the evidence and then I would think an acceptance following their scrutiny of the evidence..
We must consider the following;
1. They might be right and we should subject their arguments to proper scrutiny and if they stand up then they are likely to be correct.
2. They might be completely wrong, but in the process of examining their claims we discover the truth and improve our thinking.
3. It is never possible to know the absolute truth about anything (not in science anyway)so we must always be on the alert for where our ideas need to change.
I continue to read up and discover whatever I can about global warming and man's influence of natural systems. I remain convinced that we are at a great time of change for mankind and that decisions taken now can have massive repercussions for our children, preferably for their good and the good of all living things.

Dust to Dust

Scrapping the scrappage scheme for cars... well, letting it fizzle away, is this a good thing? Tough one this. Carbon worriers were vocal at it's introduction about how encouraging people to buy new cars would increase carbon footprints, but it's a complicated story. Scrappage has been a great success and typically cars that have been bought under the scheme replaced vehicles that produced around 25% more CO2e emissions, so that's good.... I think.
It all comes down to the "dust to dust" carbon of a manufactured item. This is what Jeep refer to when they claim their vehicles are some of the very best you can buy in terms of environmental friendliness. Yes they use more fuel than others, but are typically replaced far less frequently. The smug Prius driver should consider the environmental costs of mining the metals (not least for the batteries which comes from Ontario) and shipping the cars.
It's all a bit, can't do right for doing wrong. I have said before and I will keep saying it; time to lose the car. The 19th century horse gave way to the 20th century car which needs to give way to the next transport revolution. We don't have that yet, not while car manufacturers and the oil business has so much influence. We need that breakthrough.
Horses continue in our society for recreation from racing to pony trecking. We could retain similar for cars, cars for fun. The real business of getting about needs to be something else.
Here is my latest solution to be getting on with; dig up (most are dug up now!) the central reservations of our motorways, dig up too the two fast lanes either side and build high speed rail in place. No land to purchase, much infrastucture already in place, a comprehensive network, perfect. Make the trains that run on it "drive on, drive off" like "Le Shuttle" and you begin to have a very efficient, low (lower)carbon system.
Little cars for beetling around town and local journeys, drive onto the train for inter city travel.

Zoom, Zoom.

It is very difficult (well, impossible) to be entirely "green", totally "eco-friendly", of course it is. I once worked alongside a "green maniac" who was forever berating people about their behaviour, nagging them about the smallest of green peccadillo's, what a pain and how much damage did she do by putting people off?
Anyway, it is difficult to forgo some things and indeed surely we have the wit to solve sustainability without wearing the old hair shirt. Never-the-less here is one of my many failings..... driving fast, can't help it, love it, try as I might. Drivers seem to fall into one of two schools; the tut tutting pain in the neck, bimbling in the middle lane, (might as well just have two lane motorways, hey!), creep up to junction (causing huge queues behind and burnt out clutches) types or, the far too quick, scare people silly, too close to the person in front, bordering on maniac kind.
Here's a thought; when I started driving cars it really did feel that you were flying at the (truly fast) speed of 50mph, 60 would really rattle and shake and 70 was supersonic. My little old Mini had a delightful "sweet spot" at 62 and was deliciously terrifying at 70.
Increasingly cars have become bigger, heavier, better equipped, include more "safety" features (ABS, stability control, EBD etc) and so, increasingly cars have become faster and, more worryingly, easier to drive faster with less impression of speed.
So, come on car manufacturers, make cars less like a moving house than can travel well over 100mph and more like the thing that it is, a machine that hurtles you along at 50 mph. Strip out a load of weight (great for fuel efficiency and low carbon), make it fun to drive and in doing so unlikely to exceed the speed limit because that's quite fast enough!
I miss my little old Mini.

Many thanks to Adam at "PeopleProfitPlanet" (check them out)... for this; Animals Save the Planet... very good;
http://bit.ly/3A3Psv.

Climate is What You Expect, Weather is What You Get

If you hear someone bleating on about how given the recent cold weather then climate change is nonsense ask them, "Next time there's a heatwave in summer or an unusually mild spell in winter will you accept you were wrong? If a cold snap means the weather is getting colder, surely a spell of hot weather proves it is getting warmer". Clearly all rubbish. A bout of extreme weather does not prove anything about climate change. Climate is the average weather over decades. Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get.
That said, it is perfectly reasonable to ask why, if the World is warming, have so many places in the northern hemisphere been experiencing record lows? The answer is that for the past few decades cold Arctic air has mostly stayed in the Arctic over winter, trapped by strong winds spinning around the pole. This winter the vortex has weakened and in many places cold air is spilling further south than usual. The result has been freezing weather as far afield as Florida, China and the U.K.. However, the Arctic, Greenland and much of the Mediterranean and southern Asia have been warmer than normal.
Some areas could have more cold weather in the future as part of just such changes in weather distribution. That will not change the big picture, the World warmed over the 20th century and it is going to get warmer still. Anyone who tells you otherwise is either intellectually challenged or dishonest.

What's the best way to get two whales in a Mini?
You don't it's far better to get to Wales by train to save carbon emissions............. sorry!!

Here is a link to a talk (on the excellent TED website... bookmark it) with Rachel Pike explaining the science behind a climate headline, just a few minutes, cut and paste the link.

http://www.ted.com/talks/rachel_pike_the_science_behind_a_climate_headline.html

Terra Branco to Terra Preta

Gazing out at the snow falling on snow and listening to sun tanned cricketers in South Africa it almost makes you long for Global warming! Despairing of our inabilities to make even the simplest of agreements in the farrago that was Copenhagen it is tempting just to think, "tsch! Bring it on!".
Certainly the author of the Gaia hypothesis, James Lovelock is of the opinion that it's too late now to do anything about climate change apart from adapt, and even then, adaptation will only prolong the agonies of massive World disorder for a very short time. All off to hell in that hand cart it seems.
Well no, still time to come to our senses, re build international cooperation, re double our efforts to improve societies through innovative and inventive alternatives to pillaging our fragile and only World. Still time to affect the global politics of haves and have nots by redistributing energy provision. Still time to discover how to move people and goods around, provide enough food for ourselves and yet maintain the habitats of all the other life. Big job, but someone's got to do it.
Actually, James Lovelock does consider that there could be one redeeming solution, along with others he proposes that we adopt the system of sequestering carbon in our soils, then if we (and it needs to be quickly!) enable the use of agriculture and land management to be the very significant solution to climate crisis that it could be.
The dependence on large scale industrial agriculture increases the amount of fuel required to transport the food from field to table, needs huge amounts of fossil fuel to drive the tractors and trucks, manufacture the fertilizers and herbicides, deliver the food (often from one continent to another), all the while degrading the land.
A dramatic shift in agricultural policy (and Hilary Benn MP has started that in today's release of the governments' agricultural policy going forward) and practices to focus on building soil organic matter, including the restoration of carbon to the soil, by organically managing and enriching soils. Currently, soluble nitrogen fertilizers are used which encourage very rapid and complete decay of organic matter, sending carbon into the atmosphere instead of retaining it in the soil as organic systems do. By using "no till" techniques and by enriching soils with natural sources of nutrients, farmers can cut costs and improve on both productivity and profitability.
Success will depend on two factors; A strong bottom up demand for change and a top down shift in national, European and Global policies to support farmers in this transition. Farmers should be paid on the basis of how much carbon they put back into and keep in their soil rather than how many tonnes of grain they can produce. Some experts consider that the potential scale of what can be accomplished by such a shift of agricultural practice could sequester nearly 40% of current CO2 emissions.
That's not all, one of the most exciting new strategies for restoring carbon to depleted soils and sequestering significant amounts of CO2 for 1000 years and more is the use of biochar. Mr Lovelocks panacea. Biochar is a form of fine grained, porous charcoal that is highly resilient to decomposition in most soil environments. It occurs naturally but can be manufactured cheaply in large quantities by burning wood, grasses, manure, stubble or other biomass in an oxygen free or low oxygen environment. This transforms the biomass into charcoal more than 80% pure carbon. The process can also be designed to produce gas that helps fuel the process for making more biochar.
Burying biochar in soil replenishes the carbon content, protects important soil microbes and helps the soil to retain nutrients and water. It reduces the accumulation of greenhouse gas pollution by avoiding the releases that would occur by the rotting of the biomass on the surface, by sequestering the CO2 contained in the biochar, and by assisting the process by which plants growing in the soil pull CO2 out of the air with photosynthesis. Biochar also increases the organic health of soil by stimulating the growth of rhizobium bacteria and mycorrhizal fungi, improving the overall quality of the soil. Not much is new, Amazonian Indians were using biochar at least one thousand years ago to create fertile black soils that are still more productive than the soils around them. These soils, called terra preta by the Portuguese provide a unique way of assessing the benefits to soils by using biochar.
So, there you have it and to quote our old friend Mr Lovelock; ".... you can start shifting really hefty quantities of carbon out of the system and pull CO2 down quite fast.... this is the one thing we can do that will make a difference, but I bet they won't do it."
It's still snowing, terra branco.

A lesson in Geopolitics.

Well that's it, Copenhagen talks simply paralysed by the growing chasm between rich and poor countries. The accord finally pushed out by the U.S., China, India, Brazil and South Africa did not receive the universal support from the 193 countries represented and provoked reactions from fury to despair. Sudan's chief negotiator compared it to the Holocaust! Hugo Chavez talked of the sulphur of hell and suggested that Obama was Satan. Ian Fry of the drowning island of Tuvalu likened the accord "to being offered 30 pieces of silver to betray our people of the future".
We need to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves down and , well, pretty much start all over again. However, surely you didn't expect a sweeping deal out of Copenhagen, not if you considered today's polarised and charged geopolitics. The rift between rich and poor countries is wide, and the chasm paralysed the negotiations.
China opposed key elements of proposals, not least (unsurprisingly) external monitoring of greenhouse gas emissions and yet had moved very far coming into the talks. India too found some proposals one too far and then retreated to a fail safe position. The World's changing political land is partly why even Obama's last minute brokering did not produce something powerful. Many in G77 see Obama forming a league of super-polluters and would-be super polluters, a coalition of foxes who would together govern the hen house.

Well, well are we all doomed? The accord is better than no accord, even if below our ambition and well short of what is desperately required. They are all going to have to go back to their capitals and think long and hard. Meanwhile lets see what we've got.
Copenhagen has given us the first significant climate fund for poor nations, promising $30bn over the next three years and to raise $100million in yearly climate financing for poor countries. A deal was struck helping developing economies convert to green energy. Not enough I fear.
The question is whether these initial financial commitments are seen by developing countries as an incremental step that moves towards figures they see as sufficient.
The next UN climate conference in Mexico in 2010 will present many of the same challenges that faced leaders in Copenhagen, it will be very interesting to see how they approach this one. They should all remember that flood, drought, fire and all the other effects of rampant global warming are indiscriminate, a category 5 hurricane hitting, say Miami would be no less damaging than a typhoon hitting Bangladesh, global warming is not just a problem for the developing World.