Hats off to a successful Annual Conference!

Transcription

1 Hats off to a successful Annual Conference! Dear Colleagues, The final morning of the Annual Conference 2018 kicked off with the Network Executive Team (NET) reporting to the CEOs on progress since the last conference. It was also an opportunity to interact and ask questions on governance issues.

2 Since the last Annual Conference, NET has worked hard to build a transparent and honest relationship with the Practice Leaders to ensure that the strategies are living, adaptable and flexible, yet still strategic with outcomes that are smart, measurable and compelling to the external world, showing what we are doing every day is paying off. There has also been strong integration with fundraising, communications and conservation. The NET Impact team s role was to drive initiatives to be sharper by using a coaching approach, while also incorporating learnings from other organisations. As a member of this coaching group, Carter Roberts, WWF-US, said, We want to build a culture of lean, smart initiatives, not just for High Impact Initiatives (HIIs) because today s teeny initiative could be tomorrow s HII. A good open discussion followed between CEOs and NET discussing thoughts, concerns and ideas for the future, including the importance of being focused but not at the expense of new ideas and learning. This was followed by a session, hosted by Shivani Wadhwa, WWF International HR Director, and Tanya Steele, WWF-UK, about building the organisation we want to be, including our values. They both stressed that, off the back of the Oxfam issues, we need to be more clear about our values and have strong safeguards, not only from a

3 risk or legal perspective but also as an opportunity to create an even better WWF. It is important to look at broadening and strengthening our current policies and safeguards to incorporate more far-reaching and ambitious principles around our core values, respecting staff and child protection, for example. CEOs were encouraged to talk to their staff to gather their ideas and thoughts to ensure we walk the talk. The new fundraising platform was launched with Thomas Vellacott, WWF- Switzerland, saying that, to achieve our priorities, funding is an essential piece of the puzzle. The funding platform being developed by Ajay Barai, Director Network Planning and Integrated Performance and his team will be a transparent way to allow us to leverage external funds, as well as using internal funds more wisely for shared goals. Launched in phases starting immediately, the platform will be curated by the Practices. Fundraisers will be able use the platform to coordinate and find information. This is one step on a longer journey of change to increase our entrepreneurialism, collaboration, and focus on priorities. Thomas Vellacott, WWF-Switzerland CEO, describes a new funding platform that aims to change the way we fundraise by coming around big ideas and working together in a more transparent and collaborative way to mobilise funds. This was followed by a discussion about accelerating impact through measurement looking at how we measure our performance and what can we learn from it. Kirsten Schuijt WWF-Netherlands said, to have impact, we need to measure impact. This is

4 the reason we are currently developing an integrated reporting system which will blend external and internal data, including a conservation dashboard, which will report on: brand and communications, conservation, resource mobilisation and Network development. The Open Space parallel sessions covered a number of topics including: WWF s 60th anniversary - Dermot O Gorman, WWF-Australia Our Planet - Tanya Steele, WWF-UK Entrepreneurship and system change: WWF s partnership with Impact Hub - Thomas Vellacott, WWF-Switzerland What to do when your city faces a water crisis: lessons from Cape Town - Morné du Plessis, WWF-South Africa Climate and Energy Opportunities - Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, Climate & Energy Practice Sustainable Landscapes - Margaret Kuhlow, Finance Practice Carol Monoyios, Executive Director for Fundraising, hosted a session on resource mobilization where a number of funding case studies were presented, from collaboration with Singapore s EDB (Economic Development Bank) and innovative

5 work on snow leopards to the journey of Bhutan for Life inspiring the high impact initiative, Earth for Life and a far-reaching partnership with the German Government to raise awareness of nature loss. In the session hosted by Li Lin, Global Director for Policy and Advocacy, Marco introduced our virtual guest speakers who share our dreams for the Workplace livestreamed session titled, A Global Deal for Nature: Monique Barbut, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), Cristiana Pasca Palmer, Executive Secretary, Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and Erik Solheim, UN Environment Executive Director and Under-Secretary- General of the United Nations. The aim was to explore how we capitalise on this unmissable opportunity of 2020 to influence the agenda to bend the curve on nature loss by The recurring themes were to keep it simple, practical and focus on issues that grab the hearts of politicians and people; learn from the Paris Agreement; make nature a political issue and think of one deal that stops the environmental community working in silos. WWF should capitalise on its vast network and tremendous communication power to reach new audiences with a relatable narrative to make 2020 the launching point for nature.

6 If we are going to halt the continued biodiversity loss we need to reach and mobilise the public to a level far beyond what the conservation movement has done before. With a record-breaking Earth Hour 2018 that focused on the loss of nature and the launch of the social-listening Connect2Earth platform, Sid Das, Global Director for Digital Engagement, reminded us that we have already started on our journey to engage millions of people to drive the unprecedented ambition to mainstream nature and build an integrated campaign to mobilise people to influence policy. Our Planet is also part of this global communications strategy to engage and inspire a billion people, which will be critical to influencing politicians and driving policy. Our Planet is far more than a TV series. With a global education programme, halo content on all our priority issues and ambitious fundraising goals, Tanya Steele, WWF-UK, stressed that this project will fuel us to drive conservation impact. And we cannot do this alone, there are huge opportunities from working with multipliers like the Scouts, big technology companies and other organisations.

7 The conference closing, also live-streamed on Workplace, was an inspirational session reflecting on how far we had come since embarking on this deep change within WWF. Now we are focussing on conservation and implementation. The overwhelming sentiment was that WWF is on the brink of something huge with momentum building to 2020 with a bold strategy, a focus on partnerships, a diversity of innovative initiatives and strong plans to engage society as we have never done before.

8 Neville Isdell, Chair of WWF-US, joined us virtually for the closing session reflecting on how delighted he was to have witnessed past silos within WWF broken down. He then summed up the sentiment of the room saying, The future is really for the Madisons (youth) of this world and what we leave behind. I know that the work you have done over the last few days has put us on the way. Best wishes The AC18 Communications Team Videos

9 Pavan Sukhdev, WWF International President, reminds us that while this conference has been very inspiring, it leaves us with a call to action: how do we convert the billion hits and online chatter that we need into on-earth action and results? Kirsten Schuijt, WWF-Netherlands CEO, talks about the importance of measuring impact and how this is one of the most crucial things we should be doing together.

10 Ajay Barai, WWF International Director Network and Integrated Performance, talks about a new integrated system to help us effectively measure our performance against the objectives and targets we've set out. Eliane Ubalijoro, WWF International Board Member, says it's exciting to see how everybody is working in the same direction and the role of innovation to increase sustainability.

11 Fresh out of the Sustainable Landscapes meeting, Ricardo Bosshard, WWF-Chile CEO, believes that we should be working in the scale of landscapes for a more holistic approach but there are still challenges we all need to address together. Ron Tsutsui, WWF-Japan CEO, says that we are part of a generation that's been granted the responsibility to turn our planet's situation around and that we should work together to make it happen.

12 Day 4 Photos Copyright 2018 WWF, All rights reserved. Photo credit: Keith Arnold, WWF-US Visit: OneWWF or Workplace Brought to you by Network Communications Want to change how you receive these s? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list

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