Happy Sunday!
Welcome back to Founders Feature, a weekly newsletter all about the journeys of young startup founders.
For this week's edition, I interviewed Emma Heiling, CEO & Co-founder of ClimaTalk, an international youth-led non-profit organisation working to demystify climate policy, registered in Austria.
If you think someone else should read this too, feel free to let them know!
If you're reading this outside your inbox, subscribe to receive future editions directly:
Here’s what ClimaTalk is all about:
🏠 The Basics
The Problem:
The climate crisis, and particularly climate policy is incredibly complex. It has a lot of different elements and aspects to consider, and it’s very difficult to understand if you haven’t studied it or are not an expert in it, especially if you are a young person looking to get into climate action and fighting the climate crisis. Existing material, such as thought pieces by think tanks, or original documentation, are long and inaccessible to people with no background in climate policy.
The Solution:
We want to enable and empower young people to act on the climate crisis by being able to understand what’s behind it, and engage in discussions and in solutions to the problem that we’re facing. We do this by providing simple, accessible, and understandable information about climate policy and related topics. We also showcase what opportunities are available for young people to get active or start a climate education or career.
The Team:
Currently, we have over 100 young, international volunteers, divided across our eight teams and six projects. We are mostly university students, but also young professionals or school students. All teams and projects are led by one or two people, and we have an executive committee of five people - myself, Gianna, Georgia, Hannah and Sadiyah. Gianna studies Human, Social and Political Sciences, Georgia is doing her PhD after a Master’s in English literature, Hannah is a Geography student and Sadiyah studies Law. My background is a Bachelor’s in Land Economy, an intersection of Environment, Law and Economics, at Cambridge and I am currently pursuing my Masters in Environmental Policy at Sciences Po in Paris.
🚀 The Journey
How did you come up with your startup/solution?
Back in March 2020, a small group of students got together in Cambridge to set up something for Cambridge students to get involved in COP26. That first meeting really showed me just how difficult it is to understand climate policy specifics, in particular agreements, concepts, and regulations. This was right before Covid started and very shortly after we all got sent home.
In April, two of us from the meeting got together again, virtually of course, and decided to build a platform that enables young people to understand climate policy, even if they have no background in it. We wanted to create short-form content that explains concepts and terms in an easy and accessible way.
COP26 got pushed to 2021, so we were able to cover that in a lot of detail since we had already been going for over a year by then, which was great.
Why is this the right time for this problem to be solved?
The history of climate policy can be divided into decades or periods, and the period we are in now can be called the ‘decisive decade’. We are currently living in the decade where the future will be decided based on how we decide to act now. We currently still have some chance of keeping global warming in the ‘safe(r) zone’, but if we don’t act now, it will be too late in future decades, and we will face catastrophic consequences that can no longer be reversed. So, now is absolutely the right time to empower and inform as many people as possible, especially young people, our generation.
What is a recent success you are proud of?
I am extremely proud of our COP26 coverage, where we produced daily content of interviews, explanatory posts, live sessions and much more, with several people from our team reporting directly from Glasgow, myself included. I am also proud that we crossed the mark of 100 volunteers from all over the world - a bit over a year ago we were still only a handful of people and I never thought we would grow that quickly!
What is a recent challenge you have faced?
The fact that we are a team of volunteers and have no funding is challenging. We are focusing on fundraising this year, but with everyone volunteering in their free time and having other things on their minds, it can be a challenge to complete things in the time that you want them to happen.
What do you wish you knew before you started and is there anything you would have done differently in hindsight?
Looking back, I can recommend registering as an official NGO as early as possible, because it can be very beneficial financially. NGOs get discounts or even free access to a lot of digital products, such as Google for Nonprofits, which is incredibly helpful given how hard it is to find funding as an NGO.
I would also have asked for more advice and help from outside people regarding the process of setting up an NGO. It can be hard to know where to start and know what to look for. Other people can and will be very helpful with this.
🧠 The Lessons
What is the best advice you have been given recently?
If you don't achieve what you want with what you do, then you have to do something else. Don’t wait around for other people to change, or expect things to change by themselves - it’s in your hands.
What advice would you give to other young founders?
Don’t be afraid to make mistakes and don’t let mistakes discourage you - it’s a learning journey. You will overcome many challenges and there will always be ups and downs.
What is the biggest lesson you have learned so far?
I have learnt to accept that nothing can ever be perfect. I particularly like the idea of the 80/20 rule for improving efficiency - you can achieve 80% of results with 20% of effort, whereas the last 20% take 80% of your effort.
✨ The Inspiration
Who inspires you?
My parents have inspired me my whole life. I am also getting much inspiration and hope from all young climate activists and especially young activists in the Global South and other areas where it’s not as safe to be an activist. I’m incredibly impressed and inspired by their commitment and dedication, and it shows how much of an impact just one person can have.
What book do you think everyone should read?
Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows - Melanie Joy
Yes, Minister (and the follow-up “Yes, Prime Minister”) - Jonathan Lynn and Antony Jay.