Birds, Bees (Biodiversity) and Business with Abby Chicken

[Music] Hi, welcome to Straight Talking to Stainability. Where every week we answer your questions and help you navigate the choppy waters of sustainability in your business. We're going to try and cut through the noise, help you simplify your focus, and hopefully choose actions that will really stick with lasting impact. We're all about sharing and making connections. So are you ready? Should we dive in? Hi and welcome to this episode of Straight Talking to Stainability. I'm Emma Burlow and I'm really pleased to welcome today Abby Chicken. Thanks for joining us Abby. Abby is head of sustainability at Open Reach. Big job there Abby. So I'm hoping to hear a bit more about that. But you're an experienced sustainability professional. So we're really excited to have you on the podcast. As well as being head of sustainability at Open Reach. You're also a trustee in the vice chair of Story Wild Life Trust, which is also fantastic, which is really what I wanted you to come and talk to us today about this kind of interface between business and nature. The birds, the bees and the business. So I see that I understand that your work's really broad ranging. Sustainability strategy, decarbonisation, but also nature biodiversity, circular economy, obviously engagement side. And you've been entering the world of carbon literacy as well. So we're going to probably cover that. So welcome Abby. Thanks again. I'm just going to dive in really. We want to know, want to hear from you, like what the biggest challenges you've got. And particularly around biodiversity. I find it quite a difficult topic. It's kind of on the outside periphery for a lot of businesses. So I've been really impressed with what you've done in terms of pulling that higher up the agenda. But what do you think is our biggest challenge when we're trying to engage businesses on biodiversity? I mean, I think you're absolutely right. It is on the periphery for most businesses, if they're not agricultural or really at the sort of the crunchy sort of face of nature. So for us, I think there's a real lack of understanding of how nature is relevant to businesses, especially if you're in a kind of service industry. I mean, for us at OpenRuch, we do operate everywhere. We build through various landscapes, but we're very light-hatched. We're not converting land. We're not huge polluters. We're not huge consumers of water. So having the conversation with our exec board, where they say, "Well, shouldn't we just focus just on the carbon stuff?" Because that's a problem for us. It just seems really kind of light for us, so maybe we shouldn't worry about it. And I think there's a lot of people who think it's nice to do. It's not really a problem, is it? It's quite green out there sometimes. So yeah, I think trying to kind of get people to talk on business pragmatic terms, or actually this matters. And it's maybe outside if you're existing business planning horizons for 45 years, but it is coming. Yeah, so what is the biggest thing that gets them to move from that kind of apathy position, I guess? So the thing that has worked for me, if I talk sort of bottom-up on top down, so bottom-up, like, nobody cares about carbon, you can't visualize a metric ton of carbon. So our CFO gets quite excited about that because it's straightforward and you can measure it and you can track it. But everybody else kind of goes, "carbon, what's that?" Whereas nature, everyone loves nature. I say everyone, hopefully most people can actually relate, but most people can think of a kind of moment in their life where they really have engaged with nature and value it. So they get excited by that. So that sort of works at a grassroots level. In the boardroom though, I think it's really meeting where they are. So if it is, if you're talking about risk, like, engaging with what are the risks of climate and nature crisis to your business, from a physical, from a transition and from a liability perspective, how does that translate into what really matters money, sadly? So when we've had the state of nature report and the dust gutter report, and all of those brilliant documents that translate this into, actually what is this doing to the economy, what is this doing to your bottom line, then you find people start to sit up and listen because it's not talking about, "Oh yes, but fluffy bunnies, it's talking about businesses," which is what they get at, that's why they're on New York. Yeah, and that's a bit I'm really interested in. I think a lot of sustainability professionals find it hard to find this, like the key to the door, like this mystery key that unlocks everything, and you know, it is often money, as you know, but it's not as simple as saying, it's going to cost you money because, like you say, you can't see it, so you can't put a pound, chill in and pants on it. We mentioned at the start that you're a trustee and the vice chair of Surrey Wildlife Trust, and I'm really interested in kind of why you went into that role and how it's helped you raise the profile of biodiversity, to open each of the two things sort of complimentary? Yeah, they are. I mean, I started, so I had been on that leave during lockdown, and so I live in Surrey, sorry, Wildlife Trust, and I started spending a lot of time in that first year of maternity leave, just basically hiking with my son, anything to kind of get at, house and so stuff, and a little sling and just jump around the place, and found all these brilliant walks right on my doorstep, and I was lucky enough to have gone to, I think, would have been a four-runner for a forest school. I had this one, everyone's got one really inspiring teacher, who kind of really cared about it, and it sort of reconnected me with some of the stuff I was doing as a kid, and so I was a member of the trust, and I think I saw some things saying, oh, the AGM trustees, and I thought, well, how'd you become one of those? So I just sent an email saying, how'd you become one of those? And they said, oh, as it happens, we're interviewing next week. So I went and did that. If I'm honest, I think I was a bit of a wildcard for them, because I'm not an ecologist. I didn't have huge amounts of nature conservation. We've got some brilliant land management people, but I, from a business perspective, from a kind of DNI, and people engagement perspective, I think I brought something quite different. So I hope they found it useful. I found it phenomenally interesting, because Surrey Wildlife Trust was one of the early developers of biodiversity and at game credits. I think it was quite far ahead in that. So as I was from a business hat, sort of watching this legislation, what's it going to do to us? And it's definitely to us, open reach, not for us, at the wildcard trust. Sort of learning how that all works. And so it's a lot in terms of nature engagement and that move of nature engagement into business. But also, outside of the kind of environmentalist and conservation part of it, I have access to a boardroom, I'm a regular part of that boardroom. And so really being able to kind of test what works here, people's arguments, because we do have, in the same way as any business, a real mix of views on different topics. So starting to be able to kind of understand how you get some of those arguments across with people who maybe don't agree on whatever topic has just been fantastic. So yeah, I think they are quite helpful to each other. Great. Yeah. And I think you've touched on something there that I've seen with a few of my clients that traditionally there's a bit of a golf between industry or business and charity, and probably even more so in terms of nature charity. So it's normal to have a charity that we donate to and then it was normal to have CSR and all those sorts of things. But when you come to a mutually, I don't say beneficial, but a mutual topic, right? For me, the most obvious thing is to get together to try and deal with that, but often you see a polarisation or why. So it's kind of, oh industry do that, you know, the big bad way and oh charity don't understand how we operate. So they of course they think that, you know, you just see this big golf. So I think that's really great. And I think you've engaged with other charities as well. Yeah, we have. And it's exactly that. I think the opportunity to kind of be greater than some of your parts, you know, if so we work with the RSPB. So we have it's a business conservation partnership. So it's not an old school kind of corporate philanthropy. We donate some fundraising and part. And it is their business conservation unit. They've got ecologists who are trying to help businesses on this transition. So we set ourselves the agenda of becoming nature positive and I am very aware that that becoming is doing a lot of work. And there's only so long before, you know, I set fire to my own platform. But I think, you know, working with them on what the steps are to really being able to make that claim. Has been interesting, but it is a two-way street. So as well as them helping us, we do help them with some of the other stuff, volunteering and things like that. But there's that ability of their CEO to me, our CEO to have conversations to the amplification of, you know, businesses going into government and saying actually we support this thing that the RSPB is trying to do. It's the muscle there, I think it's. it plays a different dynamic when you've got a broad sector. It's so important. I think it's so important. And I think I kind of look forward to the day where that's normal. That's normal. How many employees are open to each other? So we're about 30,000 people. So it's vast network of people. Were you to only reach 10 or 20 or 30% of those? It's a vast number for a charity-- like you say, not just with charitable aims, but with really a lot of expertise in it to reach. So I think-- I don't know if you agree, but I think we're missing a trick really in terms of building bridges between those two worlds. So I'm really glad to hear that you are, and that it's working for you. And it's not seen as a philanthropy thing, because I think that's just a bit too easy to throw a bit of money at it in the open. Yeah, that's so-- It is 90 CSR, isn't it? Whereas now, I think, finding a partner which engages on an issue that matters to you. So when I was in a previous role, I was at Selfridges. We had partnership with Oxford. We're talking about fashion and pre-love fashion, and it just made sense. And I think that that's where you really get great results is where it does make sense, and where there is that alignment of an agenda that you can sort of help each other. Yeah, brilliant. I think we need a lot more of that. And hopefully other people listening to this will see what you've done at being. I think, well, why can't we do that? From any business, any tiny business can partner with someone like a wildlife trust. And I know to the client that had them come in and do a lunchtime talk, and they've taken them some employees out on a walk. And the first thing, obviously, the employees say, is I had no idea there was a nature reserve, within more conditions of our office. So those things are not only nice to have, but I think really important in terms of trying to reconnect. And reconnect people. And again, bringing that back to the business outcomes, the impact on mental health, on well-being, on retention, all of those things. If you look at the amount of money businesses are spending on mental health absence, the green social prescribing agenda, connecting people with nature just make business sense as well. So I take great joy in where our old head office was, just next to Kamali Street, Nature Park. So I have-- I know. What happened in things that anyone who came off the train that came across us like this is where we're going? Oh, fantastic. Because that was-- became my breakout space. It was brilliant. That's a really simple step, actually. So yeah, I think that's a good takeaway for everybody to try to say, well, actually, rather than this one-off beach clean, or this one-off litter pick, or whatever we're going to do, which is all great. But we know there are just sort of one-offs. And what long-term relationship can I build with my local RSP and what I trust those are the two main ones, I guess. But there will be other smaller local charities as well. And like you say, it can learn off each other. I think that's a really nice hybrid approach. So turning now to carbon-- and I know you've engaged with the carbon literacy project, and we've run some training together, which is great. What have the outcomes starting to show from that? What are the learnings of your hair? Oh, God, it's the dream. So I can't take credit for it really. There was an inspired director in our team commercial who had heard about carbon history, wanted to do something. And so started this ball rolling, and did all of the hard work in terms of engaging his line manager on getting budget, and all of that stuff, which is really important and brilliant. But the shift for me is, I am no longer in a room. We go to various leadership panels. I'm no longer the only one who asks the sustainability question. And up until quite recently, there'd always be guests speaker and I can like, what are you doing? On sustainability. And now I can just sit there and listen. And they, rather than it being-- for people who are quite engaged in the darker side of the Greens spectrum, coming and saying, I've had this great idea, can sustainability do this? They're taking ownership for their own actions. And so what I get is occasionally, can you just have a glance over give a bit of a thumbs up? Or nothing? And I just hear about these initiatives happening, and it is fantastic, because that's the start of a movement. Wow. That's so good to hear. I'm trying to be one of your teams this week. That's really a huge change. I see stuff on LinkedIn. This is great. Yeah. Yeah. And I've been really impressed, too. And I think this is-- I think people underestimate that when you give people a little bit of knowledge, the bit we've underestimated how much they actually do care. And I think it's almost like your G.S. Lifting that lid off to say, OK, you've got permission now. Off you go. And because professional, well-educated people that have got good values, they do pick it up and run with it. So I've got a lot of confidence in that. But I think people still think, oh, people won't be into it, and they won't engage. So yeah, we focus on the negative. So that's really, really good to hear. And it's also really good to hear that it was actually started by somebody non-sustainability in the business. Yeah. And I think face to face in that room, and they kind of all-- I've been to a session. My team have been to some sessions, but it's not always or not even often sustainability people. So they all start to get the energy off each other and go away and make their pledge. And yeah, it's-- Yeah. And I think the beauty of it, Abby, is that it's not always a sustainability people. And the last cohort I trained, it is literally a real cross-section. And I think that's the beauty of it. Seeing some of the actions that are coming out as well, literally things I could never have thought of. Because as you said, they know their business inside out and the commercial teams have taken a really interesting slant on this. So yeah, if anyone wants to know more about that, we could talk all day about that. But I'm interested to see whether you think this could work for biodiversity, because there isn't really an equivalent. And so yeah, there's not. And I imagine this will seem like a really obvious point in a couple years' time. I'm not sure that they are or should be different things. I think-- And in COP next year, when it's in Rio, if they're talking about the climate COP, if they're not talking about nature when they're right next, they almost-- like that feels like a mess. So it feels like hopefully these agendas kind of blend because they do. And one is a solution to the other. So yeah, I think biodiversity is so desperately needed. For all of the reasons we've said people don't entirely get how to start when it comes to biodiversity. They get the KPIs and the carbon reduction. For us, I'm not going to say that carbon is easy, but it is straightforward. We know what we've got to do. And we know roughly how we're going to do it. Whereas when it comes to nature, I was on a panel the other day and somebody said, what indicators are you using? And I went, oh, god, I don't know. And I am invested in this. And I still don't know what indicators we're going to use to measure our progress. And that's overwhelming for a lot of people to go, oh, that seems like something else. Yeah. Just stick the lid back on for a bit, actually. Yeah, I get that. And actually, you could probably ask half a dozen people what indicators you should use. And you get half a dozen different answers at the moment. And I think there's a sort of-- there's a maturity thing to all of these things, isn't there? That we've somehow literacy's dropped, and we've almost got to start again from foundation level, and then it won't mature. And like you say, in five or 10 years time, we might not need it anymore, or something might have happened. Or we've got some sort of combined thing. But we certainly don't have that now. But I will repeat myself. I think it's just below the surface. It's really unusual to find someone who doesn't like nature. You might get a real city dweller that's like, no, I'm really happy in town. Occasionally, I like to go to nature. So it is very latent in us. And I think it's not that-- a lot of us at work in the sector often say, I grew up in the country, aside, or I was lucky to live in the other woods or see or something. So it is close to the surface. So just in terms of that, getting people engaged piece, I'm just interested in your experience in such a large company, how you start to begin to shift people. Because they must be really busy, as you said, happy to put the lid on it and wait to let it becomes more important. So how do you start to engage people in such a large organization and they're really, really busy? And they are, as you say, happy to just put a lid back on it. What's your secret there, Abbey? How do you engage people? So I said earlier about meeting them where they are. And I think that's one of the really exciting things about Open Reach is we have got, by nature of the job, a bunch of outdoor-- maybe not loving, but like frequently to be found outside, often in rural locations, engineers who work in all weather's. And they are engineers, they fix stuff. So the reason I came to Open Reach, because I thought, hey, the product does fundamentally help. And B, if you can galvanize a workforce of engineers and set their minds on this problem, then they just break it down and they fix it. And so that sort of-- I don't know if you're familiar with Ikea, there was a martial art, but kind of using the momentum of your opponent to the kind of. Yeah, this is one of my favourites because I think in sustainability, it really helps. - Yeah, it just leads me. - Whatever the energy is coming at you and use that to get you where you need to get to. So, you know, if it is your finance team, then talk to them about finance. If it's your legal team, talk to them about risk. And if it is somebody who is really passionate, then you can kind of cut loose and talk about dormice. But it's just kind of being, I think, as Kameleonic as that and being able to speak multiple languages. - No, that. - And one size does not fit all of them. Definitely doesn't fit all. But for us, this is something that played back on our social media. If you look at our corporate website, it speaks in a certain kind of voice. If you look at our Instagram, we have a lot of pictures sent in by engineers. Look at the Robin that just settled on my van or you know that. - No, that's what I mean. It's right there. - Yeah. There are countless. Here's, look at this beautiful view. You know, I had to get up early this morning and I'm at the top of the telegraph pole, but look what I can see. And it's never a cityscape. It's always a beautiful sunrise. - It's never a concrete car park. - Yeah, exactly. So, I think it's just having the kind of energy to try lots of different approaches and figure out which works and be really, really flexible. Because one size, absolutely, just not fit all. Yeah, I love that. Because, you know, the phrases, I'm sure you hear all the time when I hear all the time, is we're banging our head against a brick wall. And I may have felt like that in the past as well. But now, I'm kind of like, okay, different wall. - Yeah. - You know, move on. I'm not really, you know, I'm just not going to go there for three years on one topic. There will be somebody very close by who sees things in a different way. - Well, I was just, somebody said, you could approach everything with high intention and low expectation. And I really like that because it's kind of, you know, go in, hope for the best, but just don't necessarily, like expect that you're going to get results every time. And to build in yourself and your team's the resilience, to do that, you know, throw a lot of mud and some of it will stick. And because for most people in business, if you're good at what you do, you deliver what the business does. But for, if we're working in sustainability or DNI, or any of the kind of business disrupting and business functions, you are going up against it. So you've got to be able to just get back up and go again. And it can be exhausting, but you've got to get that into your head. - But I think once you've got that into your head, it's fun. You know, it's like when I trained for my one and only marathon, just putting that in my head. I was like, got it into my head. I was like, okay, right? This is this sort of challenge. - Yeah. - And so, which maybe an exact same way. (laughing) I don't know any. - Yeah, I went back and did that again. I don't know. Quite sure about that. So, yeah, no, I think that's a really good insight, I think. High intention, low expectations. And I find, and I know this is contentious, actually. People say, oh, the small things don't add up and small actions don't, are in the earth and we must be bold and all these sorts of things. That's one, that is a few point. My viewpoint is that if you don't celebrate those small actions, good luck getting the big ones. Because people need to sort of warm up. (laughing) There aren't that many epiphanies. The odd one or two. But, and, you know, newsflash, not everyone thinks like us and has the priorities, same priorities. So, I really like that. And being happy with that. And just going, okay, and now we go again. Because that's how you build, right? That's how you go from running one kilometre to. Oh, don't talk to me about running. I don't run. I don't run. Whatever. But that's how I thought about it. It was like, okay, you know, so now we do this and now we do that. And, I think I don't know if you told me this, but you weren't the first if you did. The story about Starfish. And you know, it wasn't me, but I was the second. This was it. We had a teacher who, oh god, I'm just asking what teachers today? Who loved this story in Assemblies? And it's a little boy on the beach. And there's been a title wave and all these Starfish or like 100 of them got across the beach. And so he's thrown them back in. And some guy comes along and says, "Well, how can we possibly expect to make a difference?" And then a little boy looks at the Starfish and says, "Made a difference to that one." And that, I think, is great. Because yes, those tiny little actions might not be the magical key that unlocks everything. But it makes a difference. Every single time. 100%. And I think if you, yeah, if we just talk about big actions, which are important, if you have that agency and you're in that right place and the wind's blowing in the right direction, setting big targets, all those sorts of things. But 99% of the day and 99% of the people are in that room on that day. So what are they gonna do? And so the option is you just wait for everybody to make bold decisions. So I think that's really nice and a really nice nature link there, Abit. (laughs) So you mentioned trying different things, right? So be honest with us now, what's been your most successful project or campaign you've taken? - This is not particularly kind of huge in terms of headline grabbing, but I loved it. So we piloted the TNFD, so Task Force One Nature-related Financial Disclosure. And as part of that, we were looking at our buildings and we mapped out assets that were within 500 meters of three protected landscapes. And we found that our Crawley training school was one of those, you know, thousands of buildings, the thing was maybe 42 buildings and stuff like that. And I thought Crawley, on an industrial estate, the back of Gatwick, which turns out is quite rich in others. Who knew? Those of others at Gatwick, very by diverse. But so we went, we went to have a look and I thought, how does this work? And they said, oh yeah, when we put it in, we had to do all these creosite trance because of the water course next door. And then we were getting the bus back to Gatwick to get the train. And opposite the bus stop, there's this little sign and it says, "Croters Brook." And I thought, what's there? So kind of went down. And there's a nature reserve and it is a, it's a protectorate, it's a triple SI, it's a ram-sized site, so wetlands. And so we went back to the people in the training school and we explained, you know, your training school is really important. Oh my god, that's amazing. Next time we went and they've set themselves up a partnership with the Gatwick Green Spaces partnership. So they're volunteering, they're extracting invasive species. So they're all like pulling up Himalayan balsam. And they said, oh, and we've planted some wild lassied over here and we've got, so off some of the offcuts of waste, we've made these bird boxes and they've been adopted by some glutes and, I know. Oh my goodness. And then we took our RSPB business conservation advisor, Natasha, and she said, oh, there's bats in this nature reserve. For now they're building bat boxes and they're so excited. And, you know, this is still quite early. And we don't necessarily have any indicators. But just that empowerment of a group of people who are passionate and kind of go, do you know what we can own this and we're going to? And they've got, by the coat, that's the base. It's just brilliant. Yeah. And I almost don't think any indicator can kind of measure that. Because, you know, it's a shift. It's not just a mindset shift, but it's a behavior shift. It's a, there's a biodiversity shift. You know, you can see it with your own eyes. It reminds me of it and I won't give the location away. But I went and see the pine martins in Rhorusity. We never see them. They're very, very enliven. But I went to monitor them. And the guy Jamie was telling me, the best place to see beavers. And I was like, oh, wow, what's that? And he was from Somerset. And he said, shall we next to the house, the car park? So, but don't tell anyone. I was like, no, I won't tell anyone. He said, but the loads of people know locally. They're the beavers of built at home, right? In between, I don't know, in between that. A bridge in the car park wall or something. You know, they've got a stream there, a culvert. So yeah, there is, you know, it's not, I wouldn't say it's an urban environment, but there's a lot of, you know, there's a lot of soil micro-own. So there is this kind of, how do we bring nature in? And I hear a lot actually businesses saying, oh, but we've just got a warehouse and a office and a car park. You know, we could have some, you know, they always want to go for beehives or, I don't know, wildfire boxes that die in no one, you know, waters. But even at headquarters of a company I work with in Watford, the wildlife trusts were able to advise them that they were on a route for swifts. So they've got swift boxes. You know, right next to the brand about it. So I guess never say never in terms of nature. Yeah, and you know, in Hungary, a little plantar or something, like everyone could do something on nature. And I was talking to, talk talk. And I did this itself, just do, they converted all of their default browsers to, I don't know, he's a cosier. You can see it. Oh, yeah, he's got streams. And, you know, what a brilliant thing, you don't even have to leave your desk. You still plant trees. Well, they're not. We had a, we were, you know, those are plantar outside one of our sites. And somebody said, I want to put wildfires in it. And then they said, oh, you've got to go and you've got to ask the property team and you've got to get permission from this person. And he just went and this is proper guerrilla gardening. He still bombed it with fae seed bombs. And when it all just came up and everyone, oh, isn't this beautiful? Like, which one? Yes, we should. 100%. I would just fill my pockets up. Oh, unfortunately, I've got a whole of a pocket. It's interesting. about the extent of their biodiversity being some pigeons in a fox. You know, it's not much else around there. But one of the things we hit upon is that every time they have a home game, they have like 14,000 people to sending on that site. All of whom go home, many of whom have a garden. You know, so again, like just thinking a bit laterally about this, okay, can't do much there. It's car park, it's, you know, venue, you know. But yeah, work again, back to where we started, work on the wildlife dress, hopefully trying to reach some of those, some of those visitors, you know, can be a brilliant. Yeah, and education is absolutely critical. It doesn't have to be necessarily action. Action is very good. But if you can just inspire people and educate people, do that too. Brain print is a big thing. Yeah, and I think putting your weight behind it, you know, I think that's a big thing. It's like, oh, look, who could have had partner with? Oh, you know, and if you're a loyal sports fan, you'll be more likely to take that, you know, you're more likely to take that seriously, I think. Again, how honest you measure it? Who knows? But I'm not so hung up on that, because I think you can tell, you can tell a nature rich environment, you can tell why people's behaviour, how much literature is et cetera, et cetera. And I think we will get there with metrics. Okay, so it's my success, Paul, and that sounds great. Would you share with us what you think your biggest flop spin, Abbey, and what would you do differently? We all have it. I'm not going to call it a flop. I'm going to call it a learning exercise. A lesson. What do you think your biggest lesson? Oh, God. So this is, this is ongoing, and I'm not done yet, but there is a collaboration between bug life international and the Kentish, Kent wildlife trust and some other partners, but it's called bug matter. And they measure the insect population by bugs, bats on number plates. I've heard of this. Yeah, brilliant. So they do it every summer. And obviously, they're using that data to be able to bring a bigger lamb out, the kind of pesticides and habitat loss. And everything else is pointing in a pretty scary direction. And they said, oh, we don't get that much data. And so once you've cleaned the data, they don't have a huge sample. Oh, really? My wife works in market research. So I understand the importance of a sizeable sample. So I thought, well, we've got a big fleet. We operate the second biggest van fleet. So I thought, well, how hard? We'll just get them all to drive one journey. We get an extra 30,000, that'd be brilliant. How hard can it be? I've been having to see it. And-- oh, yeah. Maybe it's not safe to check or something. And so we went. And this is absolutely a lesson in why you've really got to-- you know what, it was an website. Simon's next five. Why did you go back through the wide? Because we said, oh, insect populations in decline and everyone went great. I mean, I won't get bugs on the picnic. And I hate mosquitoes. Why should I be worried about that? I don't care about bugs. And so for me, kind of going, you want to map this? Because, oh, my god, bugs aren't just decline. We haven't explained. And also, if you like wine or various other foods, then you want to want to pay attention to this. So there was a bit on really understanding why we were doing that. And we tried for how easy it's going to be, but also engaging senior leaders. So it wasn't the sustainability and we're making us to count bugs every day. That's really lost it now. And so, I mean, we didn't do terribly, but I was thinking, we're going to do 4,000 journeys. That seems such a low bar for us. We're going to smash it. And we barely did 1,000. And of that 1,000, it was a handful of people who did quite a lot of journeys. I think our top recorded it 66. So we've got a few people who got it and we're doing it. But yeah, it was definitely exciting, actually. I'm revealing though, yeah. Because I think we do, in the sector, we see it all the time on LinkedIn, where people are visibly shocked at sort of like, how do people not get this? And so we have to kind of deal with that as well. It's like, well, actually, something we're just going to get it. And people don't like to be like that bat kind of, oh my god, and surely you understand, is such a disengaging fact. Do you watch them? Yeah. What was that film? Don't look up. Yes. I thought that was-- Do you see, I think it's really problematic. Yeah, I think it's really, really bad. Yeah, well, it's pretty-- Yes, it's pretty confrontational. Well, I think if you are-- if you're on board with that message, then you'll watch it. If you're not on board, you're not going to watch it. But you're right. Because I think it just confirmed or everything I knew anyway. And it was like, oh, thank god someone else thinks the same as me. It presents people who don't think the same as you. As really stupid and oh my god. And I thought if you were somebody who happens to watch it, you'd be like, not going to listen to anything but a lot of God's sake. Yeah. Yeah, no, good point, Abby. And there's a new one, isn't there now, about consumerism? Yes, Netflix. I've not seen it yet. I can't remember what that was called. Something about please stop shopping, I think. I mean, on that message, I hate like Friday. Don't look up-- don't throw stuff away. Yeah. Something like that. Yeah. No, which I can't bring myself to watch, actually. I'm just thinking of being too annoying. But in the same way as Black Friday and all that stuff is happening, I do wonder-- my gut feeling is that people, the people, won't watch it if they think it's not relevant to them. So it is probably that extreme end of the panel. In fact, I ask a lot of people on my courses if they've seen-- don't look up in this very unusual that somebody has watched it. It's really just like you say people in the industry. Good. OK. Well, that's really, really helpful. I wanted to just bring this episode to an end with some key takeaways. Because we really want to mine your experience in your brain today, Abbey. So what do you think the top action that people working in this field can take today to get their employees and a little bit keep this low expectation more engaged with nature? I was at an event where the icebreaker was for everybody to go around and talk about a moment in their life, a sort of magical nature connection moment. And everybody had one, whether it was-- you know, went on somebody had gone on a safari as a really special kind of birthday trip, or somebody who'd been-- my grandson had been harvesting their first tomatoes, you know, all of that stuff. And it got me thinking about this is a throwback for a while. It was the guy who recorded a video that went absolute viral. And it was called Double Rainbow. And there's a-- you know, it's just him standing at our house and there's a double rainbow. And he's like, oh my god, a double rimmer. And he's gets so emotional. And it became really funny. But actually, it was just his complete awe at this freebie act of nature. So I think having-- like starting there with a moment where people are connecting to nature, we put in, again, this is an RSPB gift. If you've ever gone on LinkedIn or on that social media, they do a nature break. And it is just-- if you're in a really born conference in an airless, windalous room in between sessions, just having 30 seconds of video efforts, it's great. Oh, I didn't know that. Really, really good. Can people access that? Is that just something that you need to remember me? Well, I mean, I see the one LinkedIn, and we've borrowed them because we have an RSPB partnership. So I think we're OK. Well, there you go. There's another good reason to be able to have partners. I think that would be awesome to run that in the middle. Let's be not trust-specific. The woodland trust do a similar thing, and you can go and just-- they've got a thing on the Celtic main forest. You can just go and watch-- So sometimes, if I'm kind of like a bit screen-dead, it's just might actually have a couple of minutes. A bird song? Or a bit of a babbling brook? Yeah. So I think start with that, because that does engage people. And then get yourself some allies. So just don't worry about the metrics, or am I going to be the only person? Just don't ask somebody whether it's your finance team, or what is your pension doing? Is that investing in deforestation? Because if you ask it and somebody else asks it, suddenly they'll go, people care about this. Whereas at the moment, what they're getting is nobody's asking, they're OK. And so ask your property team, like, do we have-- for us, it was, where do we have rare and endangered species? We've got Paragraphal and Falkans on quite a few of our buildings, fastest creature on the planet. So I think, yeah, just find some allies, and then just see where it goes. I love that. Have an open mind. Have an open mind. I think this often sits on the two-hard part, because it falls into this category of, oh my goodness, we don't have a roadmap. We don't have any KPIs. We don't have a plan. We'll have a recovery. We can't start until we find exactly where we go. We don't know where we're going. So just get aboard. And then nature doesn't work like that. Nature's message. So I like the point you mentioned there about deforestation. It is quite-- sometimes quite limited is what you can do on the ground. But you've got a supply chain and you're buying stuff from other places. And so your biggest biodiversity impact could well be on the other side of the world. Yeah, I had-- This was such an amazing opportunity, but I got to go and visit our Telegraph Pulse supply chain. So our Telegraph Pulse come from Nordic Forests in Finland. So it was about this time last year, middle of winter, absolutely magical. They are sustainably sourced Telegraph Pulse. Scott's pine. Did you meet a reindeer or any-- Did you take me to a reindeer? Quite. But I do know, I mean, we all pass thousands of Telegraph Pulse and you probably don't want me to do road somewhere. And just the idea that that was Scott's pine tree. Very strong. You can do it. It's just the idea that someone's actually bothered to find out where it comes from. Impressors me. I go back and check again for you if you want. I could come check myself. So once you've lifted the lid on that, maybe we won't say it out live, we don't have a plan, but we're going to start anyway. We're going to start anyway. I have that approach to everything. What we do in this week, that feels works out, isn't it? You have your weekend, what's it all to? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I always think, well, the chances are something will happen. We're not all just going to sit on our hands, without the rest of everything. So chances are something will happen. And I'm fairly confident because we're all professional people that we're not going to make a real disaster of it. So I think that I sometimes say this about having that kind of non-negotiable position. It's like, we find something you like about it, because we're doing it anyway. It doesn't have to be grandiose. In fact, I think the smallest things happen these barriers. So you can almost have a stealth, you know, sort of by stealth, you're doing things. And then suddenly everyone's like, oh, I really like this. Or that didn't work, but nevermind. Or whatever. So I love that. So what about the topic skews that we need to stop making? Maybe we've parked that one of, like, we don't have a plan. That's one excuse. That's a big excuse. I think somebody else, you know, the government will make me do it. Or big business will sort of say, the kind of I'm too small, which is not, you know, you don't take it as you sit on it. You just don't want to tell the God to. Yeah, it seems a bit complex. And, you know, it's probably somebody else's problem, I'm sure, like, you know, there's another business who's got a much worse impact than us, so let them mop it up. So I think that's a big excuse. And I think kind of putting into those financial terms of, you know, what is this going to do to GDP? Nature restoration is estimated to have a 12% impact on GDP, which is more than COVID. It's more than the financial crash of 2008. So if that doesn't make it suddenly, your problem. It's just a good head and some. Yeah. And I think actually people, for me, I think the carbon thing connects more closely to the financials than nature, but actually, as we said earlier, it's just really, it's possible to find someone who doesn't care about nature and to clean air and clean water and also sorts of things. I completely agree. I love that. The topic is that, you know, my mum calls it them, or they, they need to sort this out. So, who's the aim, man? This is my favourite. You can pivot this because in April, this business, they'd be like, oh, you know, in a certain team, and I'm new teams, certain team would be like, oh, the business has asked us to do this. Who is this the business? So when I was on the other side, I became the business. I was like, the business, it wasn't Abbie, it wasn't sustainability. The business has decided you've got to do this and something like other businesses decided it was like, you went business, it's magic. It's like the firm. It's like the mafia. Yeah. It's like the people who just them. Now, I often say, when we go around in this triangle, don't we? So we have government, we have industry, then we have society. And again, it's perennial argument. How it's always someone else's problem. And one of the things I always say to people on my courses is, we are just humans who happen to go to work, right? And some of us are civil servants. So, you know, and some of our kids will be working business. And actually, we're all part of society. So it's kind of us then. Yeah. Because I know, you know, government and politicians might look like separate groups of people, but they are just people with families. And then this was fun. Somebody said this word and I'm going to give it a shot. Anthropocentrism. Right. Let's, we are actually part of nature. So if we stop making it a kind of human centric thing, it's not just we're us in terms of society and the government and community. We are us in terms of nature. We're doing this to ourselves. That brings me to my next question, actually. I'm about making things stick. And I think if you use that word, we're probably not going to, you know, get people to remember. But how do you make things stick? This is one of my things, right? Because I completely get it in terms of small actions, making things simple, bringing on people on board, et cetera, et cetera. But why see a lot of this kind of fleeting actions that come and go? So in your experience, happy, what's kind of worked for you? How do you make things stick? Well, you've said it. I think keeping things really, really, really simple. So I went and did a presentation to our executive. All the things we needed to do. And in that, I said, do you know what? If you didn't take anything else away apart from this, can we just use less stuff? Because if you use less stuff, it has less impact on carbon and less impact on nature and it saves you money. And they've got very excited about that. Now, like. It's not tricky to get your head right now. That's something, you know, we've got for safety. We've got 12 life-saving rules and the strategy director said, "I don't give me 12 planets, I even rules, I can't remember 12, everything." So one thing, just use less stuff. Everybody can do it. If you sit in an office, you can use less paper, you can use less copycars. It's a synergy. It's a synergy. Yeah. You can, all of those things. If you are out in the field, you can use less components, you can use less fuel, you can drive off. Because, you know, everybody can do it in their own way. And that might be a tiny little starfish action. Or you could be the director of procurement and do massive things, but we can do it. So. Plasma, some plants, yeah. That's fantastic. Thank you, Abby. So many tips and takeaways there. Thank you. And, you know, if people want to connect with you on LinkedIn, I'm sure that's fine. But thank you for your time today. It's been really, really great. And I wish you all the best luck with the collaboration and, you know, finding those metrics at some point. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for joining me for this episode of Straight Talking to Stage of the Team. This podcast is nothing without your questions, so please remember to send them to us, connect with us on LinkedIn. We'll just send us an email. The details are in the show notes. I'm your host Emma Burlow. See you next week.