Communicating total social impact
Guest post by Jonathan Jacob Moore from The Clear Clean
Hello friends,
This week’s guest installment comes from our friend Jonathan Jacob Moore, Managing Editor of The Clear Clean — a weekly newsletter cutting through the noise + connecting the dots to help you get clear on the clean energy transition.
Let’s dive in, shall we?
The whole story? Communicating total social impact
Contaminated water sucks. Drinking contaminated water really sucks.
You may know that cobalt and copper mining is carbon-intensive, but did you know that the vast majority of it takes place in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, in an industry rife with gross human rights abuse?
Since starting The Clear Clean, a weekly connect-the-dots newsletter for clean energy professionals in the US, I’ve gained a deeper appreciation for how empty many of the conversations we’re having actually are. I’m less interested in placing blame than changing the game: for people, the planet, and the powerful who stand in between.
If you’re a climate marketer working with startups, you’re probably no stranger to the tendency teams have to neglect the human impact of new technology. Pumping out graphs and grids is cute, but we can’t afford to tune out the many variables and ripple effects that inform our clients' long-term, holistic success, full stop.
I get it. This can be difficult when we’re rarely brought in before the building’s on fire. But at Third Revolution, a language lab for early-stage climate tech ventures that can’t wait, we really, really believe it is invaluable.
I want my clients to understand that as the playing fields become more saturated, identifying and communicating their total social impact (TSI) will help them build trust, manage expectations, attract investors, secure talent, and ultimately drive adoption. So, what the hell is it, actually?
Real people, real ecosystems
Total social impact is our framework for understanding the full scope of how a climate tech venture affects real people and real ecosystems. Here we break it down into 3 impacts and further break each down into social and environmental impacts.
1. Unknowns.
Social unknowns are the unknown impacts your venture may have on stakeholders, users, community members, industries, and people at large.
Examples include: possibly disrupting industry-standard wages, altering public perception of plant-based nutrition, and attracting unprecedented local government attention to your industry.
Environmental unknowns are the unknown impacts your venture may have on ecosystems you are directly and indirectly engaged with.
Examples include: possibly increasing the prevalence of a certain species or accelerating soil erosion.
All of these may become risks and/or opportunities.
2. Risks.
Social risks are the known risks your venture poses to people including but not limited to stakeholders, users, community members, industries, and people at large.
Examples include: failing to meet customer commitments, creating noise pollution, and exacerbating gentrification or displacement.
Environmental risks are the known risks your venture poses to ecosystems you are directly and indirectly engaged with.
Examples include: damaging biodiversity, depleting soil, and emitting carbon.
3. Opportunities.
Social opportunities are the known opportunities your venture provides for stakeholders, users, community members, industries, and people at large.
Examples include: Improving air quality for residents, bringing new jobs to a town, and enabling consumers to change their behavior.
Environmental opportunities are the known opportunities your venture provides for ecosystems you are directly and indirectly engaged with.
Examples include: improving reef health, reducing crop waste, and advancing biodiversity.
TSI in action
We live in a society! So, covering all this ground can be easier said than done for an early-stage team. The two biggest hurdles I see again and again?
Prioritizing technical details over emotional resonance. We’re happy that your technology is “safe,” but what does a world with your tech feel like?
An aversion to (or difficulty with) honestly describing potential harm on local communities and ecosystems.
This is where having a TSI-minded marketer can come in clutch.
Here are a few ways you can help early teams interrogate holistically, answer early, and ultimately produce a historically-nuanced, self-critical, socially-responsible, real-ass story they can raise and recruit on.
Coach your folks to face the most frightening futures first. Staring failure in the face at scale is terrifying, and — it’s necessary if you want people to believe the stakes are as high as you know they are. We like asking early on, “What happens to your people if you succeed, and what happens if you fail?”
Recruit diverse perspectives from their people to pressure test your understanding of the opportunities, risks, and unknowns they’re dealing with. Then, compare notes. You’d be surprised at how different a team of three’s answers can be. Which element of total social impact are they most likely to sing about, and what can you learn from the quiet?
Mine the emotional landscape of their niche, far and wide. What are the unexpected emotions produced by, say, deep ocean dumping, regardless of what the white papers say? We can’t help dope ass companies proactively remedy “icky” and amorphous reactions to their innovations if we don’t know what they are.
Final thoughts
Saving the planet is human work, and so is storytelling. As we continue our research and help teams reimagine (and integrate) their narrative and business objectives through the lens of total social impact, we’re excited to be a resource for communicators like The Climate Hub and companies alike interested in telling the story of the work ahead.
The whole story.
Thanks again to our friends at The Clear Clean. Subscribe to their weekly newsletter, or learn more about them on LinkedIn.