Ideaplants

Have you ever been in a conversation and got tired of the other person complaining all the time?

Sometimes it seems to be a popular nation-wide sport, complaining about what others did or did not do, about how bad the world is, but no of course none of us could change the world anyway.
But then sometimes you come across these little projects initiated by a few creative people and you just think: “This is really neat!”

One of those initiatives is Easy Sunday’s. It’s a simple idea and it works. Four colleagues (of mine actually) got together and founded Easy Sunday’s. This was almost a year ago, since then they cook and bake and prepare food about once a month to then invite friends and everybody else to join them for a brunch on Sunday’s each time at a different location in Brussels.

Everybody that enjoys the food and drinks donates a bit of money, which then goes to a good cause, be it to buy school supplies for a Moroccan school, supporting handicapped babies in Vietnam or like this coming Sunday to support children with severe heart problems. Will you come too on Valentine’s Day?

For more info check their site, you can also sign up on Facebook

http://www.easysundays.info/
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=48328815999

Bon appetit,

Sylvia

How often did it happen that we have to send a video file to our client that takes hours to upload.
And that while the client is just a 20min drive away. But of course everyone is on the way to a meeting it’s rush hours so even a taxi courier couldn’t solve the issue. And of course it should have been delivered yesterday.


Pedalbxl is a solution to such a situation here in Brussels. And not only quick but also green. The company offers delivery services by bicycle. Not only cost effective but also fast and reliable since the common traffic trap in rush hour times can be avoided. A nice concept really.

Just a nice viral video (part of a Friends of Glass sustainability campaign) to share with you. Merry Xmas to everyone!

Mira

I just read through an article on China Daily in which Marcos Fava Neves, professor of strategic planning and food chains at the School of Economics and Business, University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, proposes to add another dimension to the model of sustainabiltiy. Normally we consider the economic, social and environmental perspective (triple bottom line) when assessing sustainability. Marcos Fava Neves proposes to add in the context of organizations that struggle to implement this concept as part of their planning and operations pro-activeness as an additional measure.


When reading the article I started wondering whether pro-activeness is really what we are missing. Companies do most of the time act in different ways. In my eyes the issue is rather a lack of ownership and leadership in the space of sustainability. In a traditional company structure sustainability is not assigned to any specific department and therefore it is unclear who should be taking the lead on this.


It’s not just about what you do but also about how you link individual activites. Ideally an organization has an overall sustainability strategy and links activites to this strategy with the aim to create one real and coherent sustainability story. Transparency and involvement of internal and external stakeholders is key here. This involves HR, marketing, business development, and many other divisions.

Getting everyone on board requires not just pro-activeness but also smart leadership.

When was the last time you made a rational choice as part of a complex decision? Thinking about it seriously, I’m not even sure that I’ve ever made one.
How is it possible to consider all possible factors and anticipate what option might be best with our little brain that has a limited amount of knowledge?

The choice for the right study programme, the most promising job, the least polluting car, the relationship that will last forever or simply the greenest energy provider often bring us to the edge of our capabilities of making a rational decision.

James G. March wrote in his book ‘A Primer on Decision Making’ about the limitations of rationality. He identifies four factors that limit us in the way we make decisions while also considering challenges for organizations:

1. Problems of attention: Limitations in the time we can spend on considering all factors
2. Problems of memory: Capabilities to capture and process all the information we gather
3. Problems of comprehension: Capacity to grasp complex issues and interpret them correctly – this is especially difficult in complex situations that cover a wide field of knowledge areas
4. Problems of communication: Problems with sharing and communicating crucial information, factors that are not presented clearly and other limiting issues e.g. due to language and cultural differences.

All these issues make it quiet difficult for someone to make a decision that is solely based on rationality – this is probably not a good excuse for individuals and businesses, but it might explain certain behaviors and put off pressure of people that think they should always make rational and fair decisions.

Especially in organizations that have been around for a while decision making processes are extremely long and complex. In todays fast changing world, this limits and blocks the organization in making the right choices.

In today’s environment the biggest challenge is not anymore to make the right choice, but to adapt to the changing environment.

A lot of flexibility is demanded from individuals and organizations. It’s not a surprise that young organizations with less structure and processes seem to cope with this much better than multinationals that are following a model which is already many years old.

We’re calling on people around the world to organize an action on October 24 incorporating the number 350 at an iconic place in their community, and then upload a photo of their event to 350.org website.

And what does this 350 number even mean?
350 is the number that leading scientists say is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide—measured in “Parts Per Million” in our atmosphere. 350 PPM—it’s the number humanity needs to get back to as soon as possible to avoid runaway climate change.

View the map of actions here

Kanal Consulting Group a US-based management firm has developed a 12 step guideline to Implement sustainability accross an organization.


As reported on greenbiz.com, they propose the list of steps to implement sustainability in order to improve the “bottom line and the environment”.


The list covers: Be coherent in what you do, have a proper strategy & model, get everyone on board and roll this out across departments.





Employee engagement seems to be one of the key components that are still perceived as challenging when it comes to implementing sustainability.


In a way it makes sense – we are dealing with individuals on whose motivation the success of the project depends. Coming up with a really motivating internal campaign to get everyone on board, opening up the plan so employees can propose their own ideas requires not only a lot of preparation but also a rethinking of the current thinking that is being done around sustainable development. Is it time for an open source approach for global companies?

After months of hard work on our project, our e-tree team was present at Nuit Blanche Metz and Nuit Blanche Brussels this weekend.


After a long trip we finally arrived in Metz with our installation. The setup went faster than planned and also a big projector was put in place to project our e-tree animation on the wall of a big school. Everything seemed to go fine except for the Internet connection.


The e-tree project however depends on an internet connection since the animation is accessible via a website and connected with a twitter account.


After several hours of trying different connections, chasing the technical team and getting help from many different people, the official starting time of our project had passed and the stress level was rising. Since France Telecom was not willing to come and fix the problem someone had the idea of ringing doorbells at the nearby houses to see if anyone had a wifi connection we could use. After the second try it worked. A very kind neighbour came down to help us out with his connections – he even agreed to have a 100m cable being thrown from his balcony so we could get a direct connection at our both.


One hour later we finally had a good Internet connection and people could enjoy the animation. What a night! Luckily things went much smoother the day after in Brussels and since we were lucky with our location the tree was almost constantly occupied. During the 2 events over 700 messages where written on the e-tree ranging from simple expressions and messages to friends to thoughtful comments on world peace and philosophy. Try it yourself!


Here an interview that was done on our way between Metz & Brussels:



And here a video showing the e-tree in action in Metz:

Dear readers,


I would like to invite you all to a multimedia installation that I’m putting in place with a group of artists.
E-tree is an interactive project that will take place at the Nuit Blanche of Metz and Brussels the 2nd and 3rd of October 2009.


Visitors and people from the web will be able to insert text to our system, which will make a tree grow and messages will be visible on Twitter.


You can join us online the day we make the performance and participate online on the growing of the e-Tree.


Join us and express your own ideas!
Wanna see what other people write? Please follow: http://twitter.com/e_tree on Twitter


Practical info:
Metz: 02 October 2009 20pm – 02 am CET Lycée Louis Vincent (Metz, France)
Brussels: 03 October 2009 20pm – 02 am Mont des Arts/near the music museum (Bruxelles, Belgium)


Let us know you are joining!
Everyone is welcome to sign up here for the event.


For more info on this project, please visit www.e-tree.eu



The project team:
Jesús Azogue
Mira Bangel
Inge Mestdagh
Thomas Popovits
Steven Ramsdonck
David Cammaerts
James Davy
…and many nice people that are supporting us


All the best, Mira