Naji: Hello, leaders of the world. Welcome to spread love in organizations, the podcast for purpose-driven healthcare leaders, striving to make life better around the world by leading their teams with genuine care, servant leadership, and love. I’m Naji your host for this episode joined by Elizabeth Sawin founder and director of the Multisolving Institute. Beth is an expert on solutions that address climate change while also improving health, wellbeing, equity, and economic fire fatality. She developed the idea of multisolving to help people see and create the conditions for such win-win solutions. Her work has been published widely. She has trained and mentored global sustainability leaders in the Donella Meadows fellows program and provided systems thinking training to both Ashoka and Delai Lama fellows since 2014. Beth has participated in the council of the uncertain human future. A continuing dialogue on issues of climate change and sustainability among a select group of humanities, scholars, writers, artists, and climate scientists, a biologist with a PhD from MIT, Beth co-founders climate interactive in 2010. She has two adult daughters and those in rural Vermont where she and her husband grow as much as their own food as they can manage.
Beth, I am so excited to have you with me today.
Beth Sawin: I’m excited as well.
Naji: First, I would love to hear your personal story from biology to climate change being part of the UN convention on the climate change. What’s what story behind this impressive work.
Beth Sawin: Yeah. Um,
I would, I guess, you know, it’s always a, a, a challenge to think where a story starts, but I would start it as a little kid who just played in nature a lot. You know, I was the kid with the rock collection and the, um, the seed collection and playing in the Brook. Um, and so that led me to an interest in science as an undergraduate.
I saw at a biology and chemistry. Um, and I, I followed those two threads to MIT where I studied neurobiology. Um, I worked on a small soil organism, a nematode called sea elegance. Um, this was in the late 1990s. And the research question we’re interested in was about learning and memory. And the fascinating thing about this organism, um, you know, is so beautiful.
It’s a transparent about a millimeter long worm. Um, it has. A limited number of cells a little bit more than a thousand. And they’re the same in every single elegans there is, and they have 302 neurons, very specific number. Each one had a name, um, that was worked by my PhD advisor and his colleagues to make this map of a nervous system.
Um, so I was, I had little tiny piece of that to try to understand. Learning and memory and how neurons connected, um, to, to enable this organism, to navigate its environment. And I loved the re I loved the organism. I loved the research. Um, a lot of it was very quiet actually, because I had to work in a dark room, um, at a cool temperature, like 45 or 50 degrees.
Um, I did lots of microscopy. Uh, one experiment I did was using a laser to kill single, no Iran, and try to understand how the behavior changed. Um, So in some ways, you know, that’s a big departure for where I, I sit now, um, 30, more, 30 plus years later, right. Leading an organization that works on sustainability health, climate change, equity and justice.
Um, but the, I think the threads are still there. Um, Because I was studying a system and I was really interested in the whole system. Um, how, how, how do you put 302 pieces together and get, um, emergent behavior? So that interest in systems, um, led me to start following the work of one of the most important mentors in my life, which is Danella Meadows.
Um, she was the, she was the, um, co-author of a book called the limits to growth, which is actually the 50th anniversary of that book. Um, just this we, uh, so that was the first real global modeling study that used. Systems theory and computer simulation to look at what at that point was, you know, something off in the future.
Um, it was, they were asking the question, the human economy is growing exponentially on a finite planet. Um, what are the scenarios for, for that? Like, Obviously it can’t keep growing forever. Are there pathways to fit within the, the economy within the earth system? And in 1972, there were all kinds of options.
Um, of course today we, we know that the advice of those authors didn’t really get taken by the world and we’re all living through some of the implications of that. So , um, While doing this research in biology, I got to know Janelle Meadows. I was interested in systems theory and she was starting a research Institute in 1997.
It was called the sustainability Institute. Um, and she needed a group of, of young researchers because there was more work she wanted to, to do in the world. Then she could accomplish as an individual. Um, the only problem was, you know, I knew a lot about biochemistry, genetics, and neurobiology, and she needed people who could make computer simulations of complex systems.
Um, and, and so this is one of those leaps of faith in a career. Uh, cuz she was, she said, well I never studied systems theory as a, you know, in a formal way. Um, her husband at the time, Dennis Meadows. Was a PhD student at MIT studying systems theory with Jay Forrester and Della taught herself systems theory at the kitchen table using Dennis’s books and notes.
She was like, I taught myself, you could teach yourself. I was like, oh, okay. I’ll teach myself. Um, You know, now I look back, she’s probably the most brilliant person I’ve known in my life. So the fact that she could teach herself something, uh, was not like a universal that anyone including me could just sit down and, and master that.
Um, So it was a very steep learning curve. I did take a few classes, um, and I learned the basics of the, um, of the math and the computer science to build, um, what we call system dynamics, computer simulations, which are ways, um, to use computers, to handle the complexity and the interconnection of world. Um, there’s, there’s more of it than we can mentally simulate, which is, is one of the reasons so often that our systems, whether they’re.
Families organizations, countries, um, uh, international relations, you know, things go off the rails because of that complexity because of especially feedback loops, where we make changes in the world and then they feed back in ways we don’t expect. Um, so that was a big leap for me from, from biology to sustainability and systems theory, um, that led to.
You know, so many other important things in my life. One is, um, where I ended up living and raising my family because Janelle MES was really committed to the theory of sustainability, but also the practice of it. And so she had a vision around that same time in the late 1990s of a, um, a community of people, um, living more cooperatively than most Americans sharing land and.
Resources and, um, practicing sustainability to the extent they could. So, um, my husband and I got inspired by that vision and we joined as the, some of the founding members of that community where, where I still live in Vermont. So it’s 23 families on 280 acres, um, that, uh, you know, far from perfect. But we, we practice and learn about, um, you know, Everything from sustainable energy to composting toilets, to energy efficiency and agriculture.
Um, so that’s been. Really important throughline of my life is the more grounded practice of what does sustainability mean. Um, and then of course this introduction into the wor world of systems has framed pretty much everything. I think about, you know, our, our work in the world, but also how we try to organize and participate in teams and collaborations with, with just this underlying belief that.
The world is actually, um, a unitary complex system. They’re the, uh, the boundaries, whether they’re between disciplines or nations are usually, uh, we call them mental models, things that, that human beings have made up, but they’re not. They’re not the physical substance of the world, you know, there’s between Russia and Ukraine, because we’re talking right now at this moment with the world’s attention, there there’s a line on a map, but in the ecology of that part of Europe, there’s, there’s no line.
Right. And of course, Anyone who’s, who’s been to space and come back and told the rest of us what that feels like. That’s one of the most pronounced things that those explorers of of space say is, you know, this, this small unitary earth that we all share. Um, so that, that journey through sustainability Institute eventually led to a project at sustainability Institute called climate interactive, um, which grew to the point where it became its own organization, um, where I was a co-founder along with Andrew Jones and co-director until.
Little more than a month ago. Um, and most of those years that climate are active, were focused on, uh, these same type of computer simulations, focused on climate change and what countries and, um, businesses and leaders could do to, um, meet climate targets. The. So we use computer simulations to help people ask really fast.
What if questions? What if, what if China rapidly decarbonized? What if the United States switched to all electric vehicles, questions like that? Um, and, and playing that out for the a hundred year future, what would, what would temperature and sea level rise and, um, droughts and air pollution look like under those different scenarios?
Which was F fascinating. Um, you know, just like I loved the biology and the, the intricacy of that one organism. Um, this was a different kind of in intricacy of trying to represent, you know, the whole global economy and the whole planetary climatology. Um, And that work led to so many fascinating places, um, including you mentioned the UN climate conferences, um, for a group of scientists, uh, you know, to find our way into advising some of the world’s governments and.
Civil society via, and also, you know, journalists who are telling the story of these, of these meetings. Um, one role that we ended up playing was, was saying if all the countries in the world accomplished what they’re promising, because in, in these negotiations countries, each say, you know, they’re gonna reduce their emissions by a certain percent, at a certain time.
And we became really good at. Um, asking if every country did what they said, what would that mean for the a hundred year climate future? Would we meet the goals that they said they were making these pledges for? Um, and year after year, our message, there was pretty much, um, you’re making progress and there’s further to go.
Um, and, and I are really frustrated to be honest, like saying that you year after year, cuz you know how urgent these issues are. Um, we don’t have. Time to just slowly make progress and have further to go. And every year of delay, um, means like losses and suffering, right. It means communities and ecosystems that we can’t recover.
Um, so, um, that, I guess that frustration gave birth to the old strand. I’ll tell you about which kind of leads up to, to the present moment. Which is this idea of multi solving, um, with, within the climate negotiations, um, there’s, there’s kind of a, laser-like focus on the greenhouse gases on, and particularly on CO2, um, which is.
In some ways as it should be like, that’s the source of global warming is CO2 and countries need to come up with ways to limit that. But, um, we’ve been talking about complex systems and interconnection and of course, CO2 doesn’t exist in a bubble it’s connected to, um, fossil fuels, which end up, you know, having other than just CO2.
And I know a lot of your audiences. Comes from health. So of course, people know about air pollution and all of the impacts, um, on, um, developing embryos on people’s, um, circulatory system, their respiratory system, their nervous system. Um, but, but in the space of talking about climate, all of that’s often ignored.
And so you have two problems that could be, um, improved at the same time by weaning countries and economies off of fossil fuels. Uh, But, um, and this is improving, but it’s still far from where it could be too much of the time. Those are two separate conversations with public health, thinking about air pollution and climate and energy leaders thinking about transportation and, um, the global climate.
and that’s really important because by bringing issues like that together, you bring together timescales. Um, the health impacts are often a lot quicker, you know, though, we’ve been talking about the a hundred year future when it comes to climate, but if you remove tail pipes or coal-fired power plants, the air in a community gets better in days to weeks.
Um, and incidents of things like asthma gets better on that same kind of time course. Um, so. Bringing these issues together, um, can can help with this problem of long term problems are hard to face. Um, politically they can be hard to get the energy for. You can combine that with short term short term benefits.
Um, and the other thing you start to pull together with more of a whole system view is the costs and the benefits. You know, we, we have to spend money, time and effort. To build a low carbon energy system, but what we would get on the health side, um, and the world health organization has been saying this since 2018, the health benefits outweigh the costs of the energy system transformation, um, expenses.
But when those two things are in silos, Then the net win overall for the whole system. It just stays out of reach. So, um, multi solving is this idea of solutions that tackle more than one problem at the same time. And as of a month ago, that work on multi solving, which was incubated at climate interactive.
Um, now is part of a freestanding organization called the multi solving Institute, which I’m the founder and director of. So that’s the long and winding story. Well,
Naji: it’s, it’s an amazing, inspiring story, Beth. Thanks for sharing part of your, your story and journey. Um, and you ended with the multi solving Institute.
So let’s double click on this. And I remember when we first discussed about it, uh, you, you gave an example of a simple town with bicycles. And then with system dynamics, the impact overall about it, and you kind of touched it and you really frame it as a win, win, win solutions. So can you tell us a little bit more this story or any other story where you think we can have immediate impact, in fact, and, and in the word.
Beth Sawin: Yeah, multi solving definitely, um, is best communicated through stories. So I’m glad that you asked that. Um, and one of the things that we do at the multi solving Institute is collect case studies that show the variety of possibilities. Um, so maybe I’ll just mention a few that my colleagues have researched that are some of my favorites.
Um, one is a project we learned about in New Zealand called warm up New Zealand. And it was a response to the, um, energy crisis or sorry, the economic crisis of 2008, 2009. So it was meant to be a jobs program for the construction industry in New Zealand to upgrade homes that were energy inefficient. And it, it was successful at that.
Um, homes got upgraded, there were good jobs. Um, and so that’s a win, right. But we’re talking about the win, win, win, as you said. So, one interesting thing that happened was, um, researchers from the health side looked at the residents in these homes that had been upgraded and they tracked things like ha um, emergency room visits, hospitalizations, and, um, the costs of medications.
And found really remarkable savings on the health side. Um, and that’s simply because people were living in more comfortable, less drafty, um, homes potentially with better air quality. And, and so there’s, you know, there’s the second win and they’ve, they’ve developed that now, so that they’ve included, um, you know, public health, health leaders and primary care physicians, people through this program, we understand can a doctor can.
Can refer, um, patients for home energy upgrades, right? So, you know, we laugh about, instead of taking aspirin and call me in the morning, it’s like, go get new windows and a new boiler. Um, and, and so that’s an example of this stretching across boundaries that we’re talking about. Um, and the, the power of these, uh, solutions, really the engine that drives them is people being able to connect across these sort of arbitrary made up.
Lines in the world, right. When we say this is the department of energy, and this is the department of health and they’re, they’re in different buildings and the people have different training and speak a different technical language and likely don’t know each other. Um, and so those are all hurdles that have to be overcome by people leading this type of work.
Um, do you have space for another example or is that, is that yeah, please? Um,
I’m well, one that has my, uh, my interest these days, uh, is happening, I think, around the world, in the United States, there’s 19 different states experimenting with electric school buses. Um, so the first real advantage of electric school buses is for the children who. You know, are, are waiting, um, at school or on their corner in their neighborhood and breathing in diesel exhaust fumes from traditional buses.
And, you know, kids are right at that level of where the air is the most polluted. Um, uh, so an electric school bus removes right away, some of that burden of air pollution, which has so many health impacts on people. But the other thing that can happen, um, is, uh, during the parts of the day, when the school buses aren’t in use, they can be charging, but they also can be connected to the grid as giant batteries.
And we know that part of getting a really clean energy grid is using these. Intermittent sources of power, like wind and solar. Um, and so there needs to be a smoothing process to balance out demand with the generation. So school buses or any kind of BA are, are also big battery, right. And they can be used to help smooth out those highs and lows.
And the other thing that they are is, um, mobile battery. And so in, um, instances where there’s. Impacts like climate impacts say a storm that takes out the power grid in a place. Um, you can send fleets of, uh, electric school buses, which are, which then can be used for people to charge their phones or keep their medicine cold or whatever is needed, um, in a community after a disaster.
So, you know, these are, these are pie pilots. People are trying to figure out the. So, you know, the budget, how to make it all happen. An electric school bus is more expensive right now than a diesel bus. Um, but it shows you how you can put these really different problems together. Like on the face of it.
You wouldn’t think kids with air pollution, getting to school is connected with making the electricity grid work better, but this is some of the just innovation that’s bubbling up all around us right now.
Naji: I love it. And you said the arbitrary lines in the word, I love how you framed it. When we start taking off those lines that we created, obviously we can imagine the possibilities and what we can do.
Beth Sawin: Yeah. What about, and you know, that’s, I mean, that’s the human element of multi solving, right? Because it’s you human beings who transcend those. Those boundaries agree.
Naji: So what about, uh, leadership as we were talking about human being, do you, do you see, uh, multi silver as a key capability for a leader in the 21st century?
Beth Sawin: Yeah, we, I mean, we’re really curious about this and, um, we, we think of our role as.
The, I think the contribution that we in our little Institute can make, or one contribution is to look across these examples of multi solving and really try to notice what are the attitudes and approaches that are enabling this way of working to happen. I mean, even from those two examples of home energy upgrades and electric school buses, you can start to see how the variety, you know, we haven’t talked about, um, agriculture projects and walkability and cycling and, um, you know, photovoltaic farms, like there’s, there’s endless variety in the what of multis, but the common threads seem to be about the way, um, that it happens.
And. And, and so that is. You know, of, of continuing interest to me is how is that way different than the sort of status quo way within our dominant culture and institutions. And I don’t feel like we have it, um, you know, a hundred percent understood yet, but, but some patterns, um, are emerging for us. Um, one of them.
I would say is that multi solving projects tend to start small and iterate and be, um, really led or driven by a learning approach and by curiosity. Um, and so you might think while there’s all these different players involved and there must be some giant vision, um, about how to put it all together and how to convene it all.
Um, and that’s not so much what we see, you know, we see, um, sometimes. Just a, a few people working together in a small way. Um, having some success sharing what they’re doing, which builds excitement, which pulls more partners in. And so they try a little bit more, um, they carefully measure and document the impacts they’re having.
And that’s part of the driving force that, um, allows projects to get kind of like a accrete, more and more energy and attention and collaborators. So I would highlight that as kind of, um, Both a learning, learning attitude and an openness to kind of reach out to others. Um, we, we also see, I’m trying to think how to turn this into a positive.
I don’t quite have it. So I’ll just say the, the reverse, um, people who are too attached to the identity of, of an spurt, um, is actually counter to multi solving. Um, You need expertise. Like there needs to be someone who understands the power grid in that school bus project I was talking about. Um, but you also need curiosity about the parts that you don’t know about.
Right? You need the transportation planner. Who’s like, tell me more about public health. I don’t really know what air pollution does to somebody’s lungs. Um, and you need the public health act expert being like, what are the obstacles to redesigning our streets? Um, so. Maybe you could, you could just really emphasize, I guess, the role of learner versus the role of expert and a certain kind of humility, um, that I think is really needed for these projects.
Um, so there’s think there’s more, but maybe those are the two that do really highlight, like learning organic iterative, curious and humble.
Naji: Thank you. Thank you for that. It’s these are so powerful and, you know, I love the framing within expertise, but also curiosity for the things you don’t know. So it touches the humidity side of things for us to be able to Multisolve in a, in a dynamic where
Beth Sawin: you were.
I think there’s, you know, there’s one more. Can I add, cuz I think it’s important. One more to add, um, all of these projects. Are playing out against a backdrop of a world with all different kinds of inequities. That’s just the nature of our world right now, whether it’s, um, racism and white supremacy or, uh, patriarchy and gender inequity and, and so on different places, the, the inequities are different, but.
They’re part of these systems we’re trying to transform. Um, and for multi solving to be effective, uh, leaders have to be willing to grapple with, um, those inequities and make disrupting those inequities part of their strategy. Um, Because multis solving is about healing fractures in, in this kind of way.
We’ve drawn lines and broken systems into parts, um, inequities of all sorts do that same thing. Um, and so the, um, the people who have historically been. Um, marginalized or disenfranchised from decisions about the infrastructure, say in their neighborhood, um, need to be included in a multi solving project.
And so right away you have, um, potentially, you know, experts with economic, political credential power, uh, needing to work together. Other with neighborhood residents say who might know the most about, um, you know, What the problems are and what the potential solutions are. And, and so people need, um, support and skills and patience, uh, for, for working together across those boundaries and, and dismantling them as they go.
Naji: You, you worked, uh, Beth closely with Donella Meadows and you, uh, shared in the beginning, her, uh, her book, the limits to growth. Uh, so she’s an incredible thinker teacher, researcher and, and leader. Um, I read one of her articles with a title. There are limits to growth, but no limits to love. So I was intrigued to hear from you about this, this title, and also love in system dynamics for a sustainable word.
Like what does love gets into this?
Beth Sawin: Yeah. Um, one thing that really interests me is. For sure. Danella Meadows, but other systems theorists too. I think of Gregory Batson, um, who wrote several articles about love, um, uh, who was also in that even, um, earlier than Danella Meadows and her colleague, one of the kind of founders of systems theory.
Um, and then for Dan or Dana, as we called her, um, you know, she was very forthright of talking about love, um, which was. Was, and is unusual, right? For, um, a highly credentialed scientist building computer simulations, very rigorous and analytical to also be talking about love, which is so often not in our scientific discourse.
Um, Danella died. Um, far too early, she, she died in her late fifties and I had only been working with her for, you know, a few years. I, I thought I would have a whole career to learn from her. So I never asked her why love was such a prominent thing, but for her, but you’re right. In addition into that article you name, um, uh, in.
In the follow on books to the limits to growth. One is called beyond the limits, which came out in 1992. Um, there’s a chapter that’s about, um, what, what do we need in order to, uh, address the sustainability crisis? And she named, I think it’s eight different things, um, vision and networking. Um, can’t give you the whole list, but one of those is love as well.
Um, another thing about her. Is, and I’ve only reflected on this in hindsight, but any email that she would send and it might be like, I question the parameters in equation, number 45 of your model. Would be love Dana, um, which is a, a countercultural thing to do, you know, certainly my MIT professors didn’t write emails, sign emails like that.
Um, but I, so all I have is my theory, I guess I would say I’ve thought about this a lot, like you, but I never got to ask her. So these aren’t, her are words of why love became such a, a force of her thinking. Um, but I have. Put myself in her shoes and you have to picture 1972. They were very young. These authors of the limits to growth.
I think they were in their early thirties, um, such important information for the world at a time where if they had been listened to the tragedies that we’re living through now, the flow floods, the fires, the diseases wouldn’t be happening. Right. We would be 50 years later. Coasting into an era of balance and sustainability.
It probably would’ve taken these five decades. Um, so knowing what was at stake, knowing that there was an alternative, uh, knowing to some extent the suffering that would happen by not being listened to, and you’re not listened to, you’re not listen to for decades. Right. Um, To keep going under those circumstances.
I can’t, um, you know, imagine the loneliness of that. Like those of us working in climate and sustainability today often I think feel lonely and feel like we’re not listened to. And yet our movement has millions of people. And this was the very planting, the very first seeds of that. So I think she was looking for what is the.
What is the force that can bring the human global society, you know, to safety. Um, and I, the other thing she wrote about a lot, you might know this is about worldviews and paradigms. Um, uh, because I think what they experienced was what they were saying at those scientists couldn’t connect because people couldn’t imagine that this life based on extraction from the planet, that they couldn’t even imagine alternatives to it.
Um, and so I think talking about love and talking about, um, being motivated by what matters most to us was. Was the best solution she could come to, you know, for the transformation that was needed. Um, and I think the reason love shows up so much in, in this discourse of, of systems theory, um, is that when you work with systems, you see the interconnections, you see there’s, there is no separation.
Um, and so, you know, whether it’s. Domination that happens in a workplace with an abusive boss or domination that happens between one ethnic group and another there’s no systems basis to justify that. Um, and so I think also this tension between how the world was and what her systems models were telling her, you know, the reality of the world was resolved itself somehow in this, this, uh, Through line that she U she used the word love to describe.
Naji: Thank you for that. Uh, I will move to a section where I want to give you a word and would love to get your reaction to it.
Beth Sawin: Sure. Sounds fun.
Naji: So the first word is leadership,
Beth Sawin Beth: uh,
open and available.
Naji: What about sustainability?
Beth Sawin: Um, join. Do you want just one word I’m having have trouble with one word? No, I would say you can re okay. It can be, uh, sustainability, I would say, uh, rejoining the flows and networks of the earth.
Naji: So I wanna double click on, on this one. What, what, what should we do as leaders personally, individually? Like what is the first step that I should be doing that you would push towards sustainability towards sustainability
and rejoining those forces?
Beth Sawin: Yeah. Well, the beautiful thing is that because sustainability touches everything. It’s literally, how are we on this planet and how are we with each other that, you know, whatever field we’re leaders in, there’s a connection, um, to sustainability, um, You can find all kinds of lists of, you know, flying less is more important than getting solar panels.
And so I’m gonna not go to that level of detail. And maybe because we’ve been talking about both love and paradigm, um, I’ll put forth a, a way that I think about it. Uh, right now I, I believe that among. Our societies, there’s two different worldviews that are battling each other. Um, one sees, sees humanity and the earth as a pyramid that has white men at the top of that pyramid and then white women, and then people of color with animals and plants somewhere down below.
And, um, that theory has of course, um, comes with colonization and empire and has been. Dominating, um, most of earth for 500 or so years. But it is, it is only a, a theory of how the world works. There’s another way to see how the world works. And, um, many wisdom traditions and indigenous cultures, um, are embedded in, in this world view and carry it forward and, and live it today.
Um, and I think of that as a, um, an inner connected web. Um, so there’s no, there’s nothing on top. Um, and it’s all connecting and flowing in all directions. Um, I attribute most of the crises we’re in as coming from the fact that that pyramid view doesn’t actually match reality very well at all. Cuz in fact, if you look at biochemistry or climatology or ecology, it, it is all this flow and interconnection that we’ve been talking about.
Um,
But whether it’s the extraction of natural resources or the extraction of labor from people that you somehow deem, you know, beneath you in that pyramid. And it could be literally slavery, um, at certain points in history, but just as well, you know, unfair labor practices. Um, so there’s this, this extraction from nature and people falls out of that pyramid view.
Um, it creates crises because. The world, isn’t a pyramid. The world is an interconnected flow and there is no other, and there is no away. Um, and so I am gonna, I am trying to work my way back to your question of what can leaders do. And what I would say is. Occupy that worldview of interconnection of a web.
Um, and the, the beauty of that is that you are gonna have a hundred times a day to do that. Um, maybe it is, you know, choices about your physical plant. Okay. So your physical plant is part of an interconnected web that includes all life and all flow of carbon oxygen nitrogen on earth. Um, If you’re thinking of it as an interconnected web, you’re gonna think about the circular economy.
You’re gonna think about, um, very, um, intentional use of energy and materials. So you’re brought to sustainability, um, but you might, your next meeting in the day might be staff meeting with your team. Um, and are you gonna conduct that as though your company is a peer or amid with you at the top, or you’re gonna conduct that as an interconnected.
Web of mutual mutuality and responsibilities to each other. Um, which doesn’t mean there’s not authority, right? Um, there’s there’s situational authority. If you are the. The founder or the director or the senior member, you have experience and responsibilities. So, you know, it doesn’t mean all decisions will be by consensus, but it means you’re thinking about that staff meeting in a way where all voices, um, And all, you know, there’s, there’s, um, a climate for all of the voices to be heard.
Um, even if the, in the dis and the decision may or may not be by consensus. I, I hope that makes sense. That that
Naji: is super powerful. See, stop, stop seeing the word through a pyramid lens and, and just distrac, as you said of labor from people nature, but more an interconnected web it’s. It makes more that sense?
I think it’s, uh, yeah, it’s a responsibility. We have to, to think that way as leaders. Thank you for sharing this, pat. Yeah. On, on a related topic that you also work on, the, the next word is equity.
Beth Sawin: Well, of course equity is. Completely related to, to what we’ve just been talking about a world ver of, of a pyramid versus a web. Um, uh, the inequities around us are justified by different, um, theories of supremacy that are, um, if, if you’ve been socialized is in the dominant culture as I have so white woman in the United States, um, uh, Two of the most important ideologies of supremacy are, are white supremacy and male supremacy are patriarchy.
Um, and.
Those have to be grappled with unlearned brought out into the light where we can see them. Um, because of course they’re not, they’re not justified by the web view of the world yet. All of our science from, you know, particle physics to ecology says, actually, you. The world is this web, um, all of the consequences, um, from climate change to lead and drinking water, to, um, you know, child labor in different parts of the world, all these horrors that we say we want to, you know, quote solve are justified by these ideologies of, of supremacy.
So, so equity is choosing, um, To reject those ideologies and to live in ideologies of gender equity of racial equity, of ethnic equity. Um, and in systems theory, we talk about the interplay of worldview and systemic structure by systemic structure. We mean physical things like how our city, these are constructed.
Um, but also, uh, Laws and rules and incentives and investments. Um, and so because we’re, we are at a point of 500 or more years of those ideologies. Everything we inhabit is shaped by those ideologies of supremacy. And just like one example in the United States, um, the urban heat island effect is when parts of the city are, are warmer because of all the buildings and pavement.
And that can be counteracted by greenery, especially by trees, which help cool the environment. It, so it’s an important climate change solution. And. Recently people have been looking at maps of urban tree cover and in city, after city, in the us, those maps super superimpose with a great amount of alignment over maps of historic red lining, which are, um, the places where especially via lending practices, African Americans were prevented from living in certain neighborhoods.
Those neighborhoods are the ones that today don’t have tree cover. So that’s just an example of how the structures. Um, you know, we may feel like, well, redlining doesn’t exist anymore. And it’s many of those policies are no longer on the books, but yet in the trees, in the structure of the city, that inequity is still there.
So if you’re gonna address climate change and adapt to climate change in a way that dismantles inequity, somehow you need to bring the community together or to grapple with that fact and look at that history and figure out how to make amends or reparations for it. Um, and. That’s still far too rare, you know, in our, in our discourse.
Um, and time is getting really short. The I PCC report that came out, um, last week, Monday, last week, uh, You know, ends with these lines about a, um, shrinking window of opportunity to preserve a livable climate. Like those are the words of the scientists shrinking window of opportunity, livable climate. Um, but when you start looking at it with this lens of a web and not a pyramid, then you can understand why so many, especially environmental justice leaders say that equity is inseparable from climate and.
From addressing climate change. And I think this one example with redlining, but we could look at, um, other studies that show that in the us people of color. Breathe in more air pollution than their economic activity produces. And white people breathe in less air pollution than their economic activity produces.
Or we could look at how, um, refineries for fossil fuels that produce all kinds of toxic chemicals like benzene, um, are predominantly situated in NA neighborhoods, um, of people of color. So these things are tangled together and like any systems problem, you, you can’t separate them and you have to. You have to zoom out enough to see how they all fit together.
Naji: Yeah. And those are, you know, the systemic, uh, type of inequities. We can see it in healthcare also, as you mentioned, like from pollution to also health, uh, health problems. So yeah, definitely something to keep in mind as leaders as we move forward and start with.
Beth Sawin: Yeah, and we should name that pandemic as well.
Right. Which just has revealed again and again, the inequities, um, that tie all of these problems together.
Naji: Yeah. The last word is spread love and organizations.
Beth Sawin: Well, one it’s interesting question for someone who’s one month into starting a new organization. Um, one of our aspirations, uh, is to not instruct the world to do anything we’re not willing to do ourselves. Um, right now ourselves as a team of three, me and two colleagues and we have, I have plans to, to grow.
And so we’re also thinking about welcoming new people. We’re thinking about setting the patterns that we want to have as we welcome new people in, and our touchstone, um, kind of goes back to the beginning of our conversation of these attitudes that we, we are seeing promote multi solving. Um, and so. Be a learner was one of them, uh, bring your expertise, but not your identity as an expert, uh, is another way to say that, um, uh, I’m creating a white led organization, at least for now.
I’m the, I’m the director and I’m white and middle class. And I’m talking about multi solving, only being effective when you’re conscious about equity. Um, But we also know about systems and worldviews that it’s really hard to see, um, worldviews, especially if, um, you’re more a beneficiary of them than someone who’s, who’s felt the sting of them.
So, um, I’m thinking a lot about. Um, creating the conditions where my own worldview and blind spots don’t hamper, um, our, our effectiveness as an organization, um, that don’t create, you know, uh, for lack of a better word, white culture in an organization that hopes to, um, have a, have a, to that matches the diversity of the country.
Um, So I don’t have answers to most of these. Most of them are, uh, you know, questions to discuss more at our retreat or, um, uh, things that I know I need other people to help me with. But I think the lucky thing for us is that by learning from multi solvers, we have at least some amount of focus on, uh, you know, what we need to pay attention to and be deliberate about.
Naji: Yeah. And I’m eager to see how your organization will, will grow. It’s such an important topic and capability or even leadership, uh, principle to work on. So I’m, I’m eager to see how your organization will grow and help the word be a better place. Any final word of a final word of wisdom, best for the leaders around the world.
Beth Sawin: Maybe only just to beep across a, a little bit, because healthcare is a, a focus of your work and, and your podcast. Um, I think there’s. There’s a lot. I have learned from your field. When I think about social determinants of health and the phrase creating a culture of health, um, in some ways I feel like, uh, health, health, thinkers, thought leaders are a bit ahead of the climate space in understanding the.
The ways in which the conditions in our system create outcomes like health, um, and, and maybe more of a whole system view sometimes. So I don’t know if that’s a word of wisdom or more, just a shout out to say that, um,
I see a lot of potential from the climate movement to learn from some of, of that thinking. And, uh, and for me, myself to learn more from it too.
Naji: Yeah. And I, you know, as we discussed before, I think we also have a lot to, to learn and, and contribute to what you’re doing. Because as you said, when you think of it from an interconnected web, every single example that you gave today, touches health.
At some point somehow, right. And touches, you know, climate and E everything we, we talked about. So, so yeah, looking forward to, uh, to your work, and I’m sure you will be, uh, working closely with healthcare leaders to, um, thank you so much again, Beth, for being with me today and for having this amazing discussion.
Beth Sawin: Yeah. Thank you.
Naji: Thank you all for listening to spread love and organization’s podcast. Drop us a review on your preferred podcast platform
Follow us on LinkedIn and connect with us on spreadloveio.com. We’re eager to hear your thoughts and feedback. Most importantly, spread love in your organizations and spread the word around you to inspire others and amplify this movement, our world so desperately needs.