280 | The Tension for Social Entrepreneurs Between Sales & Product Development with Graham Hill
Our guest this week on the pod is Graham Hill. Graham is the Founder and CEO of The Carbonauts which hosts live, vitual workshops that helps people optimize their lifestyles so that we can build a greener future.
And a special thanks to members of the Awarepreneurs Community for sponsoring this episode!
Resources mentioned in this episode include:
Tips for Social Entrepreneur Sales: Interview with Graham Hill
NOTE: While it’s not perfect, we offer this transcription by Otter.ai for those who are hearing impaired or who don’t find listening to a podcast enjoyable or possible.
SPEAKERS
Paul Zelizer, Graham Hill
Paul Zelizer 00:01
Hi, this is Paul Zelizer, and welcome to the Awarepreneurs podcast. On this show, we dive deep into wisdom from some of the world's leading social entrepreneurs. Our goal is to help you increase your positive impact your profitability, then your quality of life. Before we get into today's topic, I have one request. If you could hit subscribe and do a review on your favorite podcast app that helps more people learn how to have positive impact through values based business. Thank you so much. Today, I'm thrilled to introduce you to Graham Hill. And our topic is The Tension for Social Entrepreneurs Between Sales and Product Development. Grant is the founder and CEO of The Carbonauts, which hosts live virtual workshops that help people optimize their lifestyles, so we can build a green future. Graham, welcome to the show. Thanks a lot for having me excited to be here. This is an exciting and sometimes sticky topic. So I'm really grateful that you're willing to talk some real world experience. Before we get into the topic, Graham, what would a listener want to know about your backstory and what you were doing that helped you say, oh, I want to go right into the space about sustainability and sustainable living.
Graham Hill 01:16
I think the thing that really got me excited about getting into this area was was really books. I think books are really world changing. And so I was very lucky to just always like reading and definitely influenced by my parents, but I started reading about evolution, we have a called Geek of the finch got me into our nature reading and then somehow stumbled across Natural Capitalism, in sort of 99 2000 timeframe. And that really blew my mind and just got me very excited about the prospect of building businesses that where you could do well, by doing good, and that they didn't have those didn't have to be separate things. And that really, the way forward for us was to really try to combine them to have many, many more businesses. And so it's beautiful to see is, in the ensuing 22 years later, there, that is much more common knowledge. And there are many, many more companies doing that.
Paul Zelizer 02:21
Now, and I started doing the work 15 years ago, there wasn't even consensus, what do we call this movement, right? You know, conscious capitalism, or social entrepreneurship, or conscious business or values based business, and not that that isn't still a topic of conversation. But I think, who fits in each of those buckets? And what some of the more common conversations depending on the framing, I think there is a little more agreement, depending on the language we use. Would you agree with that?
Graham Hill 02:53
Yeah, I think so our people just get the general concept. And people are doing it, you know, whatever they call it, which is great. And that didn't used to be the case at all.
Paul Zelizer 03:04
So somewhere along the line, you decided the world needs more good information about sustainable living. And the way you are going to help that happen, are these workshops and these learning communities through this brand called the carbon knots tell us about carbon nuts, and like what led to you wanting to found it.
Graham Hill 03:24
So I founded a site called tree hugger, a tree hugger.com, which is still going strong, 22 years later, and it's a great site with a great newsletter. And I founded it in 2004, a bit out of frustration, really, with where environmental media was at that point in time. And so we created something that was really new. I saw incredible, really, we saw incredible green future out there. But to find it, you had to scour the internet and do a bunch of reading and sort of figure it out. And so we wanted to make it easy for people to see it. We also wanted to do something that was positive and bipartisan and pro business and effectively, you could have a collared shirt and live in the city and still be environmentalists. And so that's where treehugger.com was, was born. And at that point is about mainstreaming green. That was our stated objective, because it really wasn't mainstream. And at this point, 22 years later, we have things are pretty mainstream, certainly in terms of awareness. So awareness is really, really high. And that's awesome. The challenge is that climate, doesn't care about awareness, climate doesn't care about your feelings. Climate cares about your actions. And so we can't have all these amazing solutions out there if people don't take them up. Because that's how we sort of we change the world. That's how we reduce our footprints. That's how we make a difference and that's how If you get volumes and prices down, and that leads to sort of everyone being able to access many of these solutions, so I became obsessed with the idea of how do we move people, from awareness to action. That was the main point. And I'm a techie for many years. But I've seen a lot of apps and platforms and stuff out there, and not many that have gotten much traction in this space. And so we sort of went back to basics and realized that we needed to put together something that was would appeal to people's heads, but also their hearts appeal to their emotions. And then it probably needed to be live. And so you can done in community. So you'd be connected to other people, and able to share your journey and inspire people around you and be inspired by people around you to move forward. And so that was the big impetus. So treehugger is still going strong with some great work out there, as are 1000s of other sites at this point in time, that's awesome. But we need people, individuals, to actually make the changes to become climate literate, and to actually take action both at their homes, at work, and generally in society. And so I started building a company, the carbon arts, to do that to make it easy. And so, so part of it is the communal aspect. Part of it is live and really interactive cameras on very engaging. And then part of it is getting people to focus on, we call the Big Six, six most impactful things for you, for you to reduce your footprint. Versus straws. For example, if we want to do something about straws, we're gonna do something about packaging, for sure. But there's some much bigger fish to fry in terms of the average everyday person, and so we get people focused on the big six. And then we do a tremendous amount of work to make it very easy for them to take the next step. We make it easy for them to because it matters where you are things are different all over your you'll have a different utility, they'll be different rules and around EVs, different food related stuff. And so we need to really personalize things to make it really easy. So we are able to educate people, get them to know what's what inspire them in community, and then really make it very easy for them to take the next step. And so we work for big clients, we have fantastic clients, Amazon, Chanel, Toyota, at&t, Netflix, Warner Brothers discovery, some really great big clients doing some some awesome work. And we help them move their cultures to cultures of sustainability. Our trick is that we tend to start people get the staff to focus on their homes, when we do that, because for most people, homes are number one. And so it's sort of the easiest way to get them enthusiastic. And if you learn all the stuff at your home, then that is going to be very helpful in getting you through the ASEAN climate literate, and you can bring that stuff to work. And so we ended up doing a bunch of workshops focused on on work itself. And so yeah, our, our main role is moving people from awareness to action, understanding that we need to build powerful social norms, such that the social norms, that social norm that prevails, is one of sustainability where people are living greener lives. And we are very fortunate, there are many things we can do right at this point in time. And so if we can just get more people doing these things, and sharing about these things, will be able to really transform our societies, and live greener lifestyles that allow us our species to survive into the far future instead of to 2100.
Paul Zelizer 09:13
So I love that you're talking about this issue of from awareness to action, and talk to us a little bit about that ground because I think we see that a lot in the social impact space, people will talk about a problem. And there's one layer of kind of trying to get people to understand what's happening and see some of the intersections and see some of the, you know, places that there's inequity or bias in the conversation. Then there's like, here's what actually moves the needle. And those things are not always the same. Somebody could see or understand something and it doesn't necessarily translate into behavior change. And so when you were starting to You, you know, see that issue tree huggers going people are reading or learning about environmental issues and sustainability. But now we really need to dig deeper. Like, how did you Was that like a fact base? You were reading research? Or you saw, like, lots of examples? These were stories from the street, like, how did you put your finger? Oh, here's the problem. People are aware, but we need to increase action, what would help? Do you point right there that that's what you want to focus on with carbon?
Graham Hill 10:34
I mean, I'm sure there's research that I've read and or could be read. But but you know, I think he just look around anecdotally, sort of No, no, it's, it's true. He just, you know, look around at your friends and your friends, friends, and you can pretty, pretty quickly see that not a lot of people are doing much. And so yeah, I think it was, you know, pretty much pretty much that simple. And certainly the statistics, Bear Bear bear that out. You know, vegetarianism is 5%, or whatever, like EVs are, you know, now, this is few years later, of course, since we started it, but you know, EVs are still a small percentage, and they've got a long way to go, you can see a lot of momentum. But most of these things, you know, signing up for renewable energy, which you can basically do everywhere in the United States, here in LA, and a place that, you know, generally people are think are more conscious about sustainability than your average spot in the US, still less than 1%, sign up for renewable energy kind of thing. So yeah, there's a lot a lot of stats, but also, just anecdotally, I think you can sort of sort of see it. And a lot of this makes sense. And we're not here to point fingers. And, you know, people have busy lives. And there's just so much information on this staff, and so much misinformation that even if you care, and you want to do things, when you sort of sit down to figure out what to do, it's hard to be confident and and people tend to not want to do the wrong thing. And then you know, figuring out that next step isn't necessarily that easy, particularly if you're not confident. So just an A Not, not a lot has happened. So I don't know, anecdotal, and just statistically, I guess.
Paul Zelizer 12:22
And when did you start carbonyls?
Graham Hill 12:25
We're about three years old. Yeah,
Paul Zelizer 12:28
three years. One of the things we talked quite a bit about Graham, and it was something I was really excited to share with our listeners is, you know, three years in, you've gotten some great response listeners, you can go to the website and see some of your workshops have hundreds of ratings, right, like hundreds of ratings. So you're working with, as you mentioned, some names of companies that people might have heard before, whether that's Toyota or Netflix, I live in Albuquerque, Netflix moved their base of operations here. So in New Mexico, it's a company that we're, you know, that's on people's minds a lot. It has an outsized, you know, impact and are relatively small population states. So these are big companies. And one of the thing that you were talking about is, you're now at this phase, where it's like, there's this dance. And it's not always sometimes it's a bit of a grind the gears dance between, like, building out the product, like, you know, the user experience, and new workshops and things like that, with the sales of actually going to more companies and you know, are circling back around to different divisions within companies you've already worked with, and selling more of your product and talk to us a little bit like, what is that dance been like for you? And how, when it's gone? Well, how has it gone? Well, and when it's been a bit crunchy, what does that look like?
Graham Hill 13:58
So we're not we're not the biggest company. So I'm, I'm a big, big part of this challenge, Challenge Challenge being just the tension between sales and product development. And I would start by saying that sales often has a negative connotation. But for I would imagine most, if not all the listeners. If you've got a good product that's helpful to the world, then all you really try and do is find good places for it. And people, the people in organizations that you can help and so there really shouldn't have that negative connotation. And I think, I think it probably does, because, you know, there definitely are some salespeople that are really pushy, and really don't care so much about helping people or the product itself, or the service itself, but rather, they're just, they have their agenda and they're they're trying to push it on you and that's so so Sales will can feel negative, but it's actually a really positive thing. And it's critical. You know, you need people and you need people to find you. And so it's really, really important needs to be a big priority. And I'm, we're small or small enough that that's a big part of what I need to do. And in the early days, and I, I'm a product guy, you know, I'd much rather be working on the product, I'm, I spent seven years in design school, like, I call myself a design for nerd, because I really feel like that those are the two main components that are my makeup. And so I want to just work on the product. But you gotta get that product out there. And you need some great, great clients in order to pay the bills, so that you can spend more money on the product and make it better. And so, yeah, it's, it's, it's a challenge. But it's, it's, it's critical. And so, you know, I've had to, I've had to really dig in myself. And we're figuring it out, you know, doing more and more a good job. And so I think the tricks there are, you have to develop a real process, it's, you know, it's this is, a lot of it is about details, and follow ups and just being consistent. And you need to sort of, you know, calendar, a process, a system, and a way of holding yourself accountable to do the things and not sort of just do all the things that you like to do most, which might be working on the product, but rather reaching out and having the conversations and doing the work that you need to need to do. It's definitely tricky. And and I think, as with all things, there are parts of your job that you will probably like to do more than others. And some of those other parts you'd like to do less are actually really important. And so you got to hold yourself accountable. And you want to figure out no matter how you monitor time spent, so you'd be sure you're spending enough time and try to get as engaged as possible with it. And so I sort of had to reframe it, I would say, and I try to really work with my team to have a really good process to help talk to our clients understand what their goals are, and really help them think if they're not entirely clear for them, help them think through that and help them prioritize, so we really understand what their goals are, and then propose stuff to them, that really helps those goals. So be very specific about here's, here's where we understand your goals are. And we want to help you get there. And therefore we are proposing these things. And then in the best case, let's measure let's see where you are, let's establish a baseline. And then let's check in at three months, six months, nine months, a year, what have you, whatever works, and see if we're actually helping you get to that point.
Paul Zelizer 18:11
Beautiful, then as a product guy, like what would you say helped you build your sales muscle? Yes, it sounds like, you know, I still have that inclination, I just want to make it better. And I just want to add new features or add new workshops. So you still have that inclination. But there's a way in which you're talking about sales where you sound comfortable with it, like what helped you build those muscles.
Graham Hill 18:35
I made I think I tried to in a way make make the working on the product, the price for working on the sales by like less working on sales. Okay, well, if I put in some time on the sales, then that means later today or later this week, I'll allow myself time to work on the product itself. And so that's probably one way I did. I was very lucky my friend Dobie Tang Daniels, connect me to a guy named Joshua NICUs who lives here in Los Angeles and he was able to is just knows a lot about sales and was really helpful in sort of helping coach me through that and understand sort of the how this stuff works and a lot of fantastic techniques to apply. And yeah, which has been that's been great. So yeah, give yourself some rewards I guess and ideally, try to find a mentor or a mentor or mentors to help you with the process and yeah, just realize is just like any other part of business there's a there's a there's a good way to do it. Bad ways to do it and you want to figure it out.
Paul Zelizer 19:49
And when you look at the carbon knots now like what's balanced company wide, like if there was a energy dollars if the company had 100 energy dollars How many of the dollars would go towards product development? How many of those dollars would go towards sales? And then there's other things that are neither of those. But does like proportionately, is it fairly balanced? Is one of them getting a lot more attention than the other? What would you say about that?
Graham Hill 20:20
I think that's going to be highly dependent on you know, what kind of company and no,
Paul Zelizer 20:26
but for you all in that carbon? Yeah,
Graham Hill 20:29
well, I mean, for us, I think it definitely changes over time. And if it doesn't, then we're probably not doing doing it. Right. So I think, you know, there's, I think the big the big transition is, is from landing new clients, to far like gold farming, you know, farming existing clients. So I think, once you land a client, and if you're able to do some good work for them, then it really changes the dynamic. And ideally, it's a big company. And so there are all sorts of other places that you might help them out. And that becomes powerful, because then just way more efficient people start come coming to you, you've got the your have an official vendor, you've done the whatever security stuff needs to be done, like you understand how to work together, and you can just sort of get to get down to business. So. So we're going from spending, I don't know, it'd be really hard to say, but probably spending $30, compared to $70 $30, on sales compared to 70 on product and delivery. And hopefully at some point will be at five to $10. And I can see that coming like certain certain of our clients are really growing, we're expanding into new areas, and we're developing, we started, I think we stopped, we started out doing more just a workshop or a handful of workshops, and now we're doing developing full programs for them. So we'll literally look at the year and understand their goals, and then try to lay something out. So there's real drumbeat of content, and new and different and more and more people over time. So it becomes much larger, so that the hope and really the hope is also you get more and more of known out there and and word of mouth is powerful. And so you get new clients that way and build, build your existing clients, and you just have to do less and less of it.
Paul Zelizer 22:43
That was thinking as you're talking Graham about Seth Godin, who's one of my more favorite marketing and sales, people he's been doing it forever, he talks about the challenge of selling to strangers. And and whenever you can avoid setting things up that that's the primary thing you're doing, that's where it's hardest for most entrepreneurs. And versus, like what you were talking about when people get to know you where you're circling back around and talking about recurring business with people who already know you are deepening projects, expanding them, that that kind of a business model. I'm an introvert, which is way better for me, I am not going to walk into a complete room with strangers and start selling like, I suck at that. But if you give me people have some, you know, a sense of what they're wanting in terms of an impact business and are looking for moving the needle on certain key things, and want to have a granular conversation about what that can look like. Especially if they have some idea of like who I am and what I've been doing for 15 years. I love those conversations. So So I was just hearing Seth Godin is wisdom trying not to sell to strangers, but try to like help people get familiar with who you are, what your values are, and what your organization does really well. And then those sales conversations take less time, less energy, and just more fun for all involved. Is that in any way resonating with you? Yeah, absolutely.
Graham Hill 24:11
So I mean, I think we spoke spoke a few minutes ago just about, you know, have sales having bad, bad connotation. And, you know, I think there's a general human reaction if you're, if someone's trying to make someone else do something, the other person tends to push back. It's just, this is sort of how we're built. And so I think, you know, good sales, and I guess this is partly marketing. It's just like, how do you how do you get to come to know your potential clients such that the you never have no one has to push anything on anyone. They come to understand what you do and they see your value and then they come to you. And so, you know, I think that's I tried to go to conferences and meeting people and just having fun conversations and I can be, you know, I'm truly, I'm been doing this for 22 years. So I'm obviously pretty passionate and pretty interested and what they will be focused on in their jobs and at the companies and so you can have good conversations and then then you know that the best case is and they just, they just end up coming to you. And we've been running a fantastic set of sustainability dinner series, which I've done, we've done about 25 of them, most of them have been here in my home and Venice, about 15 people, the sustainability people, NGOs, startups and big, big companies. And we've done them also in New York, and now in Seattle, and Vancouver, and soon Boston, perhaps others. And so these are just great, because I put together a fun thing, they come and meet all sorts of other sustainability people that come to learn about all sorts of other other companies and what they do. But they also learn about carbon ops. And then, if it's something that is a good fit for them, or they're curious about, then they just come to me, and that it makes for a much better dynamic, and I like it much more also.
Paul Zelizer 26:20
So in a minute, I want to hear more about the workshops themselves about the sustainability dinners and about these deeper dive programs that you're developing for some of your corporate clients. Before we do that, I just want to take a quick break and hear a word from our sponsor. Do you have a business that's about making the world a better place, and you want it to grow both in terms of your impact, helping more people and your income, so you could live a good quality life? If you do, I'd like to talk to you about some research for a second. When scientists look at what actually contributes to humans reaching their goals, the single biggest predictor, whether it's a wellness goal, or it's a business school, is what they call social support. In other words, a group of people who are on a similar journey, who can help you with specific strategies that work on that journey at the time and point of development that you're on, as well as emotional support for the ups and downs of that journey. Being a social entrepreneur has highs and lows, right? If you like that kind of support, where printers has a community called the AWARE printers community, over 270 really generous and really skillful social entrepreneurs. And that's what we do with each other. We share concrete strategies, as well as emotional support for the ups and downs of the journey. If you'd like to find out more, you can take a look at where printers.com forward slash community. And thank you to everybody in the world printers community who helped sponsor this podcast. So welcome back, everybody in the second part of the show, Graham, we like to joke about putting on our social entrepreneur glasses. Talk to us a little bit Graham. Okay, what's your in your three? You've got these what, at least when I was doing my research, what seems to be most what people familiar with the carbon arts might be most used to do are your workshops tell us like what are the classic workshops that you're known for.
Graham Hill 28:27
So we now have probably 22 different ones. So it's pretty varied. Our classic ones, I would say our we have our own version of the Berkeley cool climate calculator. And we selected that and ended up doing a deal with them, because they're the most peer reviewed out there. And we really liked Chris Jones, who put it to get put it together. And it's great to work with. And so we built our own version that just fits us a little bit better, just a variation of that. And so that's a big component of the carbon arts, obviously, we're about carbon, at least partially. That's our through line, we do talk about biodiversity and plastics in the ocean and all sorts of stuff like that. So it's not just carbon, but it's a good thru line to base things upon. And so a big part of it is helping people understand what their footprints are. And sort of the big components of it, as most people don't actually know that and once once you sort of go through that process, which can take usually takes us about 12 minutes, then you really come to understand, oh, that's what this is the stuff that matters, and then you can be more strategic. So you tend to come to understand that your utilities are a big part of the picture. You're driving, if you drive is big part of the picture and you're flying. Those are sort of three main ones and then food also has a bit of an impact as well. And so we are sort of classic few are we have base quickly a 3060, half an hour an hour, four hours and six hours focused on what we call the Big Six. And so you know, ideally the best, of course is the six hour we can go in depth over a month and a half, really get into it really get people to understand and also take action. And the big six are as follows. One is switch to renewable energy. So that switching gear your via your utility, or getting community solar or getting solar panels on your roof, if you're lucky to own your home. Second is driving. So reducing driving if at all possible, and then electrifying as many of those miles as, as possible through either hybrid, or ideally a full Eevee. Then we do food related stuff that's moving to a plant rich diet, that's reducing food waste, which it turns out is actually a really big deal. And composting, whatever leftovers you end up having. Then finally we look at flying both reducing flying and then optimizing those flights that you end up taking offsets buying as many as work in your financial situation up to or over your footprint, high quality third party certified. And then finally, one that might be surprising to some, but it's social norms. So a big thing that we help people understand is that the only way that we get there is if we build the social norms around this, a lot of people think that a lot of the most other people don't care. And part of the reason that phenomenon exists is because not enough people talk about it. So we share ways of talking about it in a non preachy positive manner, in order to help build those social norms. So that's the big six. So those are sort of our, our main, literally goes from 30 minutes up to six hours, focused on those and we ended up for the longer ones, we ended up circling back with a calculator. And then literally understanding the changes that were made during the course. So we can actually get people to reduce their footprints by 2030 40% over the time of the workshop, which is awesome. And then we have ones on like building green teams at work. Or we have one called climate friendly closet on sustainable fashion. We have one on climate anxiety, how to move to climate, optimism, how to make a make a difference. Low plastic living, voting with your your pocketbook, and stuff like that. So all sorts of different topics. And basically trying to find lots of ways, lots of onramps for people to get started. So everyone's on their own climate journey. We're just trying to meet them where they are and help move them along.
Paul Zelizer 33:12
Beautiful Graham, and without trying to be preachy, I'll just say I've tried to do a lot of work on my own personal relationship. There are a lot of that. And I'll give a couple examples. One four years ago, my kid had graduated high school, and it was time to like, where do I want to be next. And I was really thinking about climate. And I moved the one in the stay in the southwest, but I moved from outside of Santa Fe place that didn't have easy, it wasn't walkable life, and I moved to downtown Albuquerque. And like there's two growers markets within walking distance and restaurants. Like sometimes I don't, I work from home, sometimes I don't get in my car for four or five, six days at a time. I'm a passionate gardener and permaculturist you know that listeners, I'm super passionate about the Buy Nothing group and helping people recycle and the gig economy etc, etc. So I just, I share that to just say like, you know, I really appreciate what you're saying, Graham and I really hope our listeners will like, you know, look where you are in those big six of buckets and see how you might be able to move the needle I have Verma composting in my little backyard and my condo I love my worms. Because I did a bunch of research about methane and what happens when we you know, throw out our food or like you know, your garden and you like make way too much and then it spoils right like you know, so that kind of stuff really moved the needle when I was looking at research and have tried to bake that into my life. So I really appreciate what you're saying Graham and I hope all of us are looking at not just awareness, as you said, but really how can you move into action in some very concrete way?
Graham Hill 34:58
Yeah, that's great. That's I'm hearing that and that's like, we just need more, more and more of that. And you know, the reality of it is, people say we need to get to two or three times per person in terms of carbon footprint. Americans are Americans, Canadians, Australians are all at sort of 16 to 18 tonnes. So it's obviously a very long way. But places like Europe who have much better setups, to live sustainably are at like five to eight tonnes, so a lot lower, but even those guys have to go down to to around two or three tonnes. So we still have a long way to go. But the way to do there is to get way to get there is to get started. And, you know, ultimately, this is just about how we live our lives. And we have erred in, in our understanding of what makes us happy. So back in the 50s, we had literally a third of the amount of space, weigh less stuff, but our happiness levels were literally the same. So we've somehow confused this idea of more space, and more stuff, somehow making us happy to the to the point that we now have a $22 billion storage industry. And it just, it's just not the case. So happiness is about relationships, it's about experiences, it's about, you know, that that's, that's the real stuff. And so we can design our lives, to be smaller environmentally, and they're just gonna be better, all round. And so and it just it literally, it just, it's, it seems like you're just a drop in the bucket. But we just need everyone to start living this way. And the way that it starts is by you doing it and influencing those around you. And part of our challenge is that people are quite quiet about it. And those that are believing this stuff, need to start talking about it and not talking about it and to make people feel guilty, but talking about it in a friendly, inspiring, non preachy manner, in order to pull people out of the woodwork that feel this way and are ready or already doing the stuff. And to build the social norms around living in this new way. It's really, at the end of the day, it's that simple. And we just need to get some momentum. And if we get to a quarter of the population, the whole population will flip and we will be in business.
Paul Zelizer 37:39
Absolutely. And I gave some examples from my personal journey. Here's one from my work journey, I do an audio only podcast, which is not typical. And there's a variety of reasons. But one of the primary reasons I do that is because audio takes much less bandwidth. So the carbon emissions have still take some missions to store an audio. But I think it's worthwhile to help people who are working to move the needle, I hear what you're sharing Graham like this is, you know, I can give it away for free. And there's a lot of leverage in that. But they don't need to see video, they can hear it. There's links, there's handouts, and the carbon impact of having an audio go out there compared to you know, where 276 50 minute long videos, there's way more emissions going out for the servers and all the energy that it takes, or video than it is an audio. And that's just one little example. And again, I just share this to just like say, please think about your equivalent of that lesson rather than you should do this. No, no, no, no, but look at the different buckets of your life. And how do the decisions you're making? What's the impact of it in terms of our mission? So enough about exactly right? So these 22 workshops and congratulations, that's awesome ground like and and now you've been at it for a little while people are asking you for deeper dive programs. So the workshops might be like you said, half hour, 60 minutes, maybe four hours, maybe even six hours. But now people are companies are leaning in and saying hey, we want you to help us develop something more custom that really kind of, you know expands on what you touched on in the workshops. Tell us about those deeper dive programs and can you give us an example.
Graham Hill 39:31
So I can't can't get any too specific because as you know, internal stuff for clients, but we tend to do more sort of combination. Well, we're we'll probably do some stuff on their homes. But then we try to like work with our champion to come up with stuff directly related to work. So how they how the individuals can contribute to working on their sustainability goals for the company that I work. So I guess a good one at one example. So with Amazon, they have global engineering services. And these are the guys that build the facilities. And so they're really focused and size has really impressive and in terms of how much it's it's doing in this area. And yeah, they are when they end up building new facilities, they're trying to do that in a greener and greener manner. And so we can put together custom content with them. So their staff, it really it spread, they understand how they can contribute. And so yeah, so it really depends on the client, client itself, and their and their specific business.
Paul Zelizer 40:46
And when you look Graham and like the workshops, as you've been doing them, those 22 workshops in those longer customize deeper dive, like, how much is of your attention is going into each of those directions? And do you see that changing? Do you say, Oh, we want to do a lot of those customized programs? Or is that, you know, on a, that a smaller portion of where you see the carbon knots going?
Graham Hill 41:13
Well, we're here to help the clients achieve their sustainability goals. So it'll depend on what the client wants. So yeah, I'd love to do more of that. I think one role that we're starting to play is that of a convener, and so we can. So for example, we have a workshop where we pull together, people involved in Green Teams from our various clients, and then help give them the props, and the structure to do a bunch of sessions, where they can learn from us, but also learn from each other. So talk about the stuff that's working, the stuff that isn't stuff that they're gonna be experimenting with. And the beautiful thing about sustainability is, is that companies tend to be less competitive with each other and more willing to share, which is fantastic. And so we can act as a convener, pulling it together, giving it the structure, and helping people learn from us and learn from each other. And so I'd say that's, that's a big part of our focus, we might do something on supply chain or something on Green Teams
Paul Zelizer 42:28
kind of thing. So you've been up and running about three years, Graham, you've got 22 workshops, now you're getting into customized programs, like if you look ahead, like jump five years from now, where would you like the carbon knots to be?
Graham Hill 42:44
Well, you know, I've been fortunate to build and sell a number of companies over the years. And so you know, this is I don't really have to be doing this, this is very mission based. And so I'm not, you know, it's I'm not really content with just a little small business sort of kicking along profitably, I want this thing to scale. So I want to make a really, really big difference, like a noticeable difference, I want to really push our world towards the state of sustainability. So, you know, in five years, I would hope that we have a huge amount of very powerful workshops, that use text techniques based on the most recent behavior change science, and that we are just really good at helping move the world from awareness to action. And that we are applying that to many, many companies and helping them really shift their cultures to cultures of sustainability, so they can help achieve their goals. And, you know, if we can help get, I think that this this idea of, if you can build from the few percent to 25% of a certain population, that at that point, if the idea is right, if it's morally correct, I think that's when whole populations flip to the new social norm that you start from. And so in a way, we're doing that within companies and trying to build a fine there, change it change agents and support them, and so get to a quarter of the company, so the company itself flips to that new social norm. And I think if you go up one level, we can also do that with companies, if we can help get a quarter of all companies doing things in this way, that's when all the rest of the companies will flip. And so this is all in pursuit of building the new social norms and so you know, I'd love to be highly profitable such that we can develop incredible product and just do really, really good work be just as time efficient as possible with with people and really get stuff done. hopefully inspire some some copycats and and just have a you know, have a really good ripple effect. And really work on our mission help companies with their sustainability goals
Paul Zelizer 45:10
may be so. So grim, I can hang out with you all day you're doing fabulous work. And I know you're busy as our listeners, if there was something that you'd like to leave our impact founders with, we have about half of our founders are quite experienced, they've got things like product market fit, they're up and running, and ad revenue. And then we've got half of our listeners that are, you know, the next generation of impact leaders and are working on things like getting revenue to a point that it's sustainable working on their product market fit. In those two buckets, somebody has been around for a while, and somebody who's like the next generation of impact leader, any suggestions or advice you would leave for those two kinds of people?
Graham Hill 45:59
Sure, well, for those who are not quite there, I would encourage you to be sure you leave time aside for big picture, longer term thinking. So you can really, that you leave time to step back, really look at what's working, what's not look at your initial assumptions, and just make sure that you are tracking for where you want to go. Because I have had some experience where I sort of didn't do enough of that, and then really sort of became conscious of things I should have, you know, years later. And so you can really waste some time that way. So, yeah, it's also you want to be you want to deal with reality, you know, maybe the things not working, maybe you need a new approach, or maybe it's just the wrong approach entirely. And you got to move on to the other thing, but so I guess, leave time for big thinking. And probably, you know, have a board of advisors. And really, yeah, just make sure that the whole thing is is tracking and you're, you know, it's easy to get stuck and lost in the minutia. So that's what I would say, for those that are not there. For the people that are there. I mean, I don't know. Great. Good for you. Yeah, I mean, I would say there, you know, push for some scale that feels right. Also, like, you know, I may want to build a big business, that doesn't mean that's the answer, you could have a small business, which makes a tremendous difference. So I think it Yeah, depends. For the ones that are habit going. Probably less less advice and more just congratulate it's working. And, and yeah, maybe actually, you use the same advice as the first one just makes you think back and think about where you're going and, and maybe don't be scared to go big. I think I tend to be the guy that when I'm driving to the restaurant to tisc, and I see a spot parking spot that's a couple blocks away, I'll just snag it, I don't need to sort of push things I don't need to get right up front, necessarily. And so, you know, some of the businesses that I built the sole, but I probably sold earlier. And I might have, I might have bought other companies or done other deals and pushed it much, much further and I didn't. So I would say maybe, maybe consider that. Because sometimes you can take something and it might feel like you've come a long way and you're there. But maybe there's a there's a much larger dream, and then you're set to get there. And so I would consider that.
Paul Zelizer 48:52
Grant, thank you so much for being on the show today.
Graham Hill 48:55
Thanks for having me. It was fun. I appreciate it. Man. Thanks for all you're doing.
Paul Zelizer 49:00
It's great. So we'll put links to everything Graham mentioned to the carbon knots, some of the workshop tree huggers, light and other things in the show notes. Just look below. Before I go I just want to say we love listener suggested topics and guests did an interview earlier today with somebody who was suggested by a listener. If you have an idea, you can go to the AWARE printers website. And right on our contact page, we have our three simple guidelines. We try to be really transparent about what we're looking for. If you take a look at those and you think it's a bit, send your ideas on it. So for now, I just want to say thank you so much for listening. Please take really good care and these intense times. And thank you for all the positive impact that you're working for in our world.