Clinton's Bullet Point Solutions
Watching the working sessions here at the Clinton Global Initiative is like watching a a living Powerpoint presentation: bullet-points for limited attention spans and quick decisions.
But be careful - sometimes Powerpoint works, and I've been impressed with the bullet point lists pulled together in round-table "working sessions" by high-level participants in the four working tracks here at CGI - energy and climate change, global health, poverty alleviation, and mitigating religious and ethnic conflict.
Here's how it works at CGI. Each track has a series of panel discussions featuring experts froma round the world. They chat for half an hour. Then the facilitator turns the mics off and the audience (seated at tables of eight and 10) goes to work crafting a list of solutions - no depth, just a list. Then the panel comes back and reacts to the list, and digs deeper. the process is intended to involve the audience, but also to drive the rich and powerful among them to the mandatory "commitments" that are required from CGI participants; indeed, on each floor here at the Sheraton is a "Commitment Desk" with several perky staffers ready to document those commitments.
I listened in on a few of the off-the-record conversations at the tables, and there was generally a palpable energy level that produced - at a minimum - a smart and well-considered laundry list of possible solutions. Not surprisingly, business people stressed economic sustainability and cost control; NGOs talked about partnerships and cooperation with government; government ministers generally provided "realism" about the political situations in various corners of the globe.
On a panel of saving energy were Jacques Aigrain of the Swiss Reinsurance Company, Tom Cate of Primary Energy, former presidential candidate and Army General Wes Clark, and Linda Fisher of Dupont, moderated by William Reilly, former EPA chief. It was lively, but I thought some of the suggestions from the audience of bigshots - or what the Clinton staffers called "the stream from the firehose."
Interestingly, most solutions focused on corporate citizenship, a kind of redefining of corporate social responsibility toward environmentalism:
- Requiring companies to complete an energy audit
- Encouraging the development and design "green" buildings
- Reducing corporate travel and using video conferencing and services like Skype
- In procurement and purchasing, taking a hard look at corporate supply chains
- Make energy use part of each employee's performance assessment
- Set overall energy goals for each company
Sure these are bullet points, a quick list from the "firehose." But considering the caliber of the audience, which was filled with CEOs, it's an impressive list and a sure sign that corporate America is actually thinking about energy use and our common future.
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