These are the questions.
At my firm, we mostly do media relations and marketing for companies in the sustainable chemicals and plastics sectors. From time to time, we work on energy and textiles or food. We build community and organise events and we donate 1% of our sales to environmental nonprofits.
For our clients, we define and test messages. We write articles and press releases and we profile them at events and online. I can genuinely say that we have great relationships with our clients. Most of them have been with us for a long time. For this, I am extremely grateful.
And yet, there are the questions…
The questions are always there, lurking in the background. Prodding me, poking me. Teasing me, testing me and asking when I’m going to do something about them.
As I’ve written before, I’m clear on my ‘why’. My ‘why’ is to do good work and make an impact. And yet, these pesky questions are constantly testing my ‘why’.
Sometimes I feel like it’s not enough to ‘just’ do marketing and media relations. Getting the right message and communicating it credibly is important. We do steer our clients towards greater credibility. And yet…
And yet, it feels like the questions are more than communications questions. They compel me. I need to be having different conversations. I need to dig deeper.
For sure, there are reports and campaigns and stakeholder engagement that can be done around the questions. But in the way they keep showing up, they demand more from me than that. They are about substance. And purpose and ethics and equality. About our economy and how things are today. And how they should be. About the impact I want to have.
Here are the questions:
How can plastics be more circular? How can we stop the wasteful use of plastics and only use them where they bring real value?
How can chemicals be more sustainable and solve societal problems?
How can food be more sustainable and ethical? Is clean meat or other novel technologies the future? What about Big Food?
How can we green apparel and change mindsets around fashion?
How can energy be less harmful? Can I become independent?
Why now?
After a year’s sabbatical and a few months back on the job, I am yearning for something to get my teeth into. Get my brain around. I want strategy. I want connection and conversation. I want creativity. I want this and need this.
This does not mean we will be abandoning sustainability media and marketing. Far from it.
It just means that I am ready to go deeper, to work on the questions, with the people who are doing the work, the people who can change how things are done.
I could keep going with more questions. But with my background as an environment and energy journalist, sustainability consultant and conscious business leader, this feels like the most credible starting point.
How I’m going to do it, I don’t yet know. This is me putting it out there. I want to work on the questions. I want to keep having the conversations that matter. To help change how we do things today.
If you are working on any of the questions and think I might be able to help, please reach out in the comments or email me at ks@sustainabilityconsult.com.
