How the wrong message, or the wrong audience, timing, or venue, can ruin our attempts to influence others on sustainability topics.
The Big Backlash
As I write this article, a widespread retro-pedaling is occurring among private corporations in the self-proclaimed “developed” world, from engaging or investing in a category of activities, generically (and obscurely) labeled as “ESG” (Environment, Social, and Governance). What these corporations have tried did not work for them, or did not work satisfactorily enough. Many even incurred losses.
As a result, many sustainability thought leaders, including some well-known climate experts, are becoming more frustrated than ever. Their efforts to, as they often say, “raise awareness” about the dangers of global climate warming, and what to do about it, seem to be working even less today than before the backlash.
But even before the backlash, climate experts could not speak about climate with certain people, including leaders in politics and industry, without triggering knee-jerk or aggressive reactions. This hostile audience has been labeled the “climate deniers.” Now, both the latter and the former have become angrier at each other.
Well, I am not surprised. To be clear, I believe that we do have a global climate problem. But I also believe that we cannot force a piece of information down the ear funnels of someone who is not ready to receive it. And if we succeed in doing so, they will surely have indigestion. Because they can’t metabolize the forced food.
First, it is good that corporations want to correct what is not working for them. Second, climate and other experts also need to correct what’s not working with their communication.
The Solution: Meet a Demand Exactly, and Build From There (if Possible)
You don’t give solid food to a two-month-old baby just because you, the adult, can eat solids. You don’t talk about Nietzschean nihilism with a 4-year-old. You don’t give a thick wool pullover as a present to someone who lives in Manaus, Brazil. You do not gift an item of lingerie to a person you do not know. And you don’t give unsolicited advice to anyone, period.
You do not give something—anything—to someone who does not need it. Or not at that time or place. Or not if you are the wrong person to give that particular thing to them (as in the lingerie example) – although you’d be surprised to learn how often we provide information when we are not the right person to provide it. It is amazing how often we think we are the sun in someone else’s solar system!
So, what can we do instead? You will find detailed recommendations in my upcoming book, How to Communicate Sustainability for Success. You can also download a free excerpt here. In this article, I will present how (ethical) marketing and sales techniques also apply to effective communication.
When we try to persuade someone, we are in fact trying to sell them a piece of information. The payment we receive in return does not need to be in money. Attention alone is a valuable payment (social media is full of it). But in the case of sustainability, obtaining that “they” do what we want them to do is what we are really after (because it benefits all of us).
Sales 101
I had to learn it the hard way myself, and I am far from perfect. For someone to buy something from you, they must want it. It is not enough for the seller to know that the buyer needs it. People buy what they want, whether or not they need it. It is called “demand.” Unethical marketing and salespeople will manipulate a potential buyer’s emotions to get them to want to buy things that these buyers do not need. And that is exactly how excess (production and consumption) occurs in the economic system.
Now, of course, since you are a sustainability professional, you would NEVER sell anything to anyone who does not need it… Right? Hahaha! I know it is a very far-fetched assumption, but let’s pretend for a moment that you are 100% ethical.
As a climate expert, you also know that EVERYBODY needs a livable climate. And you are correct! But, sorry, you can only sell information about that to those who have become conscious about needing such information, who therefore also clearly want it, and express so.
With everyone else, you either do not engage or will have to meet them where they are exactly (with their current wants), and have conversations with them about what they think they need and want at that moment. In the conversation, you will need to cautiously and politely explore, by mostly asking questions, whether you can bring your interlocutor to see, by themselves, a perfectly logical link between what they say they need, and what you have to sell. You will have to demonstrate to them that what you have to sell fulfills their current needs exactly. And do not attempt to sell anything before the need becomes so obvious to the interlocutor herself that she’s the one who asks for its fulfillment. A good salesperson asks (good) questions. And that’s almost all they do. All the while, they show they care deeply for the person(s) in front of them. They walk away and do not sell anything when the absence of expressed need is clear. After enough trial, error, and fine-tuning, they come to targeting only a specific group of potential buyers. The ones whose needs match what they have to sell, or whose needs are just one or two logical steps away, so that the full connection with what they sell is easy to establish.
If you don’t do as ethical salespeople do, you will fail in some respect. And more often than not, you will also antagonize your audience for a long time. They will feel rightly intruded upon, and they will raise taller, thicker walls between you and them. Remember that pesky door-to-door salesman trying to sell you a revolutionary donut maker, or that illuminated preacher, also door-to-door, trying to convince you there is a faster way to redemption?
It is natural to proceed in life as Abraham Maslow suggested: one need fulfillment after another, after we’ve become conscious of such a need. It is also natural to reject what someone wants to force us to accept. There are steps in the progression of one’s consciousness, and a certain order in which they emerge. We cannot run until we have learned to walk well enough. We cannot grasp “the other” if “the self” is not sufficiently established. And we cannot grasp “the whole” (the common good) if we have not learned to accept “the other” as they are, warts and all.
It Takes Systems Consciousness, That Is, an Integrated Mind
No matter how great your idea is, it must perfectly meet an expressed demand to be adopted. So, you will have to rack your brain a little to establish the logical links between what you have to sell and the pressing needs of your interlocutors, whether it is food, income, a house, health, technical advice, or transcendence. And that’s no easy task. Most first-time entrepreneurs fail because there is no demand, no market for their fabulous product or service. Sustainability experts fail at selling their expert knowledge because they are terrible salespeople.
Luckily, the global climate is linked to all human needs, material and spiritual, because everything is related. But bad luck: only a small number of humans have connected sufficient dots in their minds to understand this (have a sufficiently, consciously, integrated mind.) And I do not know anyone who can see and describe all things and all connections in and out of their minds! The expansion of one’s consciousness to the point of even only starting to understand the interconnectedness of all things (and all needs) takes considerable life experience, that is, effort, error, pain, and perseverance. But deciding to become more conscious and then putting one foot after the other can lead to a pretty decent level of competency sooner than we may think.
How consciously integrated is your own mind?
If you yourself cannot clearly and articulately establish a link between the need for a livable climate and another human need, how can you possibly expect that others can?
Organizations and individuals are entities in an ecosystem. Well-functioning businesses and people fulfill the needs of other entities in the system quite exactly. In this way, they also receive what they need from the system in return, at the right time and in the right place. Giving and receiving seek to align.
Dear thought leader, what need(s), duly acknowledged and clearly expressed as “wants”, and by whom, do you contribute to fulfilling, with the information you provide? And what about you? What are your own needs? Tell us in the comments.
If you are interested in testing the level of consciousness that your leadership team has of their mind and system connections, try a Socratic conversation. I am here ONLY to fulfill your expressed needs, only if you want, and only when they match exactly what I have to offer. So, let’s find out if it’s the case! Reach out!