[MUSIC] If it helps you to look at some examples as you go off and change your system, I'd like to share a few real life examples with you that I'm working on. What follows are examples that I have either worked on the past and what I'm excited to be working on right now. The first one relates to my work on the Carbon War Room. It's a non-profit I worked on quite a few years ago with Sir Richard Branson. It was built on a system thinking challenge within its launch principles. How can we create entrepreneurial paths to accelerate carbon emissions reductions a gigaton scale? How can we energize and empower those climate entrepreneurs and help them seize the opportunity for them and the planet? This was back in 2007, 2008 when the world was looking to governments to get a deal done in Copenhagen. The idea was quite counter-cultural at the time, if now more accepted. Realizing the scale of the problem, we first decided to focus efforts on the shipping industry. We started with a broad question, how can shipping and entrepreneurship come together for the good of the planet? Using that broad goal, we then developed and focused our problem statement over time through convening industry players and consulting with experts. There were fine problem statement that guided our project ended up being a growth in the market for clean ships through a broader use of vessel efficiency information, a demand for that information, and new financing to fund the retrofits. We then identified leverage points. The first was information, making information available to people in the industry about what ships are clean and what ships are dirtier. Like an energy-efficient sticker you might find on a new appliance, except for ships. Only it wasn't a physical sticker you'd see on the ship. We made the information available online for free. The second was demand pool, how could we get charterers and ports interested in the information? The third was financing, how can we make funding available for shippers who want to retrofit their vessels? Then we made plans based on the progress we wanted to achieve, how we wanted things to look next year, three years out, and so on. Though I had not been trained on systems thinking at the time, and I wish I had, I could have sketched an iceberg model based on our thought process. On the current reality iceberg at the surface level, the events, ships were wasting fuel, polluting air in coastal cities, emitting carbon, and not taking advantage of new technology. Beneath the surface level and behavioral trends, we thought marine emissions were rising with global economic activity despite technical advances and charterers were picking ships solely based on cost. At the structural level, we interestingly found that 70 percent of the fuel in the industry is paid by the charterer, not the ship owner. The incentive to upgrade and save fuel is absent. Rules were very slow to change at the UN, International Maritime Organization, at the international jurisdiction level. As we saw it at the deepest paradigm level, we saw beliefs that shipping would be just too hard to abate. It can't be green or cost too much to make it more sustainable. Our desired reality, well, on the surface level, we wanted to see more clean ships, low shipping sector emissions on the way to net-zero, cleaner air in port cities and in the world in general. On the train level just beneath the surface, we wanted to see charterers starting to demand A grade ships and reject F and G, if you take the European rating system. Ports rewarding clean ships with lower dockage and preferential arrival times, marine emissions starting to decouple from the underlying volume of demand of the goods. On the structural level, we wanted to see powerful and useful information flowing to charterers who paid the fuel bill, and ports that legislated the arrival of the ships driving behavior change and efficiency upgrades on the ships. Finally, our resulting paradigm shift, a green, sustainable shipping industry that is obviously better for business and coastal communities and erase the industry players wanted to win and the winners are better for the planet and also financially stronger. The rocks of system change with a leverage points I mentioned; Information, making sustainable data ubiquitous for every ship, incentives, ports and charters favoring clean ships when they could and causing disadvantage to dirtier ships when appropriate. Then finance. Convening and publishing on the money to be made in going green. Convening and discussing and demonstrating how new finance vehicles could save and make money for all parties, the ship owner, the charter, and investor. Over time, 30 percent of non container fleet started to use vessel efficiency information when selecting their ships. To be clear, shipping industry is not yet on track to play their food part and limiting global temperature rise. The need for the aims of the project I see is still ongoing even though the actors may well have changed and I've moved on. I hope we'll continue to see more progress in the years to come. As with many sectoral approaches to climate change, it's really good to see how an entrepreneurial led initiative is now giving way to more systemic policy approaches e.g at the United Nations International Maritime Organization, as the approach to transitioning to a sustainable future matures. For those that are interested in this work, I gave a TEDx talk about this topic at the time, which you can find in our resources. Alongside my work on Yale and coaching and consulting, I'm also volunteering on some projects currently to advance climate change solutions at the global structural level. The rules of the game, if you will, influencing, trying to influence how the game is played. My work includes writing on the definition of what it means to be net-zero, and serving as part of the expert peer review group on the UN's Race to Zero campaign. This umbrella campaign aims to galvanize ambition and progress outside the formal negotiations between sovereign nations. Our work there is grounded in the system insight that we're trying to guide and enhance the rules. Creating a true race where industry players combine some efficient ambition and clarity of goals, so the world realizes a just transition to a sustainable future in time to make a difference. Particularly in the net-zero space, there are groups that are ambitious but lacked clarity. It's in those groups that we risk seeing greenwashing. At the same time, we also have groups that are high on clarity, but not ambitious enough. Those groups are too incremental to help us make the transition we need quickly enough. How do we get as many corporate and city actors in the top right box in line with or faster than what science tells us. Clear enough so that there is a path for action and accountability. With these ideas in mind, I, alongside others, have been considering how the definition of net-zero can truly capture the changes we want to see. I'm excited about a definition of net-zero that's fully scoped, science-based and fits with the global carbon budget. I'm especially keen to champion a definition that includes cumulative, which means that companies and entities are held accountable for historical emissions, not just the rate at which they're currently producing. This is the idea that if you ate and drank and a bar for years, then eventually started paying your way, the bar would still remember what you owed and expect you to settle your tab. In the same way, emitters couldn't shoot a count for all their emissions, not just their current and future emissions. You might see this idea as trying to go beneath the surface to influence those deeply held beliefs and paradigms. This is not just about hitting this year's number and patting ourselves on the back, it's right and appropriate for entities to settle their tap. This idea is linked to another area and passionate about. Was wonderful that these companies are achieving net-zero or heading towards net-zero, we want to know what else they're doing to compensate for their past emissions? Can they get involved in lubricating the north-south discussions at the climate talks and help provide capital via say carbon credits that balance historical emissions to reward Rainforest Nations for preserving their primary forest. Ultimately changing the economics on the ground to end global deforestation at the speed and scale required. How can we alter the economics on the ground to make sure trees are worth more alive than dead. How can we create one system of accounts, one set of emissions standards, one unit of tons of CO2 that aligns with the Paris Agreement. I'm currently working with a broad range of stakeholders to answer these questions. We've provided more information in our Resources section, if you're interested in diving into more detail on any of this topic. The other area I'm working on is education and engagement on climate action. This work often offers me the opportunity to speak with business leaders who don't already believe or act decisively on climate change. In many cases, it's not the norm in that area or organization or sector to act. They might think that the problem won't affect them or that the problem is so big that they can't make a difference. I think to myself before I go there, how can I engage these stakeholders? I've much power to change things and don't yet feel motivated to take action. First as an example, I tried to show them that while it may seem that we have unlimited natural resources, in fact, the environment itself is extremely vulnerable, were part of this fragile world, which you can see here in this NASA photo. We're used to thinking of the sky as endless and fast. But in fact our functioning atmosphere is only a tiny sliver, a 10 minute drive to the top. If you could point your car vertically and drive to its upper border. For business leaders in particular, it can help for them to think of the world as a business. I say to them, for instance, that if the world is 4.6 billion years old, we can think of it as a business that's 46 years old. You as a business leader, had been in charge of the world for almost 50 years and things are going along fine until four hours ago, you took a new employee on called a human. Just a minute ago, this human employee had the bright idea of the Industrial Revolution. In that last minute, has managed to destroy 50 percent of the world's forests, and in the last 20 seconds, 68 percent of the world's biodiversity. What would you do with an employee who just came on a few hours ago and is now creating this significant effect on your company's health. Indeed, on top of that, they are acting like they should be in charge too. Most business leaders will agree that that's not a good employee, and they need to do something about it. It's interesting because now they see the problem and their role in the solution in a different way. Without me having to mention climate change at all, they just understand the solution is good, responsible business. It reminds me of this Onion headline that makes me smile if it wasn't so true, that pressure should be mounting for humans to step down as head of a failing global ecosystem. The last project I'm working on in this area is re-framing the idea of tropical deforestation. Together with reinforced nations as well as with the integrity council for the voluntary carbon market. I'm working to get the voices of those who want protections in the same room with countries in the Paris Agreement to talk about what we need to save and how we can save it. To give you a sense of this issue, we have five percent of the world's population, mostly indigenous, looking after 80 percent of the world's tropical forests. How do we make sure we're all having the same conversation about preservation? There's just a quick snapshot of some of the real-world system problems I'm working on and how I'm trying to apply the lands of systems thinking myself in those situations. Is true that these are wicked problems and at first glance may seem too complex to solve. But I think you'll find that with some simple tools and in community in no time, you'll be able to develop a plan for your next systems change. It's just a matter of identifying the points of leverage, how you can think, you can change them, and how deep in the iceberg you'll need to go to do so.
