Know Your Enemy

Stakeholder!!  Not enemy, I meant stakeholder.  Sorry.

I’m joking, but sometimes it can feel like that when you have a clear plan for how to achieve your Net Zero goal and others won’t just do what you tell them. 

What’s going wrong?

You’ve presented the Net Zero strategy, and the actions that need to be taken are so obvious. You’ve explained it all really carefully.  Twice.  With graphs. 

Why won’t they just listen to you?!

But why?

Carbon reduction initiatives are complex, and implementation usually involves a range of stakeholders, all with different (possibly conflicting) priorities and interests.  And although the targets have been signed off at Board level, they are still somehow seen as “yours”. 

Net Zero is important to them, but for some reason isn't their primary objective.  Rude.

Is there another way to think about this?

If you try to “do” communication “at” someone, it’s never going to end well.  Stop pushing so hard, and listen instead.  Really listen to your stakeholders.  Encourage them to share their views, concerns, and perspective.  Let them help you understand how your proposals are going to impact them. 

One of the most effective changes I have made is to start using my stakeholders’ language.  I make Net Zero accessible for them by thinking about how initiatives will affect finance, procurement or estates teams, and then presenting it in their own words.  I don’t expect my stakeholders to join the dots for me – they’re busy, so I do the work, not them.

And once the conversation is working for everyone, it unlocks a whole world of knowledge and insights that you could never have accessed on your own.  Your stakeholders are experts in their own fields, and by challenging you, they can help you see where your proposal needs to compromise or flex to deal with constraints.

Stakeholders are not your enemy.  They are your reality.  And ultimately they are helping you, because a solution that has addressed and responded to real-world constraints is a deliverable solution. 

……Plot Twist!

Be prepared to change your mind, not theirs.