by Maurizio Liberante, Founder – Sustain Lab
Not long after the pandemic, like a lot of people, I found myself overwhelmed by the scale of the climate crisis. I was reading more, listening more, and feeling less and less sure about how to actually respond. I tried volunteering, joined a climate non-profit, and while the work was important, something didn’t sit right. It felt disconnected, too general, too far from the everyday.
That experience led me to co-found Climate Local and eventually Sustain. What I kept coming back to was the idea that unless people understand the context — where they are, what’s around them, what they care about, it’s hard to move them toward action. That might sound obvious, but it’s often missing. We jump to solutions without asking the right questions. Or we assume people aren’t acting because they don’t care, when the real issue is they don’t know where to begin.
So I started working from a simple idea: context, reflection, then action. That’s the order that seems to stick. If something makes sense, if it feels relevant, if it connects to your lived experience, you’re more likely to do something with it.
That’s also why I value RE[act]. There’s no pressure to have all the answers. It’s a space where people can come together from businesses, third sector, academia, communities and explore. Some are early in the journey, others have been working in this space for years. But the format makes it feel like everyone has something to offer. It’s open, curious, and refreshingly human.
Too often, sustainability is talked about in a way that feels heavy, inaccessible, or full of jargon. But when it’s rooted in place, when it’s linked to the buildings we walk past, the buses we take, the stories we hear from others in the city, it becomes easier to hold. That’s what RE[act] gets right.
The temptation is always to start with action, with big shifts, pledges, plans. But the most durable action comes when people are given a chance to understand first. That’s the part that’s so often overlooked: the learning, the conversation, the shared understanding of why change matters, where it needs to happen, and who it needs to involve.
If you’re reading this and wondering what that means in practice, I’d suggest starting small. Wherever you work, whether it’s a big business, a school, a council department, or a charity, take time to ask questions. Not just about what needs to be done, but about how people feel about it. What’s already happening? What’s missing? Who’s being left out of the conversation?
This approach underpins what we develop at Sustain and while the topics might be climate, ESG, or responsible AI, the process is the same. Slow down. Understand the context. Create space for reflection. Then move toward action, even if that action is modest. Sometimes the most meaningful shift is just changing how people speak to each other about what matters.
You don’t need a full strategy to get started. You need to understand where you are.
Being invited to speak at RE[act] again this year is a real privilege. I don’t come with a perfect model or a toolkit. But I do believe in the value of making time for these conversations. In a world that moves quickly and expects certainty, holding space for shared reflection is a quiet type of resistance and maybe one of the more useful things we can do.
If nothing else, I hope people leave this year’s festival with a bit more clarity. Not just about the scale of the problems, but about the shape of their own involvement. Who they can speak to. What they can question. What change might look like in their own role, team, or neighbourhood.
Sustainability is rarely about one big thing. It’s about many small things adding up. But they only add up when people are invited in when the door is left open for understanding, for ideas, for action that makes sense here and now. That’s what RE[act] offers. And that’s why I keep showing up.