Why organisations need circular education

The Circular Economy will work as a network of collaborations. Therefore, it will be too complex to provide standardised and simple solutions. Our response to challenges will not be black or white and might not even be repeatable. Instead, organisations will find the answers inside so called 'solution spaces' that contain a selection of circular strategies, all with the potential to respond successfully to your challenge. Inside those solution spaces it is up to the organisation to decide for the most suitable one to develop the circular and sustainable potential of your organisation.

This might sound challenging. Yet, this approach ensures you put your time and money in innovations that are robust and future-proof.

However, to move about confidently in the solution spaces and between the potential circular strategies, a fundamental understandig of circular economy and system thinking is necessary. It might seem challenging to engage staff through all responsibility levels with all this information and a new way of thinking, but it enables organisations to innovate tangible solutions to be successful in a Circular Economy based carbon-free market.  

Challenges for businesses

When it comes to a net-zero economy and the implementation of circular solutions, there is a lot of room for education. This is just a selection of issues you might want to assess and/or address.

The topics and skills are connected, of course. And when it comes to your staff education, ecocircleconcept will provide you with any specific learning package your organisation needs to start and continue the journey.

Circular Solutions

Organi­sations need to learn to create econo­mic value based on cir­cular re­source flows. At the same time, they have to con­si­der social and gover­nance as­pects and meet the SDG. No easy task, which needs new com­pe­ten­ces.

Risks & Opportunities

Orga­ni­sa­tions face new risks and chances: Those of climate change and su­stain­abili­ty, trans­for­ma­tion and new business models, col­la­bor­ation and value crea­tion. Or­ga­ni­sa­tions need the internal com­pe­tence to analyse them.

Co-creation

Cir­cular so­lu­tions base on the inter­con­nec­tion of systems. That means, that inter­active value crea­tion and value co-­creation is the most pro­mising ap­proach to re-­design our eco­nomy. Organisations need to learn this democratic process.

Master Complexity

The CE is a com­plex sys­tem that comes with a lot of un­cer­tain­ties. The good news is, pro­fes­sionals can learn how to think in sy­stems and master the regarding un­cer­tain­ty, change and sur­prise and make sound de­cisions.

Leading Change

Leading change is hard work. You need to com­muni­cate dry facts in a fun way and urgen­cy with­out drama, gene­rate short-­term wins in a trans­for­mation-­mara­thon and em­power people in some­times high­ly hirar­chic struc­tures.

Planetary Boundaries

The eco­no­mic tran­si­tion is no end it itself. Every step of the way we need to make sure our actions serve the goal to stay with­in the pla­netary boun­daries. We have to know the boun­daries and under­stand the con­se­quence of our actions.

KNOWLEDGE NUGGET

To be fit for the Circular Economy, organisations still need to learn a lot. However, it is not so much about expertise knowledge, but much more about understanding how to connect knowledge and information. It is not so much about learning to make the right decisions, but learning to ask the right questions and draw reasonable conclusions. It is not so much about becoming better in HOW to do things, but in deciding WHAT to do. It is not so much about learning to implement change, but learning to lead the change.

What we need to understand, is, that the Circular Economy is a complex system, while the current (or former) linear system rests mostly on complicated structures. That means, the Circular Economy plays by different rules entirely. We cannot apply linear managment methods and expect to become complexity-proof circular solutions. What does that mean?

It means, for example, that an organisation cannot implement an ESG-Strategy by just benchmarking about and setting a few fancy KPIs. The organisation e.g. needs to understand the materiality and interrelations of the criteria they measure, implement the flexibility to change the metrics and adapt them to the dynamic of the market as well as the changing economic landscape(!) and - given the urgency of the situation and the toughness of the challenge - integrate the passion and ability to shoot for the moon into their entire organisation.

Reading recommendation

For content information, please have a look on the reading recommendations on the other pages. In these books, you will find some inspiration about helfpul skills and frameworks.






For more recommendations please see the pages 'Home', 'Circular Innovation' and 'Financing Circularity'.