Can You Help?

Our friends at Climate Vision need your help with a Crowdfunder campaign … over to them to give some more details on what’s involved and what it’s for …

“In 2009, the Footsteps Project took place where networks of climate activists and scientists in Truro delivered a behavioural change campaign to support local and national delegates involved in the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference (COP15). We asked individuals and communities to think about the carbon cost of their lifestyle and to pledge easy and realistic carbon cutting actions. In only four months, the campaign enabled 4488 individuals and organisations to adopt low-carbon and sustainable behaviours such as buying local, saving energy or researching climate change.
We are now looking to calculate the carbon cost of our campaign in order to show to COP21 delegates that behavioural strategy solutions can be effective to achieve carbon reduction targets. We also want to show that they can compete with risky and more expensive technology such as carbon storage and capture. Finally the carbon cutting pledges added value to the local economy, building resilience and enabled communities to engage with climate change.
To make this happen we need your help. We aim to raise £5k through a Crowd funder that started May 1^st, half will go on data analysis to provide a Cost Per Tonne, half on publicity and getting the story from Cornwall to Paris.
We would also like to invite you to visit our Crowd Funder page to pledge to help and be a part of this solution.

If you want to hear Sundays BBC Radio Cornwall interview, listen in at 2hr 28 mins in http://bbc.in/1KUXn8Q Many thanks”

There’s Nothing Wrong With a Bit of Healthy Competition!

I just watched Rush, the story of two fierce competitors, Niki Lauda and James Hunt. Both very different characters competing beyond excellence. Their competition was before I was even a twinkle and yet their story has really resonated with me.

Both excellent formula one drivers in the 70s for very different reasons – one a technician, a perfectionist, the other a passionate risk taker. Both confident in their abilities and capacity to develop and handle a fast car in (almost) any conditions. In 1976, at the German Grand Prix, Lauda had an extraordinary accident with deep facial burns and no-one thought he would race again. James Hunt continued through the season and won enough points to contend for the world championship. It was watching James Hunt win those points that got Lauda through numerous surgeries and back on to the track in only 6 weeks! At the end of that season, Lauda is head to head with Hunt for the championship…..a deep competitive spirit between these two individuals.

Towards the end of the film, after Hunt has won the world championship, they meet and Lauda says to Hunt to get back into training so that he has someone to compete against.

The point is that we don’t want to beat our competitors, but rather have competition who is worthy of beating! Good competition means that we all do our best, work our hardest, fulfil our potential and achieve great things….so bring on the competition!

Claire Eason Bassett, Managing Director, Mackerel Sky

What’s Your Luxury?

One of the current exhibits at the V&A museum is ‘What Is Luxury?’ And I am fascinated by the concept of what we would each constitute as luxurious.

Maybe it’s about investment of time as much as money. I know that for me, time to myself is an incredible gift. As is spending a small fortune on a dress that I might wear four times. Or it might be the incredible skill and expertise in the creation of a gold pocket watch. We often think of luxury as being expensive and it often is, but it is relative to our earnings, background, ethics etc. What I perceive as luxurious will be different to yours but that doesn’t make it any less or more valuable.

In business particularly, time is also a currency of sorts and can be very expensive! Think about the amount of money that a meeting costs in terms of staff salaries, room hire, catering….let alone the time that could be spent on other aspects of work that directly generate income. So are we getting the maximum benefit from our time? Is wasting time a luxury that we can’t afford?

Perhaps it is but I would argue that what might be perceived as wasting time for one is a productive informal chat with a colleague whilst making a cup of tea. So it becomes about how we value our time and manage it as a resource that has a cash value against it. Think about what is most important to you. And how much time do you spend doing that?

And remember that it is not just about what you spend your time doing but are you the best person to be doing it? Is it your strength? Is it your interest? Perhaps there is someone out there who can enable you to focus on what you are good at by looking after the stuff that you don’t actually need to do. Those tasks where you don’t actually add any value but it costs in time that could be spent on delivering your product or service.

It might even feel a little luxurious to be building a team, or handing over the accounts, or letting someone help you with your admin, but what is the cost of not doing it?

Claire Eason Bassett, Managing Director, Mackerel Sky Events