Greetings!
I’ve always loved that scene towards the end of The Wizard of Oz where the so-called wizard reminds the so-called cowardly lion that he already has plenty of courage, he just didn’t realize it. And suddenly, he’s a courageous lion!
On that note, I’m taking a deep breath and finding the courage to share a whole bunch of stuff with you all.
I’ll share what I’m sensing, calling out as nonsense, and paying attention to.
I’ve been spending my time in very different ways of late. Buckle in!
What’s going on around here?
These are disruptive times. (Hold up! “Disruptive”?! Yes. Please pardon my oversimplification by labeling times as “disruptive”. Tucked within those three syllables is an awareness of the collective kerflooey of profound implications, from infinitely sorrowful to overwhelmingly confusing to vastly mind-expanding, and then some… Okay. Got it.) And with disruption comes the opportunity to do things differently. This entails taking a lot of possible leaps.
Leaping can be scary. Scary things require courage. Hence the appreciation of the so-called wizard’s reframing. We have all the courage (and brains, and heart for that matter) that we need.
That may sound fun in the “self-help book” kind of way. But what does that look like in practice?
Well, those who’ve been with me on this journey for a while will know that I’m more about the questions than the answers. And I’m usually taking stock of my own stuffing as it were (see also: the Scarecrow in that same Wizard of Oz film). But for those who’ve just found this little virtual room, a) welcome! and b) we’ll be going behind this non-wizard’s curtain to see what sense we can make of the stuff that’s strewn about.
To set the stage, here is one way to state what I’m up to (beyond just asking questions):
I seek out knowledge – and share what I find – about what it looks like when “meeting human needs” and “the economy” are one and the same.
I don’t accept the current industrial and cultural norms of the separation of humans from the rest of the world. And I don’t accept the idea that industry will always cause at least some harm to our biosphere and social fabric in the name of economic progress. I know — I sense on a cellular level — that we are capable of a more elegant and evolved way of being, and that in fact it’s already happening to some degree. And I believe it’s possible to expand an understanding of this and spread it around more liberally than it is currently distributed.
How to live this belief as a professional is hard to pin down. It’s not what we’re encouraged to do with our educations, to put it bluntly. And I was born and raised in the worldview that created much of the current pickle (aided and abetted by numerous viewings of the somewhat problematic The Wizard of Oz), so there’s that.
Courage, Carolyn-style
As I journey along my path, the voices and gestures of courageous people who’ve gone before me drift into my mind. I recently wrote a piece about one of the most courageous people I’ve known: Carolyn McAlpine. Here’s an excerpt:
She was the most joyful, fun person I have had the pleasure of spinning yarn with. And if you’ve ever hung out with spinners you’ll know that’s saying a lot — we are a pretty fun-loving bunch if I do say so.
It still breaks my heart when I think of her being gone, but there is something she left behind for which I am deeply grateful. It’s something I have been drawing on a lot lately: her joyful approach to courage.
Carolyn left a legacy that is as instructive as it is inspiring. You can read my article, “Carolyn and the Courageous Cushion” on Medium, here, or on my blog, here.
The courage to call out the nonsense in my work
To be honest, I wrote that piece about Carolyn because I was struggling to find the courage to do something that I felt needed doing: offer a specific and practical critique of environmental, social and governance (or ESG) reporting and strategy, the field that I have been working in for the last 20 years. And not just to critique it, but to step away from the very field that has paid my rent all those years.
On the one hand, I’ve developed a degree of expertise on how companies strive to be more “sustainable,” and how to report on progress to their stakeholders, especially investors. And this expertise has been more and more in demand as the bandwagon for ESG-related activity can barely hold the onslaught of new passengers. On the other hand, I have grown increasingly concerned that the effort is at best busy-work, and at worst, harmful. I needed to say something about what I have been learning from the trenches.
So I am giving myself time to think about what I’ve learned about industry, sustainability and ESG, and to play it back to the world in a way that might improve matters. Through a corporate art project called “Matereality”, I turn a recognized industry tool on its head.
I published Matereality as a “minimum viable product” in late March 2022 and am continuing to add to it. At this link you can access A LOT of information, including a 4-minute explainer video, a one-hour conversation on the methodology in conversation with Dr. Geoff Kendall of Future-Fit, an FAQ page, and more. You can also view the first assessment, conducted on Alphabet (Google), in draft form. I will be completing it, and conducting at least two more in May 2022. Then I plan to stand back and wonder what I’ve learned and what I can do next (other than spin yarn and knit socks, which feels like the most useful option some days).
Why might any of you spend your time looking at this stuff?
Well, the purpose of Matereality is to do some truth-telling. It’s free for anyone to view and do with as they like. If you work in the field of ESG, corporate strategy, or investing, there might be some handy resources for you there. And if you’re not in the field, but something hasn’t added up for you in all this talk of “green business,” it might just scratch an itch.
Encouraging Larry Fink to answer my letter
Some of you may remember that I have tried my hand at calling BS on my field before. For example, I wrote a letter to Larry Fink, the CEO of the largest investment firm on the planet (BlackRock) in early March 2020 explaining how ESG was being applied to our collective detriment.
To demonstrate the point I offered a free, open-source benchmarking of the ESG disclosures and investor communications of 12 large companies, in which BlackRock most likely holds a position. (Note to self: please, no more free benchmarking for billionaires.) The upshot?
In a nutshell, I found the disclosures are often hard to find and make sense of, contradictory between sustainability and core business strategy (especially with investor communications), and indicative of an existential gap between climate reality and corporate purpose.
Earlier this year I summoned the courage to repost that letter on LinkedIn, prompted by my frustration at seeing Fink’s 2022 letter to CEOs prattling on about ESG stuff again, similar to the letter I was responding to in 2020. I saw people swooning over his latest language, as if it were prompting meaningful change. I started to pen a new response and then I was like, “Wait. I’m having a déjà vu.”
The sad thing is, I think my 2020 response is probably more relevant now than ever which would explain the over 3500 views of the LinkedIn post (that is huge for my quiet little corner of the interwebs), dozens of comments and numerous shares. I haven’t heard back from Larry Fink himself (yet!). Maybe he’s busy. But I’m nothing if not patient and persistent. We spinners are like that.
I’m not sure where all this corporate art-making and field-provoking is headed. I’m going to publish a couple more Materealilty assessments (banking and food companies, coming up!). I will keep you posted — watch this space before the end of May.
The courage to be uncomfortable
One of my favourite things to do is share stories, ideas, and provocations in a live setting. Whenever I speak or present, I make the outputs visible here. There’s one set of conversations I’ll lift to the top of the pile here, from the Fish Eye Café, a place where I meet up occasionally with fellow travelers Samantha Suppiah (from Possible Futures) and Garry Turner (host of the HEXO Change podcast).
“The people that control the microphone literally control your thoughts. There are systems of power that, no matter how many people are so-called aware, or woke, or conscious, this is not the metric that gets us anywhere.”
— Overheard from Samantha Suppiah in the Fish Eye Café
These are uncomfortable times for a host of reasons (“uncomfortable” looms large inside “disruptive”). In this virtual café, we summon our caffeinated courage and go into the depths of discomfort. Sometimes our pets show up. Sometimes executives appear in furry onesies. It’s an unusual place – but it might just have kernels of the future to redistribute.
Here are videos of our intro conversation on being Earthlings; our regenerative mining chat; and our discussion on connecting to self. Yes, I wrote “regenerative” and “mining” together. Did I mention it’s sometimes uncomfortable?
You are welcome to join us. Watch our social media feeds for future dates – coming soon!
What happens when courage asks, “Colonization? What colonization?”
In my last newsletter I mentioned a speaker series I have been curating on Decolonizing Regenerative Agriculture. These are conversations with farmers who have weathered the travails of colonized, industrial agriculture and somehow still continue to nurture the land and their communities. The question we explore is: how?
After the sessions with a Mohawk farmer here and here, and with a father and son from a Quilombola community in Brazil here, I am pleased to announced that I will be hosting the third session with Yayerad Gezu from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in late May, 2022. What he has been able to accomplish, just like the speakers before him, is mind-bendingly courageous.
If you are interested in joining the live zoom session, please get in touch to receive the meeting information.
Bonus round: an always courageous podcast
This recent podcast episode, A Colonized Sky, from Medicine for the Resistance featured astronomer Dr. Hilding Nielsen, a Mi’kmaq scientist based at the University of Toronto. I loved everything about the episode and came away feeling much more at peace with the complexity and vastness of our shared human and non-human experiences. Here’s a wee quote from the wise guest:
Indigenous knowledges have an easier time with quantum mechanics, because I think Indigenous knowledge is a little more relaxed about not knowing things; it’s okay that there are mysteries. Whereas in the West, having a mystery is the worst thing possible. It has to be explainable, reducible, objective.
Imagine having the courage to not know, or to hold competing truths at the same time. It turns out this is a thing, and there are those who have been boldly going there all along.
What’s next?
I’m not sure what the future holds (haha — that’s funny) but I will keep reshaping my workbench so that it fits with what makes sense to me.
For example, I really like the visuals, easy commenting and ad-free approach of the writing platform Medium, so I have been building out my Medium page. I created a table of contents so it’s easy to see what I’ve published – from videos and articles, to thought pieces and poetry. You can also subscribe there to receive articles as soon as they’re published, versus waiting for me to get myself organized and send you one of these multi-headed-hydra missives linking to everything.
This writing adventure is an important part of my path. I feel like it’s one way I can redistribute the more elegant future which compels me forward. So I’ll keep conjuring the courage to write and share.
And to put a finer point on the traditional consulting work that I am calling out with Matereality and letters to Larry Fink, etc, I am no longer accepting corporate sustainability and ESG work except in very limited circumstances.* This is a big shift for me, having earned my keep this way since 2003. Thankfully, I can draw on a lot of sources of courage to find the trail ahead.
As ever, I welcome your feedback – either directly to me or in one of the many public fora where I make my stuff visible (Medium, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, or my blog). I always appreciate a good conversation!
Thanks for walking alongside. It’s good to be with you.
Yours in connectedness,
Lorraine
* A circumstance where I would still say, “Yes!” to corporate client work is where I am paid fairly to be honest about what I see (versus compiling content that reinforces the status quo, which is what most sustainability work is when you look closely). I would also consider connecting decision-makers / budget-allocators to more poignant, visionary voices who are already in that more elegant future and are yet either marginalized, ignored or at risk of being “economically developed,” if the inquiry was sincere. If you know anyone looking for a hand in that regard, please feel free to forward this along to the relevant parties. :-)
