I continue to be grateful for the year I spent in the Indo-Pacific Leadership Lab, [1] as well as the time since then that I have spent still connected to our network. It may sound cliche to say that I made meaningful friendships and learned valuable lessons during that time, but it’s true. As someone who has been through other leadership programs and not particularly felt any different afterwards, I can say that this experience was truly transformative. We were asked to write some reflections about our time in the program, which we discussed in our final post-Tokyo virtual debrief, and I did nothing less than wax poetic about a year that was genuinely challenging for me. Challenging times are when we grow, though – and as a very dear friend likes to remind me whenever I’m in the thick of it, “you’re leveling up.”
+3 to Leadership
Thinking back through the program as a whole, our first day together in person in Honolulu was functionally a light lift but an emotionally heavy one (for me, at least). After lunch, when we sat around for more detailed introductions, each fellow in the program shared a bit about why we do the work we do, and I talked about my mom’s influence in my life. It has become clear to me that in the wake of her death, I poured my emotional energy into this program and directed the love I could no longer give her to my “capital W” work instead: the planet, those who were being impacted by climate change, and this opportunity to grow in the Climate Lab. Unsurprisingly, as a result, I think I may have been hit the hardest among the cohort when the program itself came to a formal end in Tokyo.
Classroom sessions during our week in Honolulu covered the topic of grief (recognizing it in others and meeting them where they are), which resonated with me on a deep level and helped me better spot grief in others in the following months. [2] Our work also served to break (or at least undermine) certain misconceptions I had about the “right” way to be a leader, specifically understanding that it doesn’t have to take a traditional form or last indefinitely. Those epiphanies freed me from dated mindsets and allowed me to approach the rest of our coursework in a more flexible, intuitive, and empathetic way than I otherwise might have. [3] With that freedom, I felt better equipped during our subsequent meetings with residents of Kahuku (on Oahu), [4] Daku (on Viti Levu), [5] and Onna (on Okinawa), [6] listening to their experiences and identifying where my own knowledge and perspectives fell short.
Having the opportunity to learn, reflect, be held accountable, and grow in a safe space with this cohort over the course of the year laid a sturdy foundation for identifying what needs to be done with respect to climate on both large and small scales, and how I can contribute to those efforts. Interestingly, what I observed is that in trying to find and implement solutions to climate change, the biggest challenge we face is that so many people who could be leading in different ways don’t believe they’re ready (or even worthy) to be a “leader.” Our coursework was designed to break perceptions that leadership has to look or happen a certain way, but that didn’t stop members of our cohort (or the leaders we met during our studies) from exhibiting Impostor Syndrome. [7]
Image credit: Shinji Kawauchi
This work is hard, and it needs small actions of leadership (i.e. filling gaps) on some level, in some way from everyone, not just from people who think they can do it. (I’ll let you in on a little secret: I personally know amazing leaders who didn’t want to be leaders – they just stepped up when no one else did. Many of them don’t even think they’re good leaders – they just do what needs to be done.) In order to support a world where more people feel empowered to step into small leadership roles, I feel like we could all be encouraging each other through difficult times, supporting healthy habits and self care to keep each other moving forward, fighting burnout with levity whenever possible, and supporting the idea that “leadership” involves neither perfection on your part nor an indefinite commitment.
And that was my biggest takeaway from the program, which I described during our closing reception in Tokyo. Gaining more insight into how I personally step up (or back, as the case may be), I am also now in a better place to see and acknowledge where people are on their own paths, whether they’re not feeling ready to take on a leadership role (stepping into the unknown) or if they’re not feeling ready to give up a certain aspect of their lifestyle (grieving a loss brought on by climate change). As for myself, I have had a lot more practice this year checking my own biases and, if I feel uncomfortable, asking myself in a compassionate and curious way, “why is that, and what am I supposed to learn from that discomfort?”
What Can I Do?
The difficult work of climate change mitigation and adaptation is made even more difficult by the struggle to act quickly and effectively but also equitably and with as much information as possible. Creating a comprehensive approach informed by diverse perspectives takes time – time we don’t have in a warming world – which is why it is just as important to build frameworks that can allow for agility to act on what we know now and then adjust when new information becomes available. I attempt to approach my day job that way, but having this formal structure outside my profession to hold me accountable while experimenting with the application of different concepts ultimately resulted in – I believe – a greater benefit to me and to my organization. (Note: I do try hard not to talk about my job on this blog, but it’s difficult not to with this subject matter. Suffice it to say, anything on this blog is my own opinion.)
And speaking of opinions, I haven’t been this direct on this blog before, but since I’m reflecting on a year’s worth of self-reflection, buckle up: I believe that it is critical for those being impacted by climate change to 1) have their stories highlighted in order to better inform the crafting of equitable solutions and 2) to be involved in crafting those equitable solutions to the greatest extent possible. It is clear to me that we are not going to achieve meaningful change in systems that disproportionately impact those without power until the systems themselves evolve and are no longer driven solely by those with power. But (and here I might lose you, if I haven’t already) for any change to be long-lasting, everyone impacted needs to be involved in crafting what next steps look like: in the context of my work, that means including governments, industrial operators, and members of the general public, all of whom have incomplete information and unique, but limited, perspectives.
Image credit: [8]
I know how incredibly easy it is to fall into an “us vs. them” mentality, especially when stakes are high – and they always are when health, safety, and lives are on the line. It’s important to remember that our brains are wired to create those groupings from an evolutionary standpoint – they’re just trying to protect us, even if that inclination is counterproductive these days. But I also know that equitable solutions won’t emerge from efforts that don’t have full stakeholder representation and that don’t approach the situation with the goal of finding common ground. [9] Of course, recognizing that it is far easier said than done, but more and more I see my own role as one of identifying opportunities for unlikely partners to collaborate (or at least coordinate) more effectively. And that concept informs a project I want to work on and have referenced previously in this series: a framework for identifying and enacting equitable solutions to complex problems. [10]
Almost a year ago at this point, our cohort began discussing what we might be able to do as a result of our participation in the program: how we could be giving back (or paying forward), answering the “so what” question, given what we’d learned. There was overwhelming support for something that people could use in their work – not a shiny deliverable that would sit around and collect dust, but a real tool to help us in our work. While we had different ideas of what that might look like in practice, an important question posed to us was “what would help you do your work more effectively?” In reality, there might not be one tool that works for all 16 of us (or for everyone doing related work); instead, it might be more effective if individuals or small groups could identify a resource gap in our own work… and work to fill it. Interestingly, with a little research on my part, I found that I might not even have to start from scratch in filling the need I identified for myself.
Be Curious, Not Judgmental
A group in my own back yard, the Center for Shared Prosperity, [11] has an iterative approach for developing equitable solutions for persistent problems. Based on a conversation I had with a member of their team last year, my understanding is that anyone involved in their larger network can raise a concern about a given issue facing nearby communities and ask if anyone wants to explore solutions with them. Interested parties are then free to form a subcommittee and gather feedback from a range of stakeholders until they have some suggestions for a plan to address the issue (including how to fund that solution). The subcommittee brings the idea back to the larger group, and anyone can point out potential shortcomings in the plan; the subcommittee will continue to work on it until the group feels the plan is viable.
It has been my intention to do some more research on their framework in the subsequent months, but I haven’t gotten back to it yet – it’s a work in progress. But spending my days in a world where decisions are often made without much input from residents who will be impacted by policy decisions, I was intrigued and inspired by this approach, and I was curious to see what a similar framework would look like either hypothetically applied to one of the situations we encountered in the field during the program or actually applied to an aspect of my work. As I described in my final reflection to the program leaders, in co-creating equitable solutions, we must adopt a non-zero-sum game mindset (“we win together”) that relies on bigger picture questions like “what does success look like?” “… on what timeframe?” “… by whose definition?” without falling into an “us vs. them” or “I’m right, you’re wrong” mentality. But in order to do that, we need to accept the fact that we will never have all the information we need to create one “right” approach and must instead maintain enough humility to remain flexible when new information becomes available – and that is easier said than done.
Image credit: [12]
Admitting that we don’t know it all – but that we’re committed to learning – is difficult. Nevertheless, it lies at the core of the scientific method and the public health approach. Such an approach leaves the door open for new knowledge and insights from unexpected places, including looking back to traditional practices and nature-based solutions, as well as looking forward to emerging technologies. But at the core of that exploration, we must continue to ask the difficult questions of who and what will be impacted by whatever decisions we make. As we learned on Oahu, even renewable energy isn’t inherently good: it’s a tool, and any tool needs to be understood and applied equitably.
Over the course of this year I traveled around the globe and saw eye-opening reflections of issues we face back home. Our communities are unique, but there is more connective tissue between them than we might imagine. What we do and where we live are part of who we are, whether in Pittsburgh, PA or Daku Village in Fiji, and it is unreasonable to expect anyone to agreeably abandon things that are core to their identity (or their economy) because someone tells them they need to. For that reason (among others), I believe that this concept to approach decision making more equitably and collaboratively is worth exploration. Finding meaningful, long-lasting solutions to complex, evolving problems requires more perspectives at the drawing board, providing feedback earlier and more regularly throughout the process, not just during a public comment period at the end of the process, when positions are already too entrenched to change.
So with that in mind, I will be wrapping up this post but not this effort, knowing that our work with the Climate Lab continues in many forms in many venues – and with a set of new faces exploring these concepts and locations in the second cohort. My updates on this effort won’t be as frequent moving forward, but I still intend to revisit it on the blog to whatever extent I can as I explore and apply these ideas in the future. But in the meantime, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this equitable facilitation framework concept: what should I keep in mind as I get started down this path? … and would you like to collaborate?
Thank you for coming along on this journey.
The Indo-Pacific Leadership Lab [13] is a program of the East-West Center, [14] with support from the Japan Foundation. [15]
As always, content on this blog reflects my personal views, and not those of any organization with which I am associated.
[1] https://radicalmoderate.online/tag/climate-lab/
[2] https://radicalmoderate.online/climate-lab-hawaii-insights/
[3] https://radicalmoderate.online/climate-lab-hawaii-insights-continued/
[4] https://radicalmoderate.online/climate-lab-hawaii-in-the-field/
[5] https://radicalmoderate.online/climate-lab-fiji-in-the-field/
[6] https://radicalmoderate.online/climate-lab-japan-in-the-field-continued/
[7] https://radicalmoderate.online/climate-lab-fiji-insights/
[8] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/equity
[9] https://radicalmoderate.online/saving-us-getting-through-2022-together-part-2/
[10] https://radicalmoderate.online/climate-lab-applying-lessons/
[11] https://www.centerforsharedprosperity.org/
[12] https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/t_s_eliot_109032
[13] https://www.eastwestcenter.org/projects/indo-pacific-leadership-lab
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