Your NameJulie Hirigoyen
Email Addresshirigoyenj@gmail.com
Cohort AssignmentEurope Summer-Fall 2023, Cohort 1
1. What do you see as your primary work at this stage of your life?

Having worked for 25 years on sustainability in the built environment, I am now moving into a phase where I want to work on fundamental systems change to achieve more positive environmental and social outcomes from property investment, development and manaagement. I am taking on a few non-executive roles on company Boards to challenge and inspire a new way of thinking for those businesses, as well as a portfolio of advisory projects where I hope to make a significant difference to both places and organisations.

2. What role do you see as yours to play?

Challenging businesses to fundamentally alter their business model to one that can yield genuinely positive and regenerative impacts on people and planet.
Innovating and experimenting with new ways of working and transacting to move from incremental improvements to genuinely regenerative outcomes.

3. What goals or aims do you have in regard to the above?

To make more of a positive transformational impact than I have in the past.
To inspire and influence wide systemic change through demonstrating the art of the possible in real life projects and places.
To demonstrate that regenerative outcomes are economically, socially and environmentally beneficial.

4. Where do you feel your next arenas for personal growth are?

Spiritual development.
Deepening connection and relationships.
Horticulture and permaculture.

5. And for professional growth?

Regenerative development.
Systems change.
Sustainable finance.
Resource efficiency.
Living systems and biomimicry.

6. What have you invested in to get you where you are?

I have worked incredibly hard over 25 years in various different roles spanning start up consultancy, in house corporate roles, and most recently as CEO of a charity. I have sacrificed significant personal and family time to pursue professional goals that I felt to be paramount - but now worry that the impact I have had has been incremental and that the system itself is perpetuating social inequality and ecological decline.

7. What fields of learning and which thinkers have been important in your life?

Ecological economics; environmental management; Gaia theory; sustainable development; social value...
Satish Kumar.
Jonathon Porritt.
John Elkington.
Kate Raworth.
Bill Reed.

8. Can you frame your philosophy or cosmology of life? What role(s) do humans play in it?

Planet Earth and its surrounding cosmos is a living system that is in a constant state of flux. All living species and natural matter are Sacred, inextricably connected and in perpetual relationship - constantly evolving while maintaining perfect balance and harmony. Nature itself if Sacred and a manifestation of the divine.
Humans have exploited the natural world thanks to a glut of cheap energy derived from fossil fuels which has caused a carbon pulse that is now existentially threatening humanity's existence on Planet Earth. Given the size of the human brain, and our state of consciousness, it's imperative that we now urgently adopt a role as healer - reconnecting with our spiritual selves to restore and regenerate the balance we have upset so dramatically.

Date CreatedAugust 30, 2023