Billions and billions in images

Interesting…

And while you’re on Dan Pink’s website, take a look at his intriguing TED video on instrinsic motivation.

In brief, remember this:

• AUTONOMY
• MASTERY
• PURPOSE

More on “bridge building”

And while we’re pontifexing…

Let’s build some bridges between:

GLOBAL PROBLEMS      and WORK OPPORTUNTIES

In a most gentle way, we’ve got some issues fellow Earthlings. I blog about them frequently (although not recently)…

How we move, how we eat, how we think, how we share (or don’t), how we consume…. They’re all major complex problems that are leading us to our own destruction. (Sorry to be a doomsayer, but look at trends!) By not looking at the BIG picture (often due to the lack of bridges mentioned in last post), we don’t see how these problems are interlinked and how we can get to the root causes.

When I say work opportunities, I mean that we need to use our productive working time on figuring out how to solve these issues. What you decide to do with your life matters to all of us (idea behind the jyu talks event)

We’ve got a lot of work to do and it doesn’t help when we leave it to our spare time to volunteer or donate here and there to “a cause”. We need to WORK. And we need to build bridges to make those jobs available.

So, who wants to ‘pontifex’ with me?

Seriously, I’m planning an event for Net Impact Central Finland, Global Venture Lab, Social Entrepreneurship Assoc. etc… all on this theme. If interested in building some bridges, and you’re in Jyväskylä area September 22, let me know and I’ll give you the details…

Let’s pontifex.

A friend just passed me a book by Aldous Huxley, “The Human Situation” (actually a series of lectures he presented at UC Santa Barbara in 1959). Now I feel bad blogging about it since I’ve only read, ahem, 10 pages, but they’ve been great!

pon∙ti∙fex – latin for ‘bridge builder’

Now, I think originally the Romans used this in a religious context building a bridge between the material and the spiritual, but I think this word should come back into fashion.

Huxley used the term to show his dissatisfaction with highly specialized learning and its pitfalls for dealing with human problems (the more deep you go into one subject, the less able you are to understand another).

I couldn’t agree more.

It’s not just that I’m now a pondering PhD student (in the deep waters), but I think it’s a fundamental problem that holds us back from solving complex problems. In a University, when knowledge is in such close proximity, why am I so distant from the engineers, the teachers, the sociologists etc. when their knowledge combined with mine could really get somewhere in solving a big problem? Where are the ‘bridges’ between faculties? Between students with different knowledge and skill sets? We talk a lot about collaboration but it rarely happens in practice. Even the marketing student can feel distant from the accounting student.

So we need some bridges between:

ARTS     and SCIENCES     and BUSINESS     and TECHNOLOGY     and EDUCATION and…

Last year at my University here in Finland, I organized an event called JYU Talks to kind of pilot something in my head… my head is spinning with ideas (it’s now just a matter of building my own bridges to the talent that I need to get something lifted!)

More on pontifexing next post. Thanks Ben for the book – this word is just too cool for school;)

On a personal note, can’t believe it’s been 2 months. I went back home for a few weeks traveling around Canada, watched my sister drop the Porter name and become a Carey:),  and now just prepping for what looks like a busy Fall. And yes, I’m still in Finland – at least for another year… but life questions abound…

Abandon sustainable development? My rant on the Economist debate.

Oohh… way to make my blood boil.

Check out the Economist debate on “This house believes that sustainable development is unsustainable”.

Whew, a lot of thoughts on the Proposer, Mr. David Victor’s  Opening Remarks.

Yes, the term “sustainable development” needs work.

It has been universally accepted because no one can say that looking after our grandkids’s kids is a bad thing – yet what does that mean in practice? That’s where the term becomes empty and becomes everything for everyone.

Is it possible to live sustainably? Not really (we are far from it) although Cuba seems to be the only one who’s got a fair shot at it. (Map the Human Development Index and Ecological Footprint index and you’re left with one little communist country.)

Technology (on its own) will not save us.

Mr. Victor is optimistic that we can be saved through our own ingenuity. When we look at the trends (that giant 90 degree angle), we are unprecedented in our population.  In other words, our checks and balances haven’t been checked for a while (where do we expect this curve to go?!?). Even if we “innovated” our way out of the energy crisis with renewables – our lifestyles still won’t last on this consumption wheel.  Mr. Victor’s salt example is of but one resource. We’re in a different ball game now.

That being said, technology + societal change will at least give us a better shot at coping (not necessarily to be sustainable just yet, but at least less unsustainable;).  We can’t look at innovation as being purely technological (invention-based) either. It means process/market/service and thinking-based innovation – we need to change our mindset. And it’s worth asking the question: is all innovation good? The short answer is no. What can produce value in the short term, doesn’t always transcribe for the long run (disposables anyone?) and not all economy-boosting innovations are even good for the present social/environmental needs.

Returning to those kids of our kids

Mr. Viktor’s second point is that we (in the sustainable development camp) have only focused on the harms that we will pass down to our kid’s kids and not the benefits. I have one quick response. We leave them nothing if we don’t leave them with energy, space and biodiversity.

And those damned policy makers…

His third point is on policy (I’m writing a paper on this exact topic so happen to feel rather intelligent in my grounding right now …). Extracting resources to further economic growth today with hopes that the consequences will be beneficial to future generations is careless and dangerous to say the least.

Smart regulation and policy making means that we need to figure out where we want to go – together with all of the decision makers. If governments really put meat (or hearty veggies;) on the meaning of sustainable development, it means policy makers from all sides need to agree on a future state and start transitioning the economy, directing innovations towards creating that sustainable future. This doesn’t mean that governments should choose which innovations – it just means that they need to create the environment where the market will move into this direction.

Human ingenuity on its own has done us tremendous favours – but let’s not forget that it has also led us to the tragedy of the commons…

Renewables shwpenewables.

And sorry, Mr. Victor – your attacks on renewable energies don’t reverberate with your “let’s innovate out of this conundrum!” Mining to the last drop without aiming for new sources is ridonculous.  And the comment on windpower being an eyesore leads me to discount much of what you have to say – MIT/Harvard grad or not. Lets look at alternatives through full life cycles & costs please. Being “frugal” with a limited resource still leads you to a dead end in the end.

Economy + Environment … and oh yeah, Society.

True, sustainable development tends to leave out the social side (he’s right to ask where’s the human rights, dignity or fairness in this talk?) Sticking the ‘human side’ back into economics and realizing that it isn’t just about money models will help with this. But, I have to say one thing that it often left out of the international development debate – ending poverty can’t be the end goal either.  Sustainable international development … now there’s a whole other paradox.

…

Mr. Victor ends “the last two decades have yielded an empty debate. Intellectually and politically, sustainable development is not sustainable and has become dangerous. It should be abandoned.

Abandoning the concept of sustainable development is abandoning this planet as we know it.

I say, the last two decades have yielded an empty debate. Intellectually and politically, sustainable development has not been sustainable and has become dangerous in its inertia. It should be attacked head-on.

…

Until then… cover up when you sneeze come this Fall. Our “check” on the population might just be around the corner…

Perhaps not the most optimistic ending for a post but it may just wake us out of our immunity fantasy.

Needed: the next “pulp and paper” industry

Instead of going straight to the comments, thought i’d post my response to Jay’s comment regarding my last post in a fresh new post.

Yes, pulp and paper – as in “pulp+paper” is a dying industry because the market is no longer growing partly due to our tech habits which not necessarily a bad thing…

Those who own the logging rights will still be there… the trees aren’t going anywhere (or let’s hope not – and let’s use this renewable wisely) – but the end product has to change. The capital investment is already there – a sunk cost for most.

Half of the log is energy – the other half is proving to work well with the nano industry making nanocrystalline cellulose which could be our “new plastic” and a biodegradable new building block material. All I mean, is that there are options with the end product.  It’s in the vested interest of all of the players along the chain to keep these mills open – not just as “pulp+paper” mills.

This can be done with much of the same capital investments – their recovery boilers have been making bio energy for over 50 years… the technology is around 70% efficient (natural gas at 80%) – the technology is there.

And if some investments are written off in this case, just remember that the worse case is that they are ALL written off.  Also, by changing their end product focus they would also keep much of the same producer/supplier network  – giving some hope to these dying communities.  Making this shift will take time, energy.. and money of course. Black liquor is a tricky substance, NCC isn’t ready yet etc. But remember…

Canada will always have trees and those green things will come in handy again once, ah, our tar sands wear out. But once these mills shut down, they’re gone – along with the network and skill that supports it.

We’ll be hitting ourselves if we lose this sector.

Here’s hoping.

Some views on the pulp and paper boondoggle

Wrote this as I waited to get on to the ferry at Turku and didn’t have a chance to go online til now… Was going to be “Why the silence on the p&p boondoggle” , but the “silence” broke the first page of G&M yesterday.

Oh, well, better late than never…

Do Canadians understand the extent of the problem in the forest industry?  Enough about the car bailout, the pulp and paper industry has a right to complain and stick out their hand for government funding.

I usually take the anti bailout stance – what fails, fails. Done. Let the market determine. GM et al. didn’t do their job keeping up with the time etc.

But what’s happening in the pulp and paper industry is unnerving and it’s pathetic at how little lip service they’re getting. I was happy to see that it was in the Globe on Friday. But it still didn’t get down to the point.

WHY THE PULP AND PAPER INDUSTRY?

As someone who cares about the environment, people (i.e. new readers) may wonder why I support this industry seeing as though they have often wrecked havoc on our forests, polluted our air, etc. But, I see a different view on the pulp and paper industry. I, for one, don’t see it as a sunset industry. If they changed their vision to being a biomass industry they might just get themselves out of tunnel vision. They’re not about pulp products and paper products… they could be about energy. They could be about new biodegradable plastic, they could be…. (Read my views on it here.) – and this here requires us to invest heavily in R&D.

Black liquor is not a known word in the popular lexicon. But this green fuel (about half the log in the paper process) is one of the original biofuels made from waste product.  I believe it’s the fifth biggest fuel in the world. (sorry no links on this – sitting beside an expert on it though right now;)

WHAT’S HAPPENING?

The U.S. is subsidizing companies to promote greener fuels for transportation (i.e. blending biofuels with fossil fuels). Sounds good enough. But this also worked the other way around. Pulp and paper companies were then allowed to add fossil fuels to their original green fuels (black liquor) to get hold of the subsidy. Talk about a boondoggle….(that’s a good Bloomberg article)

What does this do to Canadian pulp and paper companies? Essentially destroys them. The p&p companies in the US are getting subsidized to the point of $250 000/day (for a 1000 ton mill a day). Let’s put this into perspective. International Paper got $330 million after taxes in Q1 of 2009… that would have been enough to keep the mills afloat in this downturn. Looking from an international paper company perspective, which company would be shut down – one in Canada or one in US?  The Canadian one of course,  the one with no subsidy. Who was looking out for these mills in Canada that just shut down? The managers operating mills in Canada are kind of muzzled since their sister mills are reaping in the benefits over the border (meaning Corporate of course won’t make a stink).

This subsidy has devastated one of the largest export industries in Canada. Mills are shutting down right left and centre, leaving billions of dollars in investments idle, useful infrastructure in limbo, and productive/knowledgeable workers (not only mill workers, but the entire network and community that surrounds it – what about the contract workers without pensions?) – in the dust. Once shut down, it’s hard to get these mills and these people back up again.

It’s frustrating.  Canada is resource rich on a renewable fuel (i.e. we have plenty of trees) As Harper pours billions of dollars into the oil and gas industry (clearly a limited time only investment), we’re letting a possible answer to our energy crisis slip between our fingers because we think it’s a sunset industry.

Enough silence. Time to get mad.

The Chinese Hummer

I was just about to post something yesterday when I saw that GM was letting go of its Hummer. It would be good riddance. I hate those things – they were meant for the army, not for city roads.

But now, I see it’s moving over to China as the Hummer is the ultimate status symbol for the middle class.

How scary is this?

I know that China is about to take centre stage in the global economy and although that’s worrisome for us, I’m worried for their own sake.  If this is the direction they’re taking their wealth, I don’t think they’ll be in the limelight for too long before their own collapse.  They’re in a little different position that us..  over 1 billion people living our lifestyles and idolizing the Hummer? Just wait. It won’t be long.

The “hugging” police in high school?

Morning in nytimes “For teenagers, Hello means “how about a hug?“

I think it’s rather nice. So what if kids just stay in the hallway and hug? It seems some people have issues with it:

“And schools from Hillsdale, N.J., to Bend, Ore., wary in a litigious era about sexual harassment or improper touching — or citing hallway clogging and late arrivals to class — have banned hugging or imposed a three-second rule.”

Wow.  I think US schools have more to worry about than students jovially hugging one another. Hugging’s a natural “feel good”.

When school shooting and bullying are increasingly in the news, just let the young American culture embrace the hug:)

Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

Student leadership in high school: a trip down NWOSSSA lane

Oh high school…

The sound of the lockers, the smell of the caf, the drama in the girls washrooms, the geeks, the jocks, the cool group, the football and cheerleaders… it was all there. I love telling my European friends that “yep, it’s not exactly what you see on TV but pretty much.” They’re just dumbfounded and love pouring through my yearbook – complete with “Jane, I’m writing in your crack!” on the back page full of signatures and precious stories.

I didn’t realize it then, but I can see now how the independence and leadership training played such an important factor in my life. (I taught English at a high school in France and saw a completely different picture).

If I was to be classified, I was the girl who ran around the school, did the morning announcements, part of students’ council and part of NWOSSSA - the North Western Ontario Secondary School Students Association.

I went to my first NWOSSSA leadership conference in Grade 9 and worked my way up until I was head of events for the 2003 conference (dream dare do!). This is no small conference – it’s a three day long event with over 300 students and a budget of almost 50k. Not bad experience for an 18 year old.

What I loved most about it was the feeling that you got when you left these conferences. It’s a high you just can’t describe. Not only do the walls between jocks, geeks, drama kids fall (an incredible experience to see on its own), but it was incredibly fun, emotional and above all, inspirational. You felt like you could move on from high school and do anything you wanted. You were just about to embark on your journey of life and the world was at your fingertips. The games you played weren’t simply games – they taught you about the fundamentals of leadership and before you knew it, you were debriefing how you acted in a game, realizing your strengths and weaknesses and what to do to be a better leader.

It’s something you’ll never forget.

Though, there are times when I do forget.

I forget what it means to lead from behind, to let others do work (even if you think you know what’s best), to remember that it’s the journey, not the destination. In high school it seemed like a breeze, now I’m beginning to see where I slip.

As I likely begin my PhD journey I feel as though I need to revisit those NWOSSSA leadership manuals and take a good look at what seemed so second nature in high school.

My parents come to Finland next week and my dusty old leadership manuals are coming as per my special request. They’ll be good for me as I venture on to my newest project, starting and leading the Central Finland Net Impact chapter – an organization to change the world through business. Never lost the drive for leadership though, and sustainability in business seems to be my theme in life – and where leadership is needed most!

It’s been nice pouring over the good old NWOSSSA days. I can say I spent thousands of hours with that organization, not paid but one of the most purposeful jobs of my life, and the memories last a lifetime.

The 2009 leadership conference is next week and I’m even getting excited for the new delegates to see what it’s all about.

Good luck and enjoy the hug-tolls

For some oldies check out the pics and more.

new trailer from the buried life

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