Why YOU Should Build Climate Influence

Bloomberg Green Festival last week was powerful in many ways, but especially in the way it served the basic, post-COVID, need to see and connect with people in PERSON. It truly spurs big, creative and collaborative thinking. It was wonderful to meet so many inspiring folks in one place AND to be able to point people to the very cool things about the city of Seattle that they may have missed. (It’s a really fun place - especially if you can find your way to some of the just-outside city core neighborhoods.)

One conversation I had repeatedly at the Festival was around the truth that the world needs more of the folks who were in those McCaw Hall rooms to understand and use their climate influence better. We can’t save this POWER we have for green conferences, folks! We need you to be the dot connectors for your sectors to push massive, quick climate acting shifts in all industries and sectors.

On that note - my latest audio post is about why YOU should care and build your own influence, to the benefit of your own company or nonprofit - beyond the altruistic reasons to “be seen leading” which will build in the process. You CAN be selfish about why you’d spend time building climate influence. It all serves the end goal. I’d love your feedback, and hope to advise some of you soon to jumpstart YOURS.

***

Two excerpts (my italics for emphasis):

It's a coaching, it's a pulling you in, helping you get comfortable with this, figuring out what your authentic voice is, seeing how you can connect the dots from your sector to broader climate coverage, et cetera, et cetera. The results I've seen in working with people have been with corporate sustainability leaders, with real influencers in climate policy with NGO leaders, with even members of Congress, the story, the announcement, the moment they want to amplify it gets bigger coverage than they'd ever hoped.

Here's some examples I've facilitated. I've facilitated Bloomberg coverage in one situation. I've facilitated getting global sustainability leaders into private civil society dinners at COP. I've facilitated getting leaders very quickly onto a GreenBiz stage … and getting sustainability leaders into key climate and sustainability podcasts. And, obviously, climate podcasts and understanding that world is an extra benefit to the background that I have. So the idea is that I advise on this to help build a bench of leaders ready for and comfortable and getting them more comfortable with more public visibility on their own personal climate values. So a lot of people never talk about their own personal climate values in relation to what they're doing, and that is a problem. And the point is that if you can get comfortable talking and connecting the dots about why you even doing this work, why you made this product, why you're excited that you've got a better sustainability report to talk about and how that is behind all of your organization's announcements and moves

People, what we've been missing is seeing the human being, who's leading and how that connects the dots to this bigger picture that you're doing with a corporation or an organization.

And..

I am here to inform, kind of nudge and inspire more of you to step up to this thing. It doesn't have to be a big communication strategy, budget item, et cetera, et cetera. It is me talking with you as a human being and getting you to understand how you can take some nugget of some personal story that really motivates you and have that make a huge difference in your media coverage and just the buzz and the partnerships and the networking from there on.

So, I help you step up, and that's my advising, but that's also, if you're reading the Substack and if you listen to my podcast, et cetera, that's what you're getting. You're getting me nudging you to be a little bit bolder.

***

Thank you for reading Andrea Learned On Climate Influence. This post is public so feel free to share it.

Finally: One more fun thing I did, somewhat connected to folks being in town for the Green Festival, was host a small group eBike ride. While I realized that a lot of folks had scheduled flights out of town for early Saturday morning, the wonderful fellow riders who did come along had a BLAST. And, I definitely *sold* them on the idea of ebikes as local transportation - which is always my mission. That’s why it is one key focus of my Living Change podcast interviews (along with plant-based food transition and cities). Huge thanks to the folks at Bosch eBike Systems and Seattle Electric Bike for providing a selection of incredible bikes.

***

Thanks for your interest in my work, and for sharing/amplifying this post if you know of folks who need a little extra inspiration to get on THEIR climate influence. Until next post…