Every country comes to Copenhagen with their own agenda, seeking to influence the agreement so that it favors their particular situation and demands less of them. What a challenge to create sufficient shared purpose and sense of one-team to facilitate the willingness to sacrifice personal short term gain with group longer term sustainability. As I watch them struggle to reach agreement, I realize how much easier it makes things in a corporate structure when there is one overall boss who has the authority to pull most of the strings that influence culture. For changed behavior on climate change we need enough trust to develop that everyone is prepared to give something. The PM of Australia was quoted yesterday saying that ‘he would not give anything unless everyone does’. Hmm…
The Oxford Leadership Academy has started a journal with the wonderfully aspirational goals of “changing the trajectory of civilization” in which I wrote an article about building a culture which supports sustainability. Take a look here.
