Now & Z/Yen - March 2007
|
Now & Z/Yen - March 2007
|
|
c Products
Knowledge
Fun
Links
© The Z/Yen Group of Companies 2008
|
Green, Mean, Debating Machine The Job Must Go On Green Game Gamble Term-Time Gresham Professor |
|
We
note a change of climate at Z/Yen Group, not just our recent sale of a
subsidiary to Aon, but also the increasing emphasis on "climate change". As
regular readers know, our interest in environmental matters is long-standing
and, at a personal level, well pre-dates our 1994 founding. Nevertheless,
it is gratifying to see numerous projects finally underway. The London
Accord, our "cash-in, carbon-out" project with BP and the City of London
Corporation, among others, holds its pathway conference on 29 and 30 March at
Reuters in London. We also made a small contribution to a February 2007
publication, "Clean Capital: Financing Clean Technology Firms In The UK",
produced by Forum for the Future, in partnership with the City of London
Corporation, DTI, Defra and Gresham College. “Clean Capital” – available at
We
have a number of new and exciting projects underway. One new client is
PEFC, the global Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification, where we
are helping with strategic planning. PEFC endorses standards used to give
society assurance that people manage forests sustainably. We are able to
deploy our deep experience with both environmental issues and standards markets
in our work with them. We have also been working with PwC and the World
Economic Forum on a ground-breaking project to move from just identifying global
risks to providing a framework for their solution. In our view, the world
needs to get together and collaborate on these big issues, or collapse.
The objective of the work is to provide a methodology and set of publications to
help people organise cooperative efforts to combat climate change, public health
and security problems of a global nature.
Devotees
of Z/Yen's S.B. Lady Daphne networking trips know that no trip is complete
without an "icebreaker" game. This year is no exception and we've been
working hard at this year's new offering. Our games have ranged from our
"Boating Bourses" to "OligopoLuedo" and "Smugglers' Choice". All of the games
have a rigorous theoretical underpinning and help to elucidate things such as
Prospect Theory or the Prisoners' Dilemma. For the past few months we've
been working with Mike Young and Geoff Buckingham of Corda, part of BAE Systems, on a joint venture
game that helps people to understand negotiation in the context of cooperation
on reducing carbon emissions.
Michael
claims that one of the great thing about Gresham College is summer break.
Can even he be tired of the sound of his own opinion? Michael's last formal
lecture this academic year will be "Does Society Risk My Life Through Safety?
The Perils of Too Much Risk-Aversion" on Monday, 19 March 2007 at 18:00, in
Barnard’s Inn Hall, Holborn, London EC1. Naturally, all are welcome and
Michael has big plans for the 2007/2008 series of lectures, but we're a bit
concerned when Michael then claims he's off-duty till September – don't forget
the day job!