A Book Published... And The Author's Dilemma

Horray! LMI’s new book on climate change is finally, officially released!

Last night, we introduced some of our LMI colleagues to what we’ve done with the book, and each author was able to hold court and offer some insights into their work on this book. It was a nice internal rollout, and the discussions that took place reminded me of a key element to such a work—even after the writing is finished, the story continues.

Francis Reilly discusses his chapter on land use at the launch party for Climate Change: What You Can Do Now

Consider an author’s dilemma: there is great satisfaction that comes from finishing that last page, sending it off to the printer, and getting ready to share it with the world.

And then the very next day there’s the new stuff that pops up that you wish you could have included.

For example, just a few days ago, new details were revealed with regard to Apple, Inc.’s, newest data center in Prineville, Ore.—a choice location for tech giants (Facebook chose the same location for a data center last year). Apple’s new data center is confirmed as an intended green project—very worthy of discussion in our book’s “Information” chapter, which focuses on IT and communications.

The point, of course, is that when it comes to climate change, there’s plenty to talk about that a book couldn’t possible incorporate.

My fellow authors will be contributing regularly to this blog and use it as an opportunity to bring their expert analysis to the day’s events as they relate to the climate change issue.

The authors of this blog are experienced, they’re experts in their fields, and they’ve a passion for tackling the nation’s most vexing challenges. We’re all employees of LMI, and for 50 years this organization has used its not-for-profit mission to help the public sector with its management needs.

Our authors are

Rachael Jonassen, one of the world’s preeminent climate change scientists;

Dr. Michael Canes, noted economist and expert on energy markets and regulation;

John Yasalonis (public health)

Francis Reilly (land use)

Rich Skulte (infrastructure)

Julian Bentley (vehicles and fleets)

Taylor Wilkerson (supply chain)

Jeremey Alcorn (national security).

(The IT/communications chapter, in case you’re wondering, was a team effort, as Dr. Canes and I worked from a framework that a former LMIer, Greg Wilson, set forth for us. Greg’s role is greatly appreciated!)

You’ve already heard from John Selman, who introduced the book’s concept and goals, and Rachael Jonassen, who is our resident scientist. Soon you’ll get to hear from the rest.

As we move forward, we’ll continue to discuss the many issues related to the climate change that the book touches on—and offer new depth and new points of discussion for this complicated issue. This blog will also be a great way to keep track of when and where our experts are speaking at conferences and forums and what topics are driving their individual discussions at the moment.

So stay tuned! We’ve got a nice slate of things for you to think about and to discuss with us.

Helping Non-Scientists Use Climate Science

Let’s say you're an expert in Chinese and your boss comes to you one day and asks you to teach a doctor and a lawyer Chinese so they can write a book about the legal aspects of medicine in China. And by the way, they want you to help them understand how the medical and legal fields are different in China!

Imagine yourself in my shoes. You’re the only person in your company with professional background in climate change and you’re asked to help seven senior folks, each a specialist in their own field, each with little background in yours. You need to make sure they grasp the key issues and use them correctly. The success of the project depends on it. You have just a few months to succeed.

Suddenly you need to bring your colleagues up to speed, give the project a clear focus, help structure the result, and provide ideas for each. In some cases you must convince them it’s even possible.

What do you do?

These are hard-nosed professionals who really know their fields through long, distinguished careers. And they all really care about what they are doing. They have their own ideas about how this should be done.

By the way, this effort is on top of their regular duties and takes them away from their comfort zones.

And, this effort is intended to create something that helps all professionals like these. The results will be broadly published and freely available to similar experts who have not had the chance to think about how climate change affects their work.

What do you do?

To make it more complicated, imagine that you’re in a field where the consensus of about 99% of experts is that the problem is so big that everyone, in all these specialties, must change the way they operate and must do so soon.

To give you a better idea of what a challenge this is, think of it this way. What are some other big crises that we've faced that folks knew were global game changers: WWII, nuclear war, and racial discrimination?

What do you do?

In my case I had a little to go on. I’d already helped create a book on climate change which also involved working with many authors with limited background in the subject. It also helped that all the authors really wanted to do this, believed in the importance of the work, knew it would be a big step, and were willing to work together to get it right.

So here’s what I thought would be needed: (1) a clear idea of the audience, (2) a well-defined structure, (3) a common approach to each chapter, (4) agreement on the key climate challenges to discuss, (5) balanced coverage of how to prevent (mitigate) climate change and how to deal with it (adapt) as it happens, (6) reliance on the best available information, (7) an iterative approach to writing, and (8) outside review by highly knowledgeable people.

Next time I’ll talk a little about these seven goals. It wasn't easy!

Welcome to LMI’s blog for Climate Change: What You Can Do Now. This is our way of bridging the gap between our last day of working on the book, and today.

We’re enormously proud of the book, and expect this blog to be a great medium for continuing the conversations we’ve started—a platform for all those things that will become part of the climate change discussion in the coming months, and for issues that benefit from added depth and perspective.

But first, let me tell you about the book.

LMI has previously written a book about climate change: A Federal Leader’s Guide to Climate Change. We believe that book still stands as the definitive guide to climate change for the federal sector. It’s unbiased, nonpartisan, and easy to use. It’s a great reference piece for federal leaders.

This new book offers a different take on the climate change issue—one that steps beyond our first book’s discussion of federal government and the science involved in the issues. We wrote this book with managers in mind, not only in the public sector, but in the private sector as well. That’s because the functional areas that we focus on in this book are relevant to almost every organization and every level of government—public health, IT and communications, land use, infrastructure, vehicles and fleets, supply chain, and national security.

Each of these areas can be a starting point for action, whether it’s mitigation or adaptation to a changing climate. And each of these areas can be where the strategies are developed and implemented and eventually touch the other functional areas we discuss. In many cases, these strategies can spur an entire organizational effort on the climate change issue.

One thing we’re acutely aware of is that action on climate change remains a tough sell—especially when the bottom line remains a key consideration. With this in mind, we also found that the tools most managers already have at their disposal—the use of risk and cost-benefit analysis, for example—are well-suited for application to the climate change issue.

As this blog evolves, you’ll get to hear from the authors of the book and engage them in the conversation you’d like to have about the climate change issue. Each of these individuals is an expert in what they do. They have very unique perspectives and are highly qualified to speak in their area of interest. I have no doubt that you’ll be able to gain insight into how they view the climate change issue.

So welcome to our blog! If you’ve not yet read the book, I hope this website and the discussions here pique your interest. And if you have read our book—thank you. I hope we can use this blog to continue a meaningful discussion on how we can all work collaboratively to address the pressing issue of climate change.