ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Episode 19 · 1 year ago
SHARE THIS EPISODE
Episode 19 · 1 year ago
Carl Pratt - Intimacy at scale or how to curate a highly engaged community
ABOUT THIS EPISODE
...how to curate conversations and connexions in the world ofthe sustainability. That is what we're talking about in this episode. Hello and welcome to the Impact Gorosh Podcast. This is the podcast for impact Entrepreneurs. This podcast aims to amplify the voices ofthe impact entrepreneurs addressing the United Nations Global goes Ikea The Sustainable Development Goals Listen into fellow impact entrepreneurs on their journey in this new gold rush off making a bigger impact Get inspired to learn howto entrepreneurship You can grow your impact to make the world a better place, leave a legacy and live a more meaningful life I'm your host Winton. In this episode, we have Karl Pratt ofthe future planet share his journey off growing super engaged community off sustainability professionals. This is mainly a UK based community, but it's been growing from strength to strength running highly curated monthly community connect events in a brand new event series called The 10 X Impact Climate. Listening as car shares his number one advice on building communities, as he calls it, intimacy at skill. But before that, if you have missed the previous episode epistle number 18, we had Zana Hobson off turn Millennium Education talk about the challenges of the current education system and why and how it needs to transform. So Gold is into that episode. And now for today's episode culprit. Welcome to the show. So you, the founder and creative director of Future planet. So that's future planet don't love. So tell us a bit about what does future turn it do. And how did you start at this platform? Thanks for a lovely to be here. Yeah, it's all about the love we rebranded Don't love this year with the view that we needed a lot more love Well, that made this with centre of how we held space is a community. Your question? What does suit a friend do? And how did you start this platform? Well, it depends when you once choose Teo. Like, look at what we were doing. Um, but I think in this...
...current guys, we started throwing events. Probably about the same time is plastic became a thing. We ran an event with Joe Murphy from Ellen MacArthur Foundation and five or six other change makers in the space on then. Since then have been running different events or had been running different events in a variety of different thematic areas of fashion, food, property, plastic act on climate like a load of topical themes. But with this intention around bringing people together from a range of different spaces on supporting to feel inspired, empowered as to the future they could co create together on we championed maybe 60 70 change makers on our stages. People with interesting storeys, people who are doing transformational stuff like Sofia Mini or uM or Solo or Cath Cath Roman package store headed for Mike here, like just many times. To me, it was really interesting toe share, the storey of what's happening behind the scenes to people and then that sort of evolved into us, running slightly more deeper events for change makers in organisation. So we did one on packaging packaging unr act and then we did another one in packaging. Packaging re wrapped and then we did tenets impact supply chains on DH. There were bringing change makers across value chains together, so a different type of audience, but still really around how we supported people effectively by bringing them together on then the very, very beautiful human. Henry Unwin, from Nando's, was our first member probably before we should've been asking from Tokyo on and on and on. But he was very supportive. And that was quite some time ago for pre code. And then the equally wonderful Kevin Dunkley joined us from a church global and and soon we...
...had a party because a couple of others have joined a swell as members on then and then we saw Van events and it got like, it's difficult to run events on DH, do everything else but the cycles really intense. So we sort of had this really big vision around bringing everyone, everyone, let's bring everyone together on then, Um, yeah, yeah. Anyway, on DH. So that bond then got sort of stuck running of it. And then in the beginning of 20 what was what was covert? When was that This last year? 2020? Yeah, it's the beginning of 2020. We had this mega plan for events. It was very tiring looking at it, but we're gonna do a load of stuff and we'd run a really great event with in partnership with Organ. And it had been really wonderful in supply chains have been really good, and we just sort of built ourselves up to this series of others on DH, then covert hit, which was for us. Transformational on DH, I think probably was the start of us figuring out what our role wass as a team as an end of minors as an individual. But also ours is a community. And so in the Mel A that was cove it like early days. I was just watching and listening and observing and just tuning into what was happening. Obviously no life events. We're going to be happening. So but on DH Laura from from compass scruples like car. Come on, What you doing like your doing community on you and where, you know, we need to connect with people and see what they're doing in their organisations. And so it's like, Oh, oh, yeah, Okay, okay, fine. I'll do that. And I felt very shy about doing that. They felt a bit like that. I felt really like no one's gonna want to come and do anything with me. But it was really the start of like What we've got now is a really strong identity around around community. And we had all the component pieces Community Unified by...
...values of love, kindness, inclusive, the empathy and optimism like some, you know, principles. Like we all wanted to work together to make the world a better place. Andre, we had that. But we'd never really connected the dots in a really meaningful and strong way. And we also have been geographic, you'd like, sort of limited in the, you know, we could run events in London, but that didn't include people from all over the place on DH. So suddenly we just had this opportunity toe play a role in connecting the who and supporting them bring together. And actually, the first one we did with six people, I think so. Louise Nichols, Laura Henry Robin from Nestle and Justin Fever Tree and one other person to have forgetting who I shouldn't be forgetting but so very small number of people. And it was just like, Hey, what's up? How are you getting on? What you doing? Like, what's up in your world? Like, how are you? And then within about three once we had probably 50 or 60 people on a monthly community connect, and now we have, like, 10 new people joined last month and really The only limiting thing for us at the moment is our timeto find and welcome new people. And so it's really allowed us to really tune into how we could be of service to the community. And I think stripping out a lot of the noise around the physical world and focusing in on digital, even though it's a more difficult format, too convenient, it's super. It's challenging. You can't just throw people in a room with some wine and food and think it's gonna be a great time. You know, you have to really think about it. But it does also allow one to really tune in tow what community is and and on what your building and say, Yeah, that's it. So it's sort of a road is arriving and it has been arriving for some time as we feel sort of followed our noses, and now we have a load of people that are really helping t deliver that mission as well as everyone in the community,...
...which is my dream. That was. We all got it together for each other, but when you'd say, How do you stop? I would say I really don't think it was me. I think it was just like it just kept on rolling. Like so many people have contributed toe what it is today. Um, yeah, that's a long answer to a short first question. Cool. Really cool. I mean, it really brings me to the next question, which is really, why is it so important to be part ofthe communities? And, you know, especially for us who are in the impact space, you have sustained space. Like where we are, where things are changing so quickly and there's so much to learn. Yeah, why? Why is it important to bring people together? I mean, I've run events as well. I think such a, um, in a way, it's It's a very rewarding rule, but it's also quite tankless because there's so many things happening. There's so much that needs to come together. So So tell us a bit about, you know, committee. Why? What does it mean to you? Why is it so important? What beautiful question. It's everything. Often I find the quotes from people that arrive, Um, Teo Teo kind of come and be part of what we do. And Adam Garfunkel? He probably doesn't remember that he arrived with this quote that he was talking, I'm going to get it wrong. It's not gonna be a quote Cisco anyway, say, but he basically said like we need. Like we like we're facing this unprecedented moment on. We need resilience to deal with that and that can't that kind of sort of comes from community on DH. My view is it could be like we're all in community all the time on different people convened at different times in different ways and that feels great on DH. Like I was on a cool yesterday with a load of people in what sussed e and that was really lovely on that's community. And like all these different things, their community, and that feels really good. What I feel like we're...
...doing future planet isn't it is an intentional community. We're the mission and we're focusing on solely community like that. Something on DH. My view is that everything can be found in community, so we would like some of the cook back. Firstly, like a lot of people just turn up to do stuff with us because I think they like it and they feel good doing it. and that's really important because it's gonna be super difficult. You know, if you're in a role in an organisation or anywhere, frankly trying to make the world a better place, it's sometimes that is sometimes a thankless task and difficult and hard. And you just need to be able to say someone Oh my God, it's so hard right now, Aunt, have someone might be on the same page, Izzie or Hey, how do you do this? I don't know how to do this. Is anyone else anyone else done this thing? Because I'd love to chat to you. You know, I think one of the beautiful things about our community is that everyone so helpful and kind and loving and like, thoughtful. So it's a really easy, easy job. It didn't feel easy because I had loads of challenges around self esteem and stuff. But it's quite an easy job to great bring a great people great group of people together that really, you know, they were really do that for us. I think what we do in future predators just think about it in a bit more than probably a deeper way on DH. I think we're building it together. I think we are building it together on dso eye view community as a way that we can start Teo be more systematic about how we solve systems on DH. There are great things around. There's a future. We have a few ways to look at it like personally want. You want you to come feel inspired, empowered. Part of, you know, a family of people that are doing stuff the same as you professionally like What are you looking for? I'm looking for this. I can help with this. I'm working on this. Anyone know this person? Anyone got any ideas around how to do this like that? Those are like the core things because that's what we were wandering around trying to find out. Or do you know anyone in this place or whatever? And then it's about creating a space where everyone could just hang out and help each other and...
...then beyond that, like, what's what we need is to be way more joined up. And so our vision is around. Every city would have a community of action, and through that you, Khun, much more effectively scale up impact whether that be solutions or ideas or policies or regulations. When we're more joined up. Cross sector cross silo cross function, whether that be across government, NGO business, investment, marketing, sustainability, the mix. That's when you can start to be much more coordinated in how we approach solving this. And we can get ahead off what we're currently playing. Capture pawn on DSO and we're now just experimenting with how do we do that? But that's what's really fascinating for me. Like, how do we collectively grow something with the same scale of extinction? Rebellion, But that is interconnected to every organisation on DH plays a functional role in supporting, inspiring, nurturing and, like setting. Thank you, Adam Garfunkel. Audacious goals for everyone, right like that. So that's where I am right now is like How do we do that? And that that is difficult like that. It's really difficult because it feels easy in words, but it's also you've got to go and build a team. You've got to go and so much to like to do that bit, you know. And so what we're experiencing now is how do we how do we hold? So how do we empower people to build community with and for us with with them for themselves, right? You know? And what what structure it do we need for that? Like, how do we what we call ourselves like we had Tribe? No, we can't be a tribe because that's appropriation. Apparently, which is great. So let's explore that maybe we have so many little things that come into that kind of call conversation that actually I find fascinating on rambling now. But it's it's like that, you know, I guess all in all of that we focus on community like our whole day. Is that you know? So I love that and you...
...mentioned Adam Garfunkel and he writes his base in London. He's a sustainability consultant. His company's got Junction Junction, Teo, so I'll definitely be reaching out to get him on the show as well. Yeah, you mentioned about the curation aspect, right? So how do you facilitate this sort of conversations? Especially when when you're bringing people who might have different views are different challengers. But there's so much to learn. How do you How do you facilitate that conversation? So it's like, um, it's like alchemy, but light touch on, then lie with loads of process, so that when anyone when everyone wears soft, getting better, so like when everyone joined. When people join us, they map out there personal, professional goals and what thematic things they're interested in. So where we've got to be now, zero about 2030 or like, I'm really passionate about, I know circle for me, so that gives us a start point. But actually, really, what happens is we just listen a lot of people, you know, and I call them out, we hang out, we just get to know each other and then I mean, that's all that's not sustainable as we grow. But it works really well for now, and I think we'll have people that, you know that's our whole vibe, will have people that do that and then we convene in an intimate way. So we're doing intimacy at scale. Every month the fantastic Sam and over on myself get together, and it's like a wedding plan, but only the best wedding you've ever been to. And we liked her people in circles who we think my vibe. Sometimes they not sure why they're there, but we know that they're interested in some of the things on DH. We've experimented with facilitators and with everyone being facilitated, lots of different things. But what we specifically have focused on his small groups. So we've got family circles and four, we do break out circles of like,...
...five or six, and we might start doing learning circles of, like, 10. But we don't We focus really on how to create Connexion around commonalities that people are working on on. We've done experienced an experiment like thematic stuff. So my favourite event, I feel, was we did with Charlotte Sul before Christmas on Andi, everyone came together around three questions. So what does it mean to be? What's what is inclusivity mean? What does it mean to be an inclusive community on DH? How can we be inclusive in our programming and actions? And we had a mirror board, we had groups, we have people just contributing and it wasn't perfect, but it was amazing. And we had, like, 216 contributions for people as to what they thought inclusivity, wass and so that so that was the experience of doing something we were all working together to create goal, you know, create set of things that they those outputs now informing everything that we're doing we, the very lovely Charlotte's soul, joined us. Um, Teo be a beacon for diversity and to help us to figure out, like how to do that. And also Samantha Nana was well, and we were already working with Louise Nickels. And so we just sort of have more of a focus around, like diversity and inclusion is result. That and so that allowed us to then focus on on that within the community. And I'm now just travelling because I can't even remember what the question wass and I feel like. I know I was asking about a festive imitation and I could see that you have all these people on your team, not now on your website. So that's really cool. So, you know, call for you've been in this space for some time, you know, for someone who is starting out their career or they have a start up in the space again in Evita. What advice could you share? A common join great community if you're flying out. Yeah, it's all about who you know, like it's asking them for coffees and connecting and learning. And that is not. It's not whether you're starting out or no, it's whatever phase you're up, like one of...
...my dearest friends in a new phase of stuff, and so is reaching out to different people who she knows in the future back community and just saying, Hey, I'm doing this. What do you think about it? When I started doing this crazy thing like I rang up by five or six friends and was like So I'm thinking about doing this. Do you think it's a good idea? And that's that For me, like that gives you energy and momentum and like it just helps, you know, like it so much could be answered through the people that you know and how you know. Beyond that, I would say also do what you love and do what you enjoy doing because it's difficult. It's hard, it takes a long time to get good at it, and you may as well do it in a way that you feel like you've got energy to do every day. It's very easy to get lost in being good, and to forget that you also need toe might be good to yourself. So thank you so much for sharing that. I think you have such an amazing community. Everyone should cheque out your work that you're doing so for people who are listening. And they're trying to find out what activities you have. Can you share for some of the events and the committees that people can put it? What a great question. So there are many ways we're almost doing too much over the next four months on, we've got a regular community connect every month where we support people with their with their goals and to get connected and feel bath community. You're welcome. You can go to our website for each planet. Don't love on applied to join on. Then we're launching a serious called 10 X impact climate, which will be 10 sessions over four months where we're welcoming our host of amazing speakers including Jonathan Foley, executive director of Project Drawdown. Talk about kind of based solutions on. We're interested in that. Siri's in supporting people along a range of theme. So we've got race zero science based targets carbon footprint ing environmental justice, regenerative supply chains rethink design, water,...
...food systems and nature for a nature of the heart of a solution. So we're really gonna adventure through on financing the future. So it really gonna adventure through so many different areas and bring together a range of different people from from so many roles Marketing, finance, sustainability, grand on DH. It's open like we welcome you. We have an inclusivity around our tickets. So, um, you can pay what you can or you can pay to join the Siris. Andre would love to welcome you to thank you very much. Call. I love to have you back on the show at some point data. And let's have this conversation going. Really? Thank you for creating the space for this conversation, and I would love to go back. Thank you. So dare you go? Della's culprits ofthe future planet dot What's been your biggest takeaway from this episode? Let us know in the comments section on our social media page. If you haven't subscribed yet, please do subscribe. This will really help us grow our podcasts. And if you can think of someone that would benefit from this in today's podcast, please do share it with them. In the next episode we have Francesco Cara, a serial entrepreneur and academic teaching digital innovation and sustainability of the Mellon Institute of Design in Milan. And he shares his observation of why innovation and sustainability is growing exponentially and how some of the technology is becoming mainstream. So tune in for next week's episode. Thank you very much for listening into the end off this episode. We really appreciate you. This is the impact Gold Rush. Mining is one time, and I'll see you on the next episode.
In-Stream Audio Search
NEWSearch across all episodes within this podcast