Darwin Strategies
Issues
It is a common observation: organisations and teams are aware of the challenges, have carried out awareness-raising initiatives, and have sometimes drawn up plans for adaptation or development, yet they struggle to put the necessary changes into practice and to engage the people concerned.
This deadlock is evident across two broad areas. When it comes to environmental issues, the diagnosis has been made, the carbon footprint has been assessed, the adaptation plan has been drawn up and the measures to be implemented are known, yet everyday behaviour is changing only slowly. When it comes to transformation plans, the strategy has been approved, the tools have been rolled out, the new organisational structures have been announced, yet teams often continue to work as before.
There are several reasons for this: cognitive barriers, misaligned timelines, visions that are difficult to reconcile, and, above all, a failure to take action. It is not enough simply to have a strategy; you need to get staff on board, give meaning to the action and bring about a change in collective behaviour.
Lost time comes at a cost, with plans carried over from one financial year to the next, investments made without any measurable impact, and teams becoming demotivated as the gap between stated intentions and day-to-day reality widens.
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Our response
Darwin Strategies helps your teams turn knowledge into action by activating the practical levers of behavioural change, going beyond mere awareness-raising.
Our approach is based on the ACTE³ method, which draws on our research at the Human Adaptation Institute, our field experience in extreme conditions, and the latest findings in cognitive and behavioural science.
The method addresses twelve parameters grouped into four pillars: timing, cost and cognitive benefit, emotions, cooperation and effort. It removes barriers to action, engages teams and makes each stage of a transformation plan tangible. The embedding process follows the forty-day cycle observed during Deep Time, the period after which a new behaviour becomes second nature.
It treats an environmental roadmap and a transformation plan in the same way, as the mechanism for taking action remains the same in both cases. Reducing a site’s environmental footprint, adopting new ways of coping with the heat, getting to grips with a new tool, or implementing a reorganisation all require overcoming the same obstacles and rely on the same cognitive and collective drivers.
This work on behaviour therefore addresses both sides of the same issue, since the practices that enable an organisation to carry out its transformations are also those that reduce its environmental footprint. Adapting and mitigating are part of the same process, which enables a company to build a sustainable business that is viable for itself and compatible with a liveable world.
It draws on the work of the Human Adaptation Institute and its scientific partners, which saves a significant amount of time when efforts to bring about change are progressing more slowly than expected.
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What we are developing
- Mobilising without making people feel guilty. A sense of wonder as a driver of engagement. We use sensory and emotional experiences to set in motion a positive process of transformation.
- Removing the barriers to action. The ACTE³ method identifies and addresses the cognitive and collective barriers that precede the transition to action: misaligned timelines, information overload, and the gap between intention and behaviour.
- Anchoring change in the long term. A structured 40-day support programme designed to turn intentions into operational habits, lasting from 1 day to 6 months depending on the type of transformation.
- Involve all levels. From your executive committee to your operational teams, and including your stakeholders, each audience requires a tailored approach to engagement.
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