Responsible - trendy adjective

Responsible tourism, responsible food, responsible consumer, responsible travel... Everyone has suddenly woken up and manifastates that being responsible is now the trend that you should not just pass by.

There used to be a time that we were looking into WHO is responsible, rather than what the concept responsible means. From who the focus then shifted into responsible FOR WHAT? And only now the real analyses of what responsibility really means have started.

Responsible actions take into account the entire organization, not just the surrounding where the actions take place and the external stakeholders, but also the values of it, working environment and personnel. It is not enough to change the slogans of the organization and claim that we are truly responsible, if the actions are limited to recycling of papers or offsetting CO2 emissions.

It is time to focus on responsible solutions and start to use them - be trend-setter with true actions, take part in Solutions local, together - Conference. If you have already registered, you are among 200 forerunners, if not it is time to act. 

Speed dating of local authorities

Conferences offer a good platform for speed dating, that is for quickly creating a network of people that can be then further improved. The continuation of the "dating" depends then on both of the parties and their interests. Very often, the connections done create a spin that will have real results only after some time has passed.

Different declarations, such as now the latest declaration that has come out of the Sustainable cities and towns conference in Dunkerque, France stress the need of innovative, sustainable and inclusive communities. The unifying of the message that comes from the local authorities is a challenging task, as we need a permanent speed dating of local authorities on different levels. This means that we should be focused on our efforts when we try to influence on legislations, EU programmes etc. Lobbying is to be done by all of us!

Solutions local, together - conference offers an excellent speed dating spot for the Baltic Sea Region to get our actions together and have a direct discussion between the different levels, as all of the levels will be there. We can take the talk to the actions and show that if we look on the actions together - we are all winners.

Future expectations

The end of the year is a good time to summarize the outcome of past year. It is a bit more than a year to go to the Solutions 2011 conference and the expectations for it are growing little by little. The conference planning is in good speed and more actors are gathering around it and bringing in their solutions. It looks very promising if at least half of the plans will fulfill.

Now after COP15 results it feels that the timing of the Solutions 2011 conference is going to be very good for making a difference and showing how we in the Nordic tackle the challenges ahead of us. From talks to action in practice.

I hope that you will do one promise for next year - that is to let me know what kind of solutions are you in need of? I promise then to do my best to fit it in to the conference somehow.

Thank you for reading the Blog during the year 2009 - more to come next year!

Make it fun!

How many times we work so focused on our tasks, that we forget to include fun as the key ingredient into our actions?

Solutions are being created
when challenge has been found and it
meets the right mixture of people
with idea to solve it.
If elements of fun are added to the concept you are sure to succeed!

For food for thought about fun and solutions, check for example the Bottle Bank Archad Machine and Piano staircase at http://thefuntheory.com