Hello, everyone, and welcome to today's
show. This is the sustainability puzzle. And my guest is Alice Schmidt.
We are streaming live for the courageous career club and on LinkedIn. We're also recording this for my podcast where Ideas Launch, the podcast for the sustainable innovator. Thank you all for joining us.
And we're gonna get into the session. So let me introduce a bit about Alice.
Alice is an advisor and an advocate and an author on global sustainability and social transformation, and she's passionate about gathering, collating and distilling deep insights on global systemic challenges and solutions regarding environmental and economic sustainability, as well as social justice.
So she has a big agenda. And in her latest book, The sustainability puzzle, which she co authored, together with her friend, Claudia Winkler, she discusses how systems thinking circularity and climate action, as well as social transformation can improve health, wealth and wellbeing for all.
Katherine Ann Byam 0:03
This is a big challenge. We've, we've now just come out of cop 26. And we've had all of these challenges going back and forth on those countries that are struggling. And it's really interesting what you're doing. So Alice, welcome. Welcome to the show.
Alice Schmidt 2:01
Well, thank you. Hi, Katherine. Really good to speak to you today.
Katherine Ann Byam 2:04
I wanted to start by sort of acknowledging the breadth and depth of your experiences across cultures and across geographies. And having started your academic life in business and Communication Studies, what first prompted your interest in social impact work? First of all, of all the things that you're interested in?
Alice Schmidt 2:23
Yeah, so a great question, let me go really far back, because it's actually affected the first, you know, children always asked what they want to become right when they grew up. And for me, when I said, I want to become an author, and I want to write a book to save the world. And I'm clearly not saying I've reached it, but just as this is to demonstrate that this has been within me. So you know, as a child, I found clubs to save the environment and to protect the environment and to help sort of socially disadvantaged people. And, um, you know, I was, I was part of the scouts movement. And I do think now with hindsight, that this kind of influenced my values. And my thinking is sort of, you know, this cherishing nature and all of that and taking responsibility for your actions.
But professionally, it came when I was working with Coca Cola and also Henkel, another fast moving consumer goods company, at the time, based in Vienna, but focusing on the Central and Eastern European markets. And it was a long time ago, that was about 20 years ago, I just came out of University and finished my business degree. And I remember thinking when I worked at Coke, no kind of dream for a lot of young marketers thinking, do I really want to focus on helping one company sell more of an unhealthy, carbonated soft drink? or would I rather use his energy, my skills to sell something that you know, is actually perhaps, you know, saving the wild, I had a similar experience with the launch of a dishwasher, dishwashing detergent in Central Eastern Europe, which at the time was quite poor, and a lot of people didn't even have enough money to buy, you know, sort of detergent at all right? They had to make soap by themselves.
And that really then drove me into this direction of social impact, sustainable development, initially, more on the social side, and then bringing back the business sort of link as well as engaging with climate issues because I really think it's this bigger picture for me sustainability is really people planet and profits.
Katherine Ann Byam 4:35
Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think my experiences in life have taken me on a quite similar journey for two years so I worked in internal audit for a huge multinational in a controversial industry. And I had the opportunity to travel the world as well and experience deeply and firsthand the plight of many societies of many communities, and how innovative they are. Coming up with solutions that are frugal. And, you know, I, I've also seen how the crisis of geopolitics has sort of ravaged the environment. Right? And how has that work across cultures and disciplines benefited your work on understanding and, and sort of tackling complex and integrated system challenges?
Alice Schmidt 5:23
Yeah so I mean, I have indeed written in about 30 countries on four different continents. And that was very much my choice. At the time, there wasn't this trade off that we discussed earlier about climate at least, you know, your carbon footprint in terms of flying around so that I neglected at the time blissfully, I was blissfully ignorant of it. And, I was clearly driven by this insert that the more I see, the more I understand, but also the more I know what I don't know. Yeah. And, I quickly recognise that solutions or sort of activities, actions, programmes projects that seem like solutions can actually make things much worse, if they're not sort of embedded in a bigger picture kind of frame just to give an example.
And students because I use this because students of mine brought this up yesterday. And you know, the famous brands toms, right, the shoes, right? That don't donate a pair for each pair that you buy. And, and if you sort of just parachute into a developing country, and you see oh, there's a few children without shoes, you might think, Okay, I have a solution, right. But then if you see him out and somehow look a bit, sort of deeper and more broad, broadly, you find that actually, it's not the shoes, perhaps at MIT. And actually, if you give away shoes, you might destroy local industry, right? And this is not to bash Tom's as a company. To their credit, they actually think about these issues and do research to understand the impact.
But I mentioned this also, because we see, you know, a lot of talk about electric mobility at the moment. But as long as this electricity, the power that you power your car with does not come from renewable sources, it's not particularly sustainable. And that let you know, leaving aside all the issues around batteries, etc. And so yes, this, this, this, for me, also, on a personal level, these trips to a lot of developing countries, other cultures more broadly, have always been very eye opening, very humbling. And they've been very, extremely useful reminders of how lucky I am, how privileged I am. And have been there for allowing me to really focus on what matters, rather than you know, winching about this and whining about that. So absolutely important in this experience. Yeah.
Katherine Ann Byam 7:58
Yeah, it's interesting, you touched on something that I'd love to explore a little bit, if you don't mean. So it's, it's around this topic of transitioning to electric cars. There's so much baggage behind this transition for me, because at the moment, I'm driving a car that's not fit for the future. I know this. But at the same time, I don't want to commit another act of criminal injustice against the climate, by purchasing a car that's going to extract more materials, rather than taking my existing car and converting it. Because if I were to sell my car, someone else is going to drive it. So I haven't solved the problem, I have not solved the problem of climate change by selling my car. So if I scrap my car and waste the asset, right, so for me, I wish the solution that people would be coming up with and I do hope to hear from BMW soon about this. But I want them to retrofit my old car. You know, and I guess the question is, how do we tackle that?
Alice Schmidt 9:00
So I mean, I think you're touching on a lot of different things. And some go into direction of circularity. And actually, if you resold your car to someone who would otherwise buy a new one, right? Yeah, that would help given that you as long as you didn't buy a new car, and perhaps went into car sharing, right? Because I think it's not so much about the car, it's about mobility, again, sort of this need to zoom out right, but we also stress in the book a lot. And look at this bigger picture. And in this case, it's mobility and seeing how we can create Win win wins, right for ourselves, for the planet. So for the environment, the natural environment, and for people and cars are a great example because of course they pollute right? Some people love them and think of them as very beautiful but you know, having tons of cars sitting on our sidewalks on our roads, right?
Instead of having greenery and forests in our urban environments is Not particularly appealing, we've just become so used to it that we don't question this. And it's, of course, what I think is interesting in terms of the electric mobility movement is that, by and large, this is something where we have policy and agreement. It's become a political force. Yeah. So it's not one of these things. And so giving people an alternative, still being able to sort of own a car, if they must, is already an achievement, I think, yeah, but it definitely does matter where this comes from for your car personally. And I mean, yeah, if you could go without a car or car sharing, I think that would be a deal. If your car is sort of not too old, it might actually be much more economical, and also better for the environment to continue driving it right for a while, if it's too old, I have this super old car. And I'm told actually, that it's, it would be better to go electric to actually, you know, sell it, but driving. For me, it's really bad. Do I need this car? And I hope the answer is no.
Katherine Ann Byam 11:12
Yeah, no, I think that's a good way to reflect on it. But I do still want the manufacturers of these vehicles that are more polluting, to take some sort of circular action to sort of help us write help. I would much prefer to have my car retrofitted and pay for that, than to extract materials again.
Alice Schmidt 11:32
Yeah. And that's true. I mean, with cars at the moment, you can't really retrofit right with buildings, you can do that in an economical way. Yeah. But of course, some of the big car firms like BMW are actually also jumping on the sharing bandwagon. Yeah. And I think this is perhaps their biggest contribution they can make.
Katherine Ann Byam 11:50
Yeah, so I'm going to take a quick pivot to the comments and just flash them through. So we have some good wishes from Sean. Thank you very much, Sean. And we have Isabel saying hello to both of us. Hi, Great that you joined us. And Mary Lou is asking me a question. So I'm facing the same mobility dilemma. Katherine, I sold my car and for now, I am managing without, but at some point in the future, I may need a new one. And I'm not convinced about electric vehicles yet.
Alice Schmidt 12:20
Go for car sharing. That would be my current really going without occurring.
Katherine Ann Byam 12:26
Right. Yeah, exactly. And, you know,
Alice Schmidt 12:29
also a trend we're seeing I mean, cities and mayors around the world. But that's not the end of the world. But some cities are really going this direction. And it's also about making cities more pleasant, more sustainable, more livable for the 50%. Right of the world population that's already living in them.
Katherine Ann Byam 12:48
Yes, exactly. And, look, I think there's so many important things that I think people need a space to kind of ask questions as well, because as your book indicates, it's a puzzle and it's complex. And we need support, we need support to make the right decisions, instead of everyone going off doing what they think is best, which might actually be causing more problems. Right. So it's an interesting debate for sure. Yeah, so let's, let's talk.
Alice Schmidt 13:16
A lot of there's a lot of well-intentioned projects and companies out there and players out there, but you know, well, meaning well-intentioned doesn't always mean good.
Katherine Ann Byam 13:28
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So let's move to a few concepts in your book that I think listeners will find fascinating. So I wanted to start with this happiness beyond GDP. And I've been following what's happening in the Greek reshuffle and the Greek pause as some, some people call it, post-COVID. And there's definitely a heightened level of interest for many, for many people to design more holistic, healthy lives and get more from their careers, more purpose from their careers. So tell us about your thoughts on how to facilitate change in the direction of happiness beyond GDP.
Alice Schmidt 14:06
Yeah, so first of all, it's true that people care and they don't want to go back to life before COVID. Right. I mean, there were quite a lot of studies on this last year, I think about 80%. So it's zero, they said that they actually wanted to go back to a more sort of sustainable life. Right. And I think this is partly a reflection of the pandemic, having forced us to think about what makes us happy. What does wellbeing mean for us as individuals, but also what does progress mean for us as societies as countries, right, and there have been, I mean, this is not completely new, and there have been a lot of very sort of big, well recognised institutions, global institutions, but also individual mayors again, yes, city governments trying to shape the target setting and policies in a way that don't just maximise the GDP, right?
Because the GDP has been the main indicator that is used around the world, to sort of indicating progress. Yeah, that's the measure we have. I mean, it doesn't actually measure progress. It measures economic output, right. And it misses all the voluntary work that our societies depend on. And it goes up when we see disasters, floods, Harrigan forest fires, right. So it's not a measure of progress. And even you know, the guy, that cannot be Simon Kuznets, who invented it, almost 100 years ago, basically said, This is not about measuring societal progress, but somehow our mindsets are so adapted to this thinking that, that it's very hard for us to move up. Having said that, a lot is happening.
And I think a lot of people start to, to value what matters to appreciate what matters companies and NGOs, but particularly as of companies are still are starting to track the social impact, the environmental footprint, and what sort of the newest, and to me, also most exciting trend is that we're getting towards a system, we're tiptoeing towards a system, where we account for costs, as they truly are, which means we valuing the services the ecosystem is providing for us, right through wood, or food or natural medicine, fibres, whatever. But also, services like climate regulation, or water filtration, maybe we never think about this, but I'm not saying I'm definitely not saying give these things a price. But I'm saying let's value these things. Let's value clean air, air pollution kills 20,000 people a day.
That's a sort of a tragedy, right for individuals, for families, for societies, but it also comes with an economic cost. Yeah. And I think it's really important that we start talking about these costs more and more. And because that's just how we think right in our world, we think in monetary terms, and that's why I think translating negative impacts into what I call the cost of unsustainability is really helpful. But of course, we don't want to communicate negatively, right? In fact, a book is very much about optimism, and about picking people up where they are, yeah. Not really killing anyone, because they have ignored sustainability. You know, until recently, I'm not laughing at any questions, obviously, but also taking seriously the efforts they are making and trying to work with them to see how they can make more efforts.
How could they perhaps, you know, increase their impact. And, and and, yeah, so I think that this is partly also for people to really appreciate what they have and what they haven't thought about before such as clean air. Right? I mean, our mental health and again, this is measurable, our measurable, our mental health improves significantly, if we live in areas where there are sufficient trees. Yeah, it's the same trees that sort of decrease this famous heat island effect, and make people die from excessive heat, right. But it's also a mental health benefit. That's really important, particularly now in these times, right when a lot of people are suffering through the pandemic. Yeah, no,
Katherine Ann Byam 18:55
That's absolutely true. And I wanted to touch on something and I didn't tell you about this before, but we'll talk about it anyway. Which is this idea of donut economics. So I recently discovered Kate Raworths' work. I hadn't heard about it before. Remarkably, even though I've been in this space for a while, and there's a lot of I'm following her Twitter account where you know, she's building communities around trying to bring these ideas of living within the doughnut to life if you want to perhaps talk a bit about that maybe explain the concept to my listeners as well and talk about your perspective on how we can do that.
Alice Schmidt 19:32
Yeah, so I fully agree can she has done great work and I think it's encouraging that her book is also really, and her ideas and her thinking have really sort of gathered very widespread attention. So the doughnut essentially tries to reconcile both the environmental and to social, the global social injustice, aspects of sustainability. Yeah, bookkeeping within the donut hole, we all know what a donut looks like.
And make sure that we don't overstretch our sort of planet services. Yeah, then that is the natural environment, but we still provide a sufficient standard of living for all people in the world, right? I mean, that's also why we wait for us, this is really important, because we also talk about our book where the subtitle is health, wealth and wellbeing for all. I think this is so important, right? People like you, and me, you've been to a lot of places to see this, these enormous disparities, right, even within one country within one city.
Right. And I think we'll understand this, but not everyone has had the chance to understand this. And so. And I, what I like about the donut economics is that it's also a concept that's now being used by governments, including city governments. I don't know, for some reason we keep coming back to urbanism and cities today, and like Berlin, or Amsterdam, right, that are really trying to use this sort of framework, because it resonates with people. Yeah.
Katherine Ann Byam 21:10
Yeah. It is easier to grasp for sure.
Alice Schmidt 21:14
And so just one thing that comes to mind here, is this, this idea, or this insight, that there are only developing countries out there that are not any developed countries that are economically developed countries, but there aren't any countries that are where we need to be environmentally in terms of environmental protection. Yeah. Or providing a sort of social justice to everyone.
Yeah. And, I think David Attenborough also said this in his famous cop speech recently, which was brilliant, by the way, so I recommend everyone out there to watch it for seven minutes, definitely worth your time. And it's also about sort of, you know, learning from that inverted commas developing world, right, because a lot of what people in these places do is exactly what we need today. Think about circularity, you know, you repair things, sharing things, not throwing them away. And that to come full circle with Acade worth, she also said, on a finite planet, there is no way you can throw things away. And that's another one I love.
Katherine Ann Byam 22:34
Yes, absolutely. Now, yes. All right. And I think the more that we have examples of countries embracing this, you're right, it's going to set a new trend as to what it really means to be an evolved society. And of course, we have other competing things that are coming into the sort of forefront now with digital transformation. And, you know, Facebook and Electabuzz, I'm not going to ask you to answer questions about that, don't worry, but it's one of the things that is now part of the whole complexity of how we redesign better for the future.
So I want to pivot now to cop 26. And there have been some commitments made around me being around reforestation, etc. But there have also been some sort of COP outs, so to speak, forgive the pun. But you know, talking about reducing coal, as opposed to eliminating the use of coal, and things like that. So I guess which agreements have been the most encouraging for you? And how has caught 26 done enough, in your view, to solve the problems that we face?
Alice Schmidt 23:48
Yeah, so um, I guess I won't give you the short or the long answer, but something in the middle. I mean, one thing I think we need to consider is that before the cup after the cup is before the cup, yes, there's going to be another one next year, and it's going to be in Africa, which is great. I think Egypt if I'm not mistaken. And I do think that it has served to really get a lot of global attention. I don't think that's just me, you know, because I'm in my little bit saving the world kind of bubble. I do think there's been more attention to the cop and awareness, pressure also from civil society, I think is key.
Yeah. What it hasn't done is really come out with this new big agreement that everybody subscribed to. Yeah, there's a text, a communique that came out at the end and which included some very encouraging text around phasing out fossil fuels. There was this debate about phasing out fossil fuels. And there was also the, the, what was it there? Yeah, phasing out fossil fuels. And then the coal that you mentioned specifically, right? Because coal is the worst, the most polluting fossil fuel. And but what we've seen from a governance perspective is little blocks emerging, right?
So a few countries, you know, going for methane are now this another few countries for forest, etc. And I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing, right? Because it could become very easy now for countries to say, well, actually, you know, China didn't sign up. So why would I need to? And that brings me Of course, another really important point. I mean, I think one of the face savers, if that's the word for COP, was this quiet last minute agreement between or at least Joint Declaration between America the United States and China? Yes. Because in the end, it will come down to that. Right. Are they going to work together? And so I think there's a, you know, there are some promising signs. But, yeah, we're not there yet.
And finally, perhaps, because one of the celebrated achievements, I think, was Brazil, among others agreeing to help defer deforestation relatively soon. And that is bread and butter, it's not going to help us that much in terms of climate change. Right. I mean, forests are important for biodiversity, for livelihoods for you know, we talked about trees already before trees in urban areas anyway. And I think, and, yeah, so we need to, we need to take everything that's come out of the cup with a pinch of salt.
And keep in mind that these are just commitments. Yeah. So this is not implemented yet, and the most beautiful policy is worth nothing if it's not implemented, actually. Yeah, so just to finish, I think we might actually need to focus more. And we see this as a trend right to resort to climate litigation. And that brings me back to Brazil and now, right, there's some action against him. And companies are starting to fear that and I think this is an act for which my activist heart tells me this is a really good sign as well.
Katherine Ann Byam 27:24
Yeah, yeah. Now this is great. So I want to close with the final question, which is, actions we can all take. So what are the sort of first steps that you would recommend people take at the household level? I mean, before we actually went live, we had a conversation about, about the whole topic of travel.
So I'm gonna let you take the floor in this one, because, for me, particularly travel is one of the one I would call the guilty pleasures that I'd love to still have. I haven't travelled since the pandemic began. But it's something that for me has transformed my understanding of complexity. It's transformed my approach to the world, and therefore it has been hugely beneficial. At the same time, it's wrapped up in a huge carbon footprint bet.
Alice Schmidt 28:11
I hear you, I find that really hard as well, myself. I try to be principled, but I don't think I will always be able to write. And, I mean, again, travelling with mobility personally, I love long train ride, so I don't mind going between Ghana and Brussels for 13 hours. You know, I like how this soul travels with me and my soul travels with me. And I'm not sort of parachuting into a new place. But of course, there aren't the trains that are a thing in itself in Europe, and there needs to be a much more improvement but do but still do take trains.
Yeah, I think a very important message is to use public transport. eat less meat or no meat, and insulate your home. Yeah, that's another sort of big lever lever. And particularly also buy only what you love. Yeah. Even if it's more expensive, invest money, invest in quality, buy something you really love, and you're gonna be wanting to repair in case it breaks and that you will want to refurbish and that you will want to perhaps trade against something else as a friend Sir.
So this circularity I think is also really something can be with and I'd like to mention also that in the book, the sustainability pamphlet, we really we deliberately included sketch notes for each chapter there which summarise the main sort of the main puzzle piece like circularity, climate action, which we're not talking about. And in each of these sort of puzzle pieces, we tell people what they can do as individuals, what they can do, you know, as representatives, companies, and what they can do as governments because I think it's really important and it's also important to, for people to understand That no matter what they do, it can have an impact.
Yeah. And it's not just about what you buy and what you do and which services you access or consume. It's very much also about how you take others with you, right? Your friends, your peers, but also your colleagues influence you at an organisational level. Yeah. So lots you can do and I hope you find more inspiration in the book. I
Katherine Ann Byam 30:28
I loved your tips, particularly about buying something that you really love, even if it's expensive, and making sure it's something that you want to repay. I think that's my main one. Huge takeaway. So thank you so much for joining me today, Alice. And thanks to all of you who've listened and do give us your comments and feedback. And do get a copy of the sustainability puzzle if you haven't already. Thanks so much for joining us today.
Alice Schmidt 30:51
Wonderful, thank you so much, Catherine and to everyone else here and keep in touch, stay in touch, get in touch.
Katherine Ann Byam 30:58
Absolutely. Season Four of where radius launch was brought to you today by Katherine Ann Byam business resilience and strategy consulting services. Catherine provides business assessments and strategic support to help guide your business toward a netzero future. Get in touch with Katherine Ann Byam on LinkedIn