Facilitating more inclusive practices as part of the Climate Activist Speaker Fund selection process
In February 2023, the Environmental Funders Network (EFN) and Climate 2025 launched the Climate Activist Speaker Fund (CASF) pilot to support young global climate activists. In this post, and as part of the funds ‘Learning by Doing’ report, Tess shares what we learnt from supporting the selection process.
When Natasha first got in touch to ask if I could support her and Sarah with their interviewing practices and approach to decision-making for the pilot of their Climate Activist Speaker Fund I didn’t initially give it the time of day it deserved. I’d been burned in the past by funders who made a lot of noise about their intentions around equity and inclusion but would at best rarely follow through, and at worst get unnecessarily defensive in response to suggested changes to their processes.
So due to time constraints on their side, and reservations on mine, I initially offered to simply talk them through a few approaches I’d consider when going through a process like this. Natasha had attended a belonging workshop that Yasmeen Ahktar and I ran at the Environmental Funders retreat so I wanted to give her as a person my support, but I also wanted to protect myself from getting too overly invested in the possibilities of this fund.
But after an hour with them I knew my assumptions and reservations were wrong. They both seemed to have endless energy and enthusiasm for exploring what more they could be doing, and how else they could be challenging themselves and others on how this new fund operated. There was so much more we could’ve talked about in that first conversation.
Following our chat they went away and instantly put in place some of the suggestions we’d talked about. And what’s more unusual is they actually followed up with me to tell me how they’d got on (yes we have had many people gain knowledge from us, implement new ideas in their processes and forget to say thanks for our time!)
When I saw how deep they went with the exercise I’d suggested around bias - where you reflect on and speak openly with other panel members about what you automatically value or overlook within an interview setting, and also talk about who you are as a person and what that means for how you might perceive others - I was blown away. I’ve done this exercise with hundreds of organisations, and more often than not people remain painfully surface level and obscure with their reflections.
So when Sarah and Natasha decided they’d like to pay me to help mediate their conversations about the potential grantees I was excited to get to hold space for people who were actually ready to be reflective and honest. The journey with Sarah and Natasha allowed me as a facilitator to really grapple with the underlying complexities in how perception, social norms, positionality, psychological safety and relationships play into equitable decision-making.
Doing the work while doing the work
One of the hardest and most powerful aspects of working within the Equity and Inclusion space is that you have to work hard to hold spaces that challenge power dynamics and norms in order to create spaces that challenge power dynamics and norms. As an autistic person being in this meta space is such a joy for my brain, so when Sarah and Natasha started to notice how they held biases or were perpetuating dynamics that were reflective of the status quo they were trying to challenge with this programme it was a really beautiful opportunity to do some deep and embodied learning.
Much of the process relied on Sarah and Natasha deciding who had a story to tell and who demonstrated the potential to captivate people if they were given better access to support and resources. But it’s very hard not to assess this in a way that centres dominant cultures and norms, because we have mental models for what resonates within activism and public speaking based on who has already been represented within that space. And we have our own cultural conditioning that tells us what ‘good communication’ looks like. This was why Sarah and Natasha’s reflectiveness on their own experiences and what has shaped their perspectives as people was so powerful when seeking to challenge themselves and each other to expand their thinking about the potential of the applicants.
Creating safety in uncertainty and complexity
This decision-making process was the hardest set of variables that I’ve had to facilitate and pay attention to - in spite of the fact that it was only two people making a decision about a relatively small pot of funding. In many ways I was as uncertain about how the conversation was going to play out as Natasha and Sarah were, which is actually a beautifully important place to stay within as a facilitator. When we start to try to predict or control the flow of conversations and decisions we start to impose our world view.
Sarah and Natasha were not only relatively new to working together - so were trying to learn how one another would respond to challenge and questioning - but they were also trying to weigh up many different factors about the people they were meeting. There were obvious differences between people based on their location and culture, but there was also more subtle forms of difference that could be interpreted incorrectly or unfairly if we didn’t spend time unpacking the layers of what people had shared about themselves and their work, what we were each seeing and hearing of that, and how our bodies and brains were responding to that information. These are complex layers to engage our brains with - and to then have a conversation about.
To create more certainty I tried to provide some structure around how we would approach discussing each applicant. We started with the people who Sarah and Natasha had scored most disparately i.e. taking on the area of perceived conflict first. And we alternated who got to speak first about the candidate. But beyond that I created safety by being human, giving reassurance to Sarah and Natasha when they felt nervous about getting it wrong or voicing an opinion that others might see as unfounded, reflecting back what I was hearing and seeing from them both, and slowing down so that they could put words to what they were noticing about how their views differed and whether that made them change their minds.
Sarah shared how this felt for her and what was unique about this way of exploring complex decisions:
“I often perceive conflict or disagreement as threatening in some way. There’s always a bit of a jolt to my nervous system as much as I try to hide it. This experience was different, and I’m still trying to understand what about these conditions made this so different and liberating. I think it has everything to do with the space that was made to share our respective rationales in a way that wasn’t about “winning” or “being right”, but that could reveal a bit more about who we are as people, our thinking patterns, and then allow us to go away and reflect on this. There was also opportunity for us to change our thinking (which we often did), and not simply as a form of “throwing in the towel” or conforming. “
There was also a unique chemistry between Sarah and Natasha - between them they possessed a beautiful diversity of experiences and perspectives, combined with a shared deep care and joy about doing this work.
One individual or one initiative cannot change the world
I think it’s fair to say that many people who work in the social justice space go into that work with the hope of changing the future. It is both a beautiful motivation and one that can actually stop us from noticing what we have the power to do right now in the present.
While it was hard to hear, one of my favourite moments in the process was when Sarah acknowledged that there were people she was desperate for this programme to be a lifeline for but that she was only one person, this was only one small programme, and there wasn’t enough resource or knowledge within the team to be able to provide the type of journey that everyone needed.
Remembering our limits within social justice work is important to be able to sustain momentum. When we push ourselves and others beyond our capacity we fall back on bad habits. We need to slow down and acknowledge that we are each unique beings at our own unique place within our journeys. Sometimes we can see and understand things clearly, and sometimes we lack the knowledge, patience and bandwidth to engage with something or someone in the ways that we wish we could.
Understanding our responsibility and creating forms of accountability
Sarah and Natasha felt a great weight of responsibility with this programme - much more so than I have seen from others who are dealing with greater sums of money and power. Again this was beautiful and reassuring to witness. If everyone took their responsibility and power as seriously and thoughtfully the world would be a different place.
We talked after the process about how different it was for them to have freedom and control to shape this programme in ways that resonated with them, and in response to feedback from activists they admire - rather than being dictated to by a board that is entirely distant from the issues at hand.
But one of the layers that they would like to explore in future iterations of the fund is ways of inviting their wider teams into the process, not just because that would bring greater benefits in terms of integrating this type of thinking and working into other aspects of their organisational work, but also because they might benefit from more people challenging them and guiding them through the process.
What is important about this is that you can start to see when certain roles need to be played by different people - and in what ways that is helpful versus power wielding. All too often I have seen boards or leadership teams stop advising and guiding those who are closest to the issues, and start to make decisions, concoct pet projects, or intervene at the last minute without context.
Creating accountability structures might help the people working on this programme to feel more reassured, but we have to do that in a way that ensures those involved understand where their power begins and ends and why those roles are important. We can also do it in much more fluid ways by opening up our thinking and learnings with the sector at large. I am interested to see how Sarah and Natasha construct the next round with more participatory approaches and whether they feel there is enough accountability from the community they build around this fund to avoid falling back on seeking safety in structures we are used to.
If you want to understand more of the practical things we implemented as part of this process you can read the full report here. Some of the approaches were borrowed from our Recruitment Guide and re-purposed for the context of grant-making.