Resolving to be Accountable
Happy (February) 2022!
I bet many of you, like us, set some goals, resolutions, or targets for the new year. A month and a half into the new year, are you still keeping up with them? If you are, congratulations! You are one of less than 50% of adults who stick to their pledge after the month of January. You might have noticed that we at Honeycomb Strategies fell behind in our goal to update our blog monthly (oops!) But we haven’t given up, and we’re back.
It turns out that one reason goal-setting often fails is because people don’t develop a system for accountability. And like our personal goals, global initiatives like climate goals require a system for measuring and achieving success.
2015-2019 were the five warmest years on record while 2010-2019 was the warmest decade on record. [United Nations]
It’s common to feel despair over an apparent lack of climate progress. When we see the devastating effects of climate change in major wildfires, floods and droughts, we can get hung up on the fact that we should have tackled this decades ago, and fear that now it’s too late. But it’s not too late, and we can and must do the work now.
Image by Li-An Lim
Honeycomb Strategies has joined the global event industry in signing The Net Zero Carbon Events Initiative.
Across sectors, industries are implementing changes to hit the climate targets developed at the Paris Accords in 2015. This pledge is the event industry’s way to unite its stakeholders and discuss pathways to achieve the targets.
By implementing guideposts like the UN Sustainable Development Guidelines as industry standards, and developing unique best practices for carbon neutrality in travel, hospitality, event production, infrastructure and supply, this pledge can pave the pathway for measurable progress. So far, the initiative has more than 195 signatories including Honeycomb Strategies and frequent clients and partners Freeman, Informa, Javits Convention Center, NBAA and others, as well as more than 110 supporting businesses.
The Joint Meetings Industry Council (JMIC) heads the task force to achieve carbon net zero by 2050.
Image by Photo Boards
The Pledge includes a commitment to collaborate and advocate across the industry.
This is one resolution we can’t afford to give up on. So, to keep us accountable and help inspire our partners to do the same, we’re dedicating the next year of the Bee’s Knees Blog to dive deep into ideas, strategies and opportunities to take measurable action. Next month we will explore event sustainability metrics and how to incorporate these Key Performance Indicators into overall data tracking.
In the future, we’ll be sharing our insights on:
Sustainable Procurement/Sourcing
The power and necessity of collaboration
Host best practices
Venue best practices
Exhibitor best practices
Impact-specific themes such as Energy, Food & Beverage, Transportation, Water, and Waste.
Delegates at the COP26 Conference in Glasgow
We here at Honeycomb are holding ourselves accountable to our climate pledges… and to our blog posts. Sign up for our mailing list to be alerted to new posts (we will NOT flood your inbox, we promise!), and follow us on LinkedIn. We always welcome your feedback and insights. More than ever before, we’re all in this together. Let’s work together to make things better for all of us.