Isabela Souza

No-one is likely to die as a consequence of my current work, so why bother? Because things do go wrong, risk assessments are an important way of preparing for handling the awkward moments. Whenever undertaking a new piece of work, engaging with a new group or applying a new tool.

First impressions in facilitation, however, are more than the type of clothes you wear. We need to spend more time in the contact phase. We need to give more emphasis to the learning journey at the start of programmes.

When things go wrong, it’s like a domino. With much of the work remotely, the report was all over the place, written by different people with different ideas on their minds. We went around in circles. External circumstances changed and the direction of the work took a U-turn.

Who has not fallen learning to ride a bicycle? As a keen road cyclist, who uses clips in her shoes, I know that if you use clips, no matter how good a cyclist you are, you will fall when you try and unclip the shoes unexpectedly – and the fall will seem ridiculous to people watching, as it all happens in slow motion. It is a matter of “when” rather than “if” you will fall off your bike!

“How can a Brazilian environmental consultant not be specialised in forests?” Most Europeans I come across immediately associate environmental issues in Brazil to the Amazon. I always have to explain over and over that over 75% of the Brazilian population live in cities and that the environmental problems of cities are as important as those in the Amazon.

Co-facilitation is like dating, you only find out if there is chemistry between you and the other co-facilitator if you try it. If you have a chance to co-facilitate, go for it! However, be aware of the pitfalls and try to have a mitigation plan if things go wrong.

About 45% of the people said they can’t spend more than one day without their mobile, with 62% checking it at least once an hour. In this context, how should we treat technology in adult classroom environment?

We have been teaching the same subjects, in the same way, for decades. The props we use have changed: we have technology gadgets now. Rather than the blackboard, we use PowerPoint (which can more often than not be called “death by PowerPoint”). Apart from technology, however, the concept of teaching has remained unchanged. The teacher passes down hard facts and information to the students, who are expected to digest it and articulate their views in an essay.

How many times have we heard: “… and then something else happened.” No matter how much we plan, when it comes to implementation of plans, something else often happens. Yet, for some strange reason some people, like me, are obsessed with planning. I’ve had people praise me for my target-oriented personality. In fact, since I was a child I had my whole life planned ahead of me.

When people ask me what I do for a living I often ponder if I should give them the short answer or the long answer. The short answer is that I am an “environmental consultant”. Sometimes, I go a step further into explaining that environment has many meanings and that I have specialized into sustainable development and climate change, that actually have a lot to do with people, society and the way we run our economy.

Rabbi Alvin Fine, Life is a journey and death a destination poem is so simple and so beautiful for its truthful account of the cycles of life. Seeing death as a destination does not mean that “whatever you do does not matter, as we will all die anyway”. Much on the contrary, because our lives are finite, we should be truthful to ourselves and make the most of each phase on the journey.

Guy Winch states in his TED Talk: ‘Why we all need to practice emotional first aid’. As much attention should be given to our mental health as to our physical health. He argues that we talk easily about physical pain, like broken bones, upset stomach, migrane and that we should do the same about emotional pain, like failure, rejection, guilt, loss, or loneliness.

There are different ways to bounce back to positive mode. One of my coping strategies is to build relationships with people that share the same principles and values as I do. I used to look for people with similar passion to sustainability unconsciously, until I heard a talk on diversity and leadership by Gita Patel. She highlighted five simple lessons we can take from nature by observing how geese fly.

Why sincere apologies matter

“Sorry” is perhaps the most used expression in the English dictionary after “Thank you”. Yet, most of the times it is used involuntarily. It is done sort of unconsciously without much thought into it. In the same way that breathing is an involuntary movement of our bodies, apologizing and being thankful are involuntary verbalizations of the British culture. British people are conditioned to say “sorry” and “thank you” from the moment they first speak!

If you examine our lives deeper, we will find out that each and all of us have many different lives. Maybe not as glamorous as the superheroes. But just like them, we tend to hide our different lives according to the circles we are in. We are used to putting people in professional categories: he is a doctor, she is a lawyer, that other one is an engineer, and so on.

The power of metaphors and creative tools is underestimated in our professional environments. It is seen as a “childish tool”. However, research shows that the use of metaphors leads to experiences that are considered transformative because participants new ways of thinking and being, lead to a fuller and richer lived experience.

I have taken my creative cards and objects box all over the world. The trick is to ask people to pick the card/object first, and then only after they pick it, we ask the question of how that represents and describes whatever it is you want to discuss. At first, there is always a strange reaction from participants and a level of scepticism, which is normal. But then people get into it.

At the extreme end of the engagement spectrum, where the Whole Person Approach lies, all stakeholders have the same power. This means that the “client” who commissioned the work will “die” and the “expert” delivering the work also “dies”. Both will co-exist with other stakeholders as equal and peers.

The Whole Person Approach (WPA) enables people to bring more of themselves to their lives, work and communities. WPA works with all aspects of the person (intellectual, emotional, physical, spiritual), the system they operate within, and the inter-relationship between them, including people and planet.

I thought I had misheard a fellow passenger taking about the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and how SDG 16 on peace and access to justice has been the least developed. It turned out that the flight was full of international development consultants. By my right side a lady from the USA (Johns Hopkins University) working with Malaria. On my left side a German lady sharing stories of how Cameroon dealt with HIV amongst sex workers.

In Sierra Leone, I kept hearing people had “bear”… I kept wondering, where has the word come from? Is it related to the animal bear? If so, does the word encapsulate the characteristics of the animal? Krio is a “fascinating mix of English, African, Portuguese, French and other influences, reflecting a unique history of imperialism, slavery and migration.” We have to bo beyond Google Translate to get the meaning of the words.

“When it is very hot, the water evaporates and then meets cold air in the sky forming the clouds and then it all comes back in the form of rain drops.” By the time my cross-country coach finished his lengthy explanation, I realised he thought that I had never seen rain before!

Whenever I disclose that I started my career as an engineer at ExxonMobil, I get odd looks. But, there is always a bright side to every shadow. I dare to say that OIMS is ExxonMobil’s environmental treasure.

Everyday we are bombarded with mixed messages about our differences. On one hand, we are encouraged to “think out of the box!”, “find your unique selling point!” and “be who we want to be”. On the other hand, we are told to “fit in”, “adjust our language and message to fit the occasion (or client style)” and “integrate with the society we live in”.

One Monday in early March 2020 I was taking my class of American students on a field trip to the Olympic Park in London. By the next Monday, COVID-19 pandemic had reached the UK. From one week to the other, all my students had gone back to the USA. The rest is history in the very long journey of mass virtual learning.

People say that if you really want to get to the core reason for something, you should ask (and answer) why five times. We reflect why we created Learning from Women to Reimagine the Future.

In an era of information overload, it is hard to keep track of everything we read and watch that makes a mark on us. We share videos, links, news and academic articles that have influenced and inspired us.