Green Edge: Unleashing the Power of Green
August 27, 2013

 

Dear Clients, Friends and Colleagues,

 

I recently read a great article in the New Yorker magazine in which the author, Atul Gawande, a Harvard Medical School professor, considered why some innovative technologies catch on like wildfire while others take decades to gain widespread adoption.  

Vintage anathesia
To illustrate his point, Gawande 
compared the rates at which modern anesthesia and antiseptics, 
both discovered in the mid-19th century, were adopted on a widespread basis by the medical community. In the case of anesthesia, the rate of adoption was almost immediate. Gawande reports that within seven years after its discovery was publicized, anesthesia was used in almost every hospital in the U.S. and Britain. On the other hand, although infection was the single biggest killer of surgical patients, it took an entire generation before basic antiseptic practices were embraced.  

As I read the article, I was struck by the similarities between antiseptic practices and climate change mitigation practices. Like antiseptics, climate change mitigation combats an invisible problem whose effects are not immediate. Anesthesia, on the other hand, "changed surgery from a brutal, time-pressured assault on a shrieking patient to a quiet, considered procedure." 

Making the Cure Less Painful Than the Problem 

If we use the anesthesia vs antiseptics analogy, in order to hasten the adoption of climate change mitigation behaviors, engaging in those behaviors has to be more immediately painful than undertaking mitigation practices. One way this could be accomplished is by imposing a widespread carbon tax, or similarly for an organization, by "taxing" carbon-intense practices and rewarding carbon mitigation practices.   

 

Remember when the price of gas shot up to almost $5.00 per gallon? Suddenly, fuel-efficient and hybrid vehicles were all the rage and car miles traveled decreased. Time and again, when people feel the effects of their behavior in their pocketbook, they regulate that behavior. But despite the likely straightforward results of a carbon tax, it's politically unfeasible. And similar widespread tactics have been nonstarters at the organizational level as well.

 

Relying on Engagement to Reach the Tipping Point
 
Mr. Gawande suggests another solution in his article. He cites the work of Everett Rogers, "a great scholar of how new ideas are communicated and spread." According to Gawande, Rogers showed that although "...mass media can introduce a new idea to people...people follow the lead of other people they know and trust when they decide whether to take it up. Every change requires effort and the decision to make that effort is a social process."  
 
Gawande cites the example of a door-to-door campaign in Bangladesh in the 1980s, with people talking to people as the key to an 80% reduction in childhood deaths from dehydration between 1980 and 2005. He cites a pharmaceutical rep's seven touch rule for persuading notoriously stubborn doctors to try new drugs: personally "touch" the doctors seven times; they will come to know and trust you, and if they trust you, they will change.  
 
So if "taxing" carbon-intense behavior would be as unfeasible for your organization as it is for the U.S. government, we have an alternative for you: engaging with people to spread the word about why carbon mitigation behaviors are in everyone's best interest and about how to implement those behaviors.
           
Let us help you engage with employees, vendors, regulators, landlords, tenants, clients and customers so you can capture your share of the billions of dollars that carbon mitigation practices generate. It's a win, win proposition. You can't afford not to.
 
Warmly,
Ellen Sinreich Signature 
Ellen Sinreich
President

212 317 1131 
 
Visit our blog