By Dr Maite Ibarretxe
As an individual, I recognize that my impact on global issues is limited unless I can create sufficient leverage. When I speak of leverage, I’m not referring to simply amplifying ideas or solutions. Attempting to convince others to adopt specific ‘solutions’ often alienates those with different perspectives, leading to abstraction and hindering creative thinking. Instead, my efforts have consistently focused on generating leverage through collaboration and enhancing the power of collective intelligence.
Climate change is presenting us with challenges that affect us all, on an individual, corporate, national and global level. While there is still denial or underestimation of the climate risk, the reality is quickly catching up and increasingly visible all around us. So, even in the most optimistic scenario, it must be taken seriously, and it demands a deep rethinking of our way of life, our achievements, and ultimately the economy that drives it all.
While there are many different interpretations to it, the core challenges remain the same, and can be summarize in one sentence: How do we preserve our achievements and our relevance while we transition towards a sustainable future?
The fear of losing these achievements and facing the unknown makes many cling to what they have and miss the opportunity to explore what could be.
In the political arena we see how these fears are often exploited for short-term electoral gains, fueling further instability into the system while failing to address the common needs we have, that call for greater co-operation, community strength and equality.
Given the enormity of the challenges, facing them head-on as an individual, a single company, or even a single country will not be sufficient without creating the necessary leverage to bring others along.
Financial limits and the supply security and affordabolitly of main goods require combined efforts to mitiagte the risks associated with climate.
These challenges are inherently global as climate change does not recognize national borders To address them and trasnform towards a sustainable future, we need:
- An all-encompassing vision for our future relationship with the planet, grounded in sustainability and long-term well-being.
- A compelling narrative that eases fears of losing social gains and embraces change as a pathway to shared prosperity.
- A clear strategy to realize this vision through practical, actionable steps.
- Tactical solutions that execute the strategy effectively, ensuring progress is both measurable and sustainable.
I believe that by embracing collaboration and collective intelligence rather than perpetuating outdated competitive approaches, we can find common ground and three elements can help to create the leverage needed to turn these shared challenges into opportunities.
These three elements are Excellence, Trust and Innovation.
We can look at them as infinite cycle of interconnected events, starting from the notion that without excellence it’s hard to build trust. Same as without trust, ideas won’t flow freely, and innovation cannot flourish.
Excellence – when we talk about excellence, we often think of strategies, frameworks, data, as well as knowledge and expertise in key areas.
On the other hand, Excellence should also encompass ethical standards, accountability and a strong moral compass together wuth the relentless pursuit of a shared vision, even when the path forward is complex and uncertain. In the context of sustainability, excellence helps to define the criteria for how we approach global problems by bringing together diverse perspectives and expertise in a way that fosters innovation and drives meaningful progress.
All these attributes not only build credibility and trust in the system, they also help create new opportunities.
Trust – Here relationships are at the center, where trust is the foundation of collaborative environments governed by influence rather than hierarchical power.
This safe environment fosters inspiration and pave the conditions for innovation to emerge. There is a significant difference between compromising and uniting people to formulate a common position towards a shared vision. The latter is more sustainable because it becomes embedded in the DNA of those participating in the process. When trust is established, it paves the way for genuine collaboration, where parties are co-creating solutions that are more robust, inclusive, and enduring.
On a practical level, enhances efficiency by shifting from a bureaucratic to a relationship-driven model. This dynamic is evident in the relationships between corporations and other systems actors such as financial institutions or governments.
Innovation-is the lever that can propel us toward our sustainability goals. Innovation must be understood broadly – not just as technological advancements. It is also about new ways of thinking, organizing, and collaborating.
While many companies and individuals still think of sustainability in terms of energy transition, the root cause of unsustainable practices makes us look at our current economic system, which is still overly focused on monetized growth. To truly innovate we must rethink those economic models, embracing integrated value as the norm and adopt orchestration to achieve it. By orchestrating people and ideas, we unlock the power of collective intelligence, creating leverage -both in WHAT we want to achieve and in HOW we can achieve it.
The Leverage Wheel – These three elements are interconnected and thrive in combination with one another. To illustrate how their synergy leads to leverage, I came to design the Leverage Wheel, where these three elements are brought together.
As the model showcases, excellence combined with trust builds efficiency, while trust paired with an innovative approach fuels inspiration. Innovation and excellence together, as well, ensure effectiveness, and the combination of all three provides the leverage needed to achieve your higher goals.
Leverage can be created in many ways and at many levels. Within your own organization or with other companies, within your country or with other countries, in all cases the aim is to expand our influence or offering or to make resource capacity more efficient. In all cases it is about orchestration of people and ideas with the goal of achieving something greater than the sum of the parts
Change is upon us, whether we choose to embrace it or not. The environment will not wait; the same as society, the market and other constituencies will not do.
Leverage is essential because the challenges ahead are so significant that none of us should want to face them alone. Competing against each other in an uncertain future will only lead to the destruction of valuable capital along the way.
So, the same as we are already well underway with our excellence strides, my advice is to use the time well and start investing today in the other two elements -Trust & Innovation,
cultivating trust-based environments, and fostering innovative approaches to unlock your potential and create the leverage needed to reinvent ourselves and advance sustainable development
Using Leverage to unlock the power of Diplomacy for Sustainable Development
Looking ahead, I am hopeful about the future of sustainability. The principles of excellence, trust, and innovation guide my work as I strive to inspire and build collaborative structures, a safe space for experimentation, to maximize impact and ultimately create leverage.
As such, I believe that using leverage to unlock the power of Diplomacy for Sustainable Development can be an important lever in addressing the complex challenges of climate change and growing inequalities. Climate diplomacy unites nations and fosters critical partnerships between governments and businesses, where trust and collaborative efforts are crucial for driving innovative solutions. In a world where geopolitical interests often clash, diplomacy serves as a vital bridge, aligning diverse stakeholders toward common goals. The geopolitical aspects of climate action underscore the importance of these alliances, as diplomatic efforts can steer global policies toward a sustainable future, where innovation plays a key role in building resilient, low-carbon economies and achieving lasting change.
Creating environments where diverse disciplines within the public and private sectors can collaborate using lateral thinking to work towards a greater vision in harmony with our planet is crucial.
An ongoing Diplomat Sustainability Dialogue in the Hague, as platform for discussion, experimentation and collaboration, has the potential to be a powerful catalyst to create some of this leverage, where the principles of excellence, trust, and innovation can converge to create real, lasting change. By uniting diplomats, business leaders, and civil society around a shared vision for sustainability, we can build the leverage needed to help address global challenges effectively and equitably. In doing so, we will respond to the urgent demands of our time while laying the foundation for a more sustainable and just future.
