Weeknotes 24.01.2021

And then there we were again. Back into the time and brain-contracting routine of schooling and working from home. It snowed overnight here in Bristol and I’m writing these in an end-of-Sunday morning window, rosy-cheeked from a good play in the snow, the small person now curled up on the neighbours’ sofa (thank goodness for the childcare bubble).I don’t always remember to grasp these opportunities — it’s too easy to fill them with pottering and chores — and I am grateful for it now.

Five things I’ve been working on

1. Developing a proposal to enable our activists to engage better with each other across our network, and with experts on a given topic, without having to come through Friends of the Earth as a gatekeeper. We’re calling this building ‘communities of interest’. Of course, lots of this knowledge sharing happens already, and we’ve tried lots of things in the past too, but we could do more to optimise knowledge and know-how sharing to maximise the impact of people taking action on the ground. I’m really interested in this as a service design problem: how can we really ground what we’re doing in a real need? How can we co-design something with users. We took an outline proposal for a design-led experiment to our senior leadership this week, and I’m looking forward to getting really curious about the problem in the weeks ahead. This set of new resources is going to be super helpful (h/t Theresa Fend) .
2. There is a similar design challenge around what data local communities really need to take action on climate. At Friends of the Earth we’ve got a growing portfolio of local tools — such as the Woodland Opportunity Map — and the green space deprivation map and I was really delighted to have an exploratory conversation with Ambition Lawrence Weston (one of Bristol’s Climate Action Plan areas) about what data they might need. Bristol City Council has also just published updated ward profiles, and for example, one thing I’ve learned is that there is a larger Polish community in my immediate area than I previously realised. But what is the ‘so what’ for me?
3. At a very different stage of development, developing the business model for OwnIt. We held a first meeting of our advisory group — what an awesome bunch of women :-) — on Thursday.
4. As part of the Boundless Roots collective I’ve started some exploratory conversations about building a narrative around ‘regenerative technology’. This builds on the work we’ve previously done on augmented intelligence — and how to build-more-than-human relationships with technology.
5. Developing my team’s strategic vision and purpose. With new Co-Executive Directors at Friends of the Earth this January’s restart has a new momentum. I’ve been thinking about how we influence others the (Communities of Interest work above is a good example) — and looking through the lens of Kotter’s Change Model at this (thanks Christian). Another big question is how do we communicate the way that we work and our impact better internally. It can be hard to share system impacts in a model that’s still dominated by linear thinking. I’ve been using this quadrant (below) to map our portfolio of projects, which has been helpful — but doesn’t help the story of the ‘ripples’ — the wider impacts of the way we work.

A useful metaphor is to think about systems work as a form of gardening, and experiments as interventions in this space. What if I found a way to use this kind of language? How could I — quickly — share with colleagues what’s currently germinating / growing / connecting at rhizome level / what we’re harvesting / what’s nourishing us? Lessons taught by gardens is a simple way of communicating this message (h/t Cassie Robinson) but not so much the lessons specific to my garden.

Five things I’m curious about / that I’ve learned

1. The potential for ‘mycoremediation’ (a new word to me). I enjoyed Merlin Sheldrake talking about this (and all things myco) at the Oxford Real Faming Conference. What if fungi really could transform plastic waste, tyres etc. at scale. On the myco theme, and at the same event, I was intrigued to learn that one of the best ways to create a tree nursery is to plant / encourage the new trees in a space bounded by mature specimens of the same species, as they can nourish the new trees from their root fungi. Obvious — but also new to me.
2. I have learned about two more edible plants that are prolific at this time of year, and grow within five minutes of my house: alexander and three-cornered leek (which I now learn is invasive). There is abundance even in the slow time, if you are patient, adaptable and open enough.
3. Why we might need to let go of the idea of the ‘one big idea’. This event with Hilary Cottam and Marc Stears really intrigued me, particularly Marc Stears’ idea that to start building a better future we don’t need big ideologies, but we do need to ‘extend our experience in the now’. Be more curious, more wide-ranging in our inputs, and more varied in our responses to them, much like the artists, writers and poets he explores in his new book Out of the Ordinary which I can’t wait to read when it’s in paperback. This is from the blurb: “[A group of artists] each worked to forge a politics that resisted the empty idealisms and totalizing abstractions of their time. Instead they were convinced that people going about their daily lives possess all the insight, virtue, and determination required to build a good society.”
4. The value of building in a regular creative practice. I am not saying anything new here, but Fridays are art day in my daughter’s home school timetable (thank goodness — because the rest of the curriculum is a disaster) and we have taken to both doing her art lesson together. The pictures in this post are my recent efforts.
5. I am deeply curious about this programme from Phoebe Tickell and Stephen Reid. The mode of organising, the topics, the tools (especially the money and organising ones). In general in this time of deep learning I remain fascinated by the scope for distributed, network based learning — from OwnIt to our Communities of Interest, to the Peer-to-peer university (lovely post from Carolin Goethel). What if… this was the solution to more of these difficult challenges? What if… we used the power of peer to renew our relationship with technology, for example? And so we circle back.