 Awesome. So what are we doing today? Hopefully you'll have, you won't hear much from me or from from, you know, we'll hear from some others, but then really get into conversations and hear from you. And as we enter the decade of action and move beyond business as usual, it's clear that unprecedented levels of collaboration between generations, cultures, geographies, sectors are needed to tackle the scale of the crises that we're facing and to create the solutions needed. But we know that partnerships can be demanding, sometimes difficult to find the right fit and sometimes provide more obstacles than opportunities. So we wanted to host a session that really allows us to explore how to foster effective and meaningful partnerships that really center climate justice. So here's how it's going to go down. We'll introduce the speakers and the facilitators who will guide our session today. We'll get into an overview of the social change ecosystem and the different roles within that. We'll then go out and break out groups which will be a chance to meet other participants and really reflect and evaluate the partnerships that you're working on or the ones that you want to and really reflect on how to cultivate more diverse and sustained partnerships using the ecosystem framework. And then we'll finish off with a large group discussion to share tools for future partnership and really make sure that we're building off of this session into and to beyond the work that you're doing. So we've designed this to be reflective but also action-oriented. And yeah, we're really excited to be here with you today. Thank you for joining us. So hi folks. My name is Shalaka. You should say pronouns and I also work with you in the climate lab alongside Dominique. We have this tweet up here from Naomi Sayers, a indigenous lawyer based out of Turtle Island. And it says, if you're a non-indigenous person and think land acknowledgments aren't enough or if you want to do something more or better, start by describing your relationship to the land. Where did your family come from? How did you end up here today? And what did you benefit, lose, gain, and what was lost? And we like to share this quote because it's a really important way to acknowledge that climate action is always grounded in land and it's always grounded in sharing stories and reflections in respect to the land. And when we work in the space of climate action and climate justice, our work needs to be rooted in this reflection. So I'll share this for a moment here. And yeah, now we'll turn to the facilitators to share a little bit about themselves today. I'm really excited to have some really fabulous young people sharing and opening the remarks for today. So Angelique, take it away. Hi, everyone. I'm really sorry about the lighting. It is 8 p.m. in the Seychelles, but greetings from the Seychelles. My name is Angelique Pupono and she and her pronouns. So I'm currently the Chief Executive Officer of a PPP, a public-private partnership or a mechanism that emerged from one. The Trust Fund is called the Seychelles Conservation and Climate Adaptation Trust and in short, Seychelles. And it was created through a partnership from government as well as a philanthropic organization in a different country. So one of my favorite things about partnership is the bringing of different expertise to one table to address a common challenge. I really like the feeling of not being surrounded in an ecodome, I could say, in an ecodome where everybody's sort of saying the same things, but you really have a partnership which can challenge the way one is thinking to create more sustainable solutions and solutions that work for different sections of society and globally. So that's definitely something I really like about partnership and in the work that we do, which involves financing projects, a lot of the time we do get the scientists to partner with the policymakers and that's always a lot of fun. I am a lawyer by profession, so when the scientists are in the room, I'm usually telling them four-year-old level, bring it down, bring it down, and if you can best explain it to me. And similarly, we have that sharing of knowledge, sharing of information and identifying ways to forge forward to address the challenge. So one question that I've got here is what brought me to climate action and climate justice and what keeps me here? Well, I'm from the Seychelles, so I'm from a very small island developing states surrounded by ocean and always been a walk away, a five-minute walk away from the sea. So my interest, I shouldn't say my interest in climate action, I guess climate action is my reality. It's my everyday. It's not something that I've chosen but has emerged out of necessity to ensure the survival of the islands. And the one thing that has kept me coming is not just being from a small island, but the hope that working with partners from different countries but particularly young people has brought me to really find solutions to address climate, to take climate action but predominantly to bring about climate justice. So I'll end it there. Thanks. Hi everyone. My name is Naya. I use she her pronouns. Apologies I don't have my video on when I did turn it on. People were cutting out so I'll just keep it like this to make things a little bit easier for today. I organize with Climate Strike Canada which is a network of local grassroots climate strike groups across Canada and I also work with Youth Climate Lab. One of my favorite things about partnerships is the experience of having an opportunity to look at things through a different lens often I think in the climate sphere especially when we all have like the goals that we're working towards and we want to sort of explain our own theories of change we can get caught up in a little bit of a narrow perspective and so partnerships for me is an opportunity or our opportunities to be able to examine things from a different lens and to actually discover new things about my own work as a result of working with different folks. I was brought to climate action and working for climate justice through a lot of hope I come to climate activism through different types of organizing and it was really inspiring to me to see how climate justice really tied lots of different issues together in a meaningful way and also attempted to engage different stakeholders and different generations in a way that I hadn't seen before and I'm kept in climate action work through a combination of eco-anxiety and still that same hope and and also the communities that I've met since doing this work and I'll pass it to Sarah. Hi everyone I'm Sarah I go by she her pronouns I am an Indigenous youth from which is in Northwestern Ontario along Lake Superior which is the largest lake in the world. I am also calling like Dominique from the unceded and traditional lands of the Algonquin Anishinaabek. My favorite thing about partnerships is bridging gaps between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples and communities to work towards the common goal of having a world to live in for the next seven generations. I've been really brought to climate actions and justice through this partnership pathway I've brought on. I first started with Youth Climate Lab last last spring and since then I've really grown my network and community organization and though I work for youth or youth for nature right now I have lent my Indigenous knowledge and expertise to various organizations across Canada including Leading Change Canada and Youth Climate Lab and I'm really excited to be here today to kind of share that perspective and meet you all. Wonderful thanks everyone for sharing. This is sneak peek to the fantastic folks who will be supporting you in your breakout rooms. I'll also give a quick introduction to myself my name is Shalaka, you see they pronounce based on the Haldiman tract tonight which is the territory of the Anishinaabek or the Shonia neutral peoples. If you wanted to Google for the space you could look at NATO land OTA, it's a great resource to recognize the territories and treaties that govern this land but if you wanted the colonial name it's also to Toronto, slightly west of Toronto in Canada. I will also be supporting with the breakout rooms today and yeah very excited to have everyone in the room. Partnerships are really unusual and great space to be in right now especially with you know naturally the the pandemic things can't be done alone they never have been able to be done alone and we're really excited to continue to add to the toolkit of partnerships. We're just going to launch a little poll of who's in the audience these are just three questions about where you're joining from, what industry you're joining from and your age range. We'll do a couple moments for each one as people fill them in but do continue to share your introductions in the chat as well as people like. I believe we might have a couple people joining just dialing in through their phones which is totally okay you may not be able to access the poll at this time. Let's do a few more seconds and then maybe switch to the next one. Yeah a lot of folks from research orgs, from international network-based organizations, no media or students here today but that's okay we we are students in our in our lives every single day. Mark, do you mind switching it over to the to the next poll? Awesome so a lot of people from the European Union, learning from ASCA as well, Asia, North America, awesome great representation all across. Ah yes good good point Claire you'll see I see I see the the note there good to know. Cool um all right and then we just want to learn the age range of folks joining today. Youth for Youth Climate Lab or Youth Youth Climate Lab as a youth for youth organization and we're always curious about who's in the room uh representation wise. So last poll here for thanks for voting everyone seems like there's there's good representation across the ages too um yeah really excited to have a conversation together uh on on partnerships. Of course head end of the work that we'll be doing today focuses on the social change ecosystem. So this is a resource by Deepa Iyer that came out early in the pandemic um around understanding what our role is in in the ecosystem around social change. So sometimes we you know when we enter meetings we we start by talking about our job title we talk about our careers and and this this model we really like at Youth Climate Lab because it's it's more about an ecosystem about how everyone's interconnected how we work together and and how our roles are more than just our job titles. On the screen you'll see names such as builders visionaries disruptors frontline responders storytellers and and we won't really talk about what each of these means in detail although we do invite you to to look up this resource following the the call um so this resource is you know centers equity and inclusion liberation justice solidarity resiliency and interdependency and it's it uses these tenants that all of us at the end of the day are trying to work towards these things and we do them in different ways the the how we get to to where we want to go is is done um in in the different you know ways that we we do our work and so the the core reason that we want to use this framework today is because it breaks down power dynamics so we no longer are talking about you know funders or or are we getting money from someone we're no longer talking about necessarily race or class or gender or age but we're talking about our role and and you know are we do we produce um art as a way to bring people together do we share stories amongst the community or tell stories and that's our way of sharing knowledge and and it's also really important to note that these roles really vary so they might not always be based on um or like the role that you are one day in one project might be pretty different from the one you know a couple hours later and and being transferable is is natural and normal and a really healthy part of of who we are as as people and and of course that believes into who we are as partners um so so I don't necessarily think we need to talk about what each of the roles ends up being maybe between these these words you'll you'll feel drawn to some maybe you feel like you are a storyteller maybe you feel like you give a lot of care and you're a caregiver um it's it's not important that you know the the perfect definition of these these roles what's more important is is what you're drawn to naturally based on the partnerships that you already have and the partnerships that you hope to have in the future so so just based on on this um brief description of the social change ecosystem I just want to see you see in the room where everyone feels like they may lie whether you see yourself as a builder or as a disruptor so there's a poll we'll have it up for about a minute and a bit um but yeah just curious to see who you think you are awesome seems like most people have voted here and and a lot of people see themselves as as bridge builders so you know in a sense connectors um there's a lot of people here as well who identified as visionaries love to see that love to see the big visions um and the excitement for the big picture of course um yeah really interesting to see some storytellers and also people who are not sure yet I really I really appreciate that sometimes you can't be sure or um haven't haven't maybe had a chance to reflect on that role and totally understand that as well also love to see artists a key part of our climate change movement and climate action movement um and of course some disruptors we love to see we love to see that great okay I'm just seeing a comment here from Tim that the polls maybe don't work in the browser but noting that kind of feel drawn to being a disruptor a storyteller cool um professionally but maybe otherwise drawn to other descriptions that's right awesome um so the next session here we're going to be getting into breakout rooms so the fantastic folks that guided uh some of our opening remarks today will be sharing um sharing some of the their reflections but also inviting you to share reflections we're going to be we're going to be using um the google jam board as a tool so this is another virtual whiteboard that exists out there in the world and we like it because it keeps the scope kind of smaller um and it's maybe easier to capture for these uh small more intimate conversations so you'll have maybe like eight to ten people in your in your breakout rooms um and yeah maybe we'll we'll guide you on over there now um and yeah in the breakout rooms we'll we'll dive into some questions like uh what are principles that guide your partnerships uh how are you you know defining diverse partnerships um and how are you cultivating these and what are you doing to build intentional relationships beyond just single projects um and so we hope that this is a space where you can reflect uh learn from other people from as we thought around the world and across different age groups and and uh different industry groups and uh we'll have about 20 to 25 minutes in these breakout rooms and then we'll come back together um we'll also want to note that um if there's someone who's really excited to share back to the group uh we'll ask maybe two to three people per group or or maybe one to two per group to share back when we come back together hi folks um thank everyone's back now um just as a note uh I to mark I'm because I have remote control I don't see the other controls on my screen um but thanks thank you um maybe maybe do you mind taking it back and I can just share our next slide I just aren't I'm not able to see any of the other settings on my screen right now apologies thank you great okay everyone so I I know it's it's really tight to have these big conversations together um but hopefully um those exercises and the white board allowed you to have some reflecting um some time to reflect and um and think about these questions and relationships to partnerships in your life um and yeah maybe you had a chance to interact with the social change ecosystem model a little bit as well in your in your group which is awesome um I just invite maybe each of the groups uh to share a little bit about what what happened in the group um and and of course if you if you didn't get through all the questions that's totally okay so these are really big questions the idea is to get lots of different things going in your mind about principles and intention in how you build partnerships so of course if you didn't get through them all that's okay but would love to hear from a group um maybe something that stood out to you or surprised you about the process um and I'll just open the floor generally to folks for that should we start we're not in no particular order are we I'll I'll just anyone who wants to share um thanks for joining Barry um we'll see you later but yeah if you wanted to to share first please please go ahead no no particular order we're a small enough group that uh you could just go or if you wanted to use the raise hand function you could do that as well cool sure well since I I'm muted myself we might as well go yeah go for it yeah and the group please with me too add add in uh but yeah on the kind of the principles I think lots of us brought the kind of this core design collaboration listening first kind of things of really engaging with the intention to shape something really together and in that like creating value for everyone involved building that trust and care explicitly as well um so those are some of the principles I don't do you want us to go through all of the kind of questions or focus on anything in particular sure just just share what stood out to you or what surprised you yeah I think uh we'll be sharing some of the notes from the discussion regardless but yeah just whatever whatever you um thought was most prominent in your group yeah yeah okay um well just to add on to that I think we're we're quite attuned to the different power imbalances uh that I will be affecting the ways that partnerships are created and coming about and that is something that we'll try and to be mindful of in our very different context and the translating those kind of aspirational values that you start with a start isn't necessarily the most simple straightforward thing so when it gets into the messy different agendas different people groups uh trying to do seemingly aligned things but then when all the differences emerge uh that it's not yeah not a very simple process so there is a lot of kind of careful facilitation of interactions that we've talked about like who facilitates those what kind of spaces are there where this interaction is being facilitated and I guess the role for organizations like kind of intermediaries or knowledge brokers in ensuring all voices are heard in equal ways and that it works for everyone in ways that yeah can accommodate those different different voices that you have so yeah maybe someone else can add into what we discussed well one thing from our group that I think builds on arena's comment there is the need for pretty intentional feedback loops so that that you can be really explicit about the differences that are emerging and to do not kind of just let them happen but to have a space that can hold them safely and that can make the most of those differences um our group also talked about the importance of um co-creation of strategy from the outset that a strong partnership um really begins at the beginning it's it's not one player bringing in a bunch of others necessarily um later on uh and um and that it's important to stay in touch that sometimes uh you know once a partnership has gotten a project up and running it the project kind of goes and everybody moves on to other activities and um staying in touch through social media for example and through um periodic you know ways to maintain the intentional dialogue um we're highlighted in our group as well that's awesome I love the I love the points there around uh staying in touch beyond and and creating care um that's awesome thank you great does anybody else want to share back from from their groups um if you don't want to that's okay I know there's there's lots going on at the conference and maybe want to reflect but really happy to to learn about what happened in the different groups hi all my name came out of the back for reporting so I'm just um doing as I've been told so what came out of our group session um well we were a lot of bridge builders and visionaries in our group which wouldn't surprise us I guess seeing the poll I think those two make sense as well empathy was one of the key principles that was mentioned in building partnerships you know being empathetic for yeah to what your partners are wishing to achieve making sure that you listen carefully um and and you know um trying to um build together um towards a common objective um that that's what stood out for some of us um partnership starts with having similar ideals um similar uh objectives and build on that um if you if you share common values um yeah you can build trust uh you stay in touch with each other uh and you can collaborate um those are highly valued um key principles um it's exploded the the the jam board here um so many post-its I hadn't seen before um so how are you cultivating diverse partnerships um some things that are written here is um don't be keen to do the business as usual so I guess that's um go out of the box be open um if you're able to accept everyone's opinion without judgments um something I wrote down is visit go into the fields um so um if you want to create cultivate diverse partnerships um don't just go to the capital city only but do make sure that you also go to you know the so-called field um make sure that you get to see the communities and get to talk to the communities you're actually um trying to support um in building community-based adaptation um yeah um I'll keep it there for now um it's really exploded here so maybe some people from my group uh would like to add what they've written thanks so much Melvin yeah if folks want to continue sharing from the groups please feel free we're happy to share the the screenshots from all the groups in case you're curious or you have some FOMO fear of missing out on on what the other conversations were um we'll be we'll be sharing those and we'll have maybe another five minutes for sharing before the next couple things so if anyone else wants to love we'd love to hear thanks can I add a comment shall I go yes please go ahead yeah so I'm really enjoying uh this session uh learning a lot um great partnership uh emerging already but um I keep thinking that we seem to be very focused on harmony harmonious partnerships building trust being like-minded finding organizations or people or communities that have the same ideals um well this session is called radical partnerships right and I'm I'm wondering if disruptive action that is needed to uh to adapt to the climate change that is is upon us um can really come from these partnerships between like-minded uh individuals or like-minded organizations that do not need to convince each other uh of a different worldview that might be necessary so I'm thinking does anybody feel that it might be useful as well to try which is very difficult to engage organizations and engage communities who are not the let's say usual suspects but organizations that might be much more conservative than your own progressive organization or might be of a different religious group than than your own organization or might be in a completely different sector than you are with completely different objectives for example when you're from a humanitarian NGO uh working together with urban planners to make sure that initiatives initiatives and projects really get embedded for the long term um anyone has any thoughts on that yeah that's not a great point Tim thanks so much for for sharing that um yeah as a as someone who isn't trained in the climate space either it's a it's a question that we always think about um and a great point I see here that Angelique you have your your uh hand raised did you want to respond to Tim um but but if not it was an error that's okay as well but I just wanted to make sure you have a chance to respond if you did want to sure thanks a lot and Tim that's such a great question um and I I I totally agree with you and and especially when you work in the space I work with in which you know we've got this really strange name for the space which is blended finance right um and really it's bringing together private capital and and public funds as a form of security um but I've also worked within the climate space and and one of the things that we always hear about especially when we're talking about climate finance for example is there's insufficient public funds right um there's we need to we need to attract private sector into the space there isn't enough taxpayers money to to fund all the climate action that we will require we need private sector to come in we need private sector to come in yet there is absolutely zero attempt at bridging language gaps and I don't mean language in a sort of English-French situation but private sector understands a very specific language they understand risk they understand um return on investment those are the things that they understand whereas people perhaps within the climate space think about equity think about inclusion they think about fairness they think about climate justice really if you say that to an impact investor they think what strange abstract concepts are these people coming up with um I've never heard that that's an interesting word and again I don't say it to to make a mockery of the of the of the the spaces but also the but also to print to point that there's so there's a lack of of attempt for us to bridge those languages and so very few people who understand both languages um who was able to take from the climate space and and speak to an impact investor in their language but at the same time I think there's still a need for impact investors to understand our language and to understand why inclusion is important why um fairness is important why climate justice is important um so I really think that um I I think one of the the notes that I wrote was be comfortable with being uncomfortable and I think that's an necessary part of building um a really strong partnership is that level of discomfort that you're not sure you want to learn more but it's it's on both sides rather than just coming from one person so I'd say great question and definitely something that we really need to put more of an effort on thanks awesome thanks so much for sharing angeline I see here that coethi you have your your hand raised I'd love to hear from you as well please go ahead yes so the point I wanted to make is also in relation to the opportunities that covid is creating um in in terms of putting a lot of pressure on us to do things differently so that also involves some some sort of more flexibility and more courage to take risks uh and uh and to diversify the the type of stakeholders that we can engage in delivering urgent responses so that opens a bit the box in which we have been working to go beyond business as usual that's on one side the second thing is that at least in Mozambique we we have been facing a lot of um challenges with um uh humanitarian interventions related to natural shocks but also in relation to some terrorism in the north so that means that you also need to really lift quite high the principally in humanitarian reasons are no regrets and when you have a no regrets kind of approach then you are also more um you have a higher appetite to rapidly engage through uh uh approaches and models that have not been deemed right awesome thank you for for sharing I think that's those are great points as well um thanks thanks for sharing Kori and I see here in the chat as well from Eliza that they agree with Angelique we need to make more effort to have the same language and and understanding it especially I guess in that point of of working with unlikely partners for sure um we have a few more minutes if anybody else wanted to respond to Tim's question about working with people who are less likely to work with us and and bring those folks on board um you can take maybe one or two more people um before we start to close the session um yeah if I may uh because it was right after I um shared about you know building trust in uh sharing common values ideals um so I get where Tim is coming from right so I work on inclusive water governance and I see uh building alliances um with unusual suspects as well so that that's what I'm striving for at the same time both ends also works um in strengthening environmental human rights defenders um and that's that's a different type of work I think than trying to up skill community based uh adaptation initiatives um so um yes Tim I think I think you're right I think that we need to strive for partnerships with also the unusual suspects but at the same time I think it's also very important to strengthen those partnerships uh with like-minded organizations and I think that's um much needed in times um of shrinking civic space and you know human rights environmental um rights being put under pressure um so I don't think it's an or or situation but I think it's an end and situation I hope that clarifies great thanks for sharing Melvin yes that's that's a good point that it's it's neither just like one option where we're only working with the same people all the time and it's not the option that we're always just uncomfortable and working with people who we're unfamiliar with by finding a balance and in the diverse kind of partnerships we have um Heather I see maybe you're you want to unmute did you want to share next or um you have a question uh well I got this little note that the organizer wanted me to unmute um and I was I was actually sending a note to Koti in the chat um I'm wondering if you can give us an example of what you called no regrets approaches that are helping under COVID with the humanitarian sector sorry I'm struggling with the unmuting so this is very much related to engaging uh partners that are not usually the partners you engage with at local level where you know very little about them and you cannot go through all those standard processes in terms of appropriate organizational assessments and all the research in terms of capacities and everything so you really try to strengthen your monitoring systems but you take the risks to engage through them so those are like partnerships that are not usually are not usually in your rather to engage with the small organizations for example thank you yeah maybe um we're just we're just coming close to the the time here and we just have a couple more components before we close so maybe if you wanted to get in touch with folks after the call um maybe in the in the chat you can private message them to continue the conversation um Mark could I invite you to just pull up slide 11 the the one with the map and Nia will will explain a little bit about that tool thanks for hearing your screen mark yeah this this map um is a resource that we've created at East Climate Lab um for you all to sort of guide your radical collaborations beyond this digital session um the largest questions I think uh it might be a little bit hard to see but the largest um two white bubbles at the top left corner um are sort of grounding points for you um both within the social change ecosystem which you were introduced to today and also within the principles that guide your partnerships which was one of the first questions that you probably discussed in your breakout rooms um and then the the sort of darker green circles surrounding those as well as the lighter green circles are additional considerations that you might already be taking into account when developing your partnerships or perhaps want to include in the future when you're when you're creating best practices for doing that um and feel free to use them as a sort of choose your own adventure type thing um and work with just those sections and the questions that resonate most with you um and with your needs and the gaps that you feel like you need to fill and I believe that will be um yeah Dominique just sent it to the chat so you can feel free to download this worksheet and use it afterwards as you continue to develop your partnerships yeah wonderful thanks so much Nia um yeah that's that's a lot of uh these these questions encompass a lot of what we talked about today and extensions of maybe some of those questions that um yeah Tim you had around like what interests you're not willing to take in building a partnership um but also you know touching on diversity of partnerships and what diverse actually means to us whether that means rural and remote versus our usual like urban comfort zone or maybe vice versa so um we really invite you to check out the resource if it's useful to you love to hear how you've used it and if it was successful for you um but it's absolutely available at the link in the chat thanks um okay great uh we'll we'll go to the um next slide and we have a one of the closing polls about just to see where things where people are at so um this poll helps us understand if your positionality and better understanding your positionality um how how that affects your partnership um so yes this process was helpful to put your reflections on paper um yes it was helpful to think of a new way of thinking of partnerships maybe you need more time to process this workshop before you can answer or uh maybe you feel the same way but you met cool people um and those are all all very good for us to know just a few few moments on that if you haven't already filled out the poll um we're sharing the results now so yeah most of folks here felt like this was a new way of thinking of partnerships which is just awesome but also we see a couple other people in different camps maybe yeah a reflective space maybe need more time to think about things or or maybe you just met new cool people and and that's great that's awesome thank you um great okay we're we're really close to time um so we're gonna start to close the session and um uh I'll start my next slide I think I have remote access but yeah really really genuinely thank you so much for your willingness to share your stories with us today with each other um it's very hard to be in a virtual space um and so hopefully we provided some new tools or spaces to reflect sometimes that's also a very needed opportunity um hopefully you met some people that you could stay in touch with feel free to share your information with folks in the chat um where they can find you next um and yeah if you do use the map really wonderful to hear um how you've used it and uh we'd love to hear that as well um mark you mind going to the next slide and yeah if you're interested in the work that we do and want to stay in touch we're at use climate lab um on twitter instagram on facebook and uh you can find our impact reports in terms of what we've been up to at youthclimateslab.org as well as learn a little bit more about the team and other projects we're up to but thank you everyone so much for spending time with us together today really really appreciate it and um yeah happy to share uh the the tools overall with you if you have the links to our jam board continue to you know hang on to them if you want to see and grow the the ideas there um and and we're really excited to move with them as well um but yeah that's that's everything from us thank you everyone and really really appreciate uh yeah your willingness to experiment with us never run this version of the workshop before so thanks for trying it out um if you want to stay for a bit after the the call wraps up feel free uh but uh otherwise yeah ended slightly early which almost never happened so i hope that's a good time um thanks everyone and uh if the speakers just don't mind staying for a little bit after uh that would be awesome take care thanks so much