To celebrate this milestone episode 150, we're joined by Simon
Holmes à Court in a very rare public interview appearance, and we
believe his first about his own story!
Simon has stood at the intersection of community, climate action
and politics since May 2007 when he began chairing the community
cooperative that set out to build Australia’s first
community-owned wind farm. Fifteen years later to the month, at
the May 2022 national federal election, one of this former
Silicon Valley dot com engineer’s startups, Climate 200,
harnessed community, climate awareness and politics to play a
major role in shaking up Australia’s tired old political order.
He is an energy analyst, clean-tech investor, climate
philanthropist, director of the Smart Energy Council, The
Superpower Institute and more.
***
Episode guiding points:
This conversation is truly wide ranging and covers a lot of
ground. We discuss his upbringing in Perth, Australia with 3
siblings and his parents being on the road a lot, and his
father’s South African heritage. Simon reflects on his boarding
school experience in Geelong, near Melbourne and how that was
physically and emotionally character building.
Hear about his aspirations at age 18: set up a computer parts
company with a friend to upgrade memory in people’s computers,
Studying law but then loved the student organisation AIESEC and
going down a different path. Our host, Vidit also was involved
with AIESEC during my university studies and couldn’t speak more
highly of the training it gave me.
Particular aspects of this conversation that stood out to us
include:
Simon and his wife left the US on sept 10th 2001 with their
first child and moving back to Australia, and living in Melbourne
(cautious after his boarding school scars)
Simon’s discovery of renewable energy during his 14 years
scaling a company called Observant: Building remote monitoring
technical solutions, and precision water management for
farmers and their family cattle stations in the Northern
Territory
How leadership of the Hepburn Community Farm Project gave
Simon exposure to everything from The capital raising, the media,
the politics, the engineering side, the commercials of building
environmental, on ground engagement
The fascinating story of The kids off naru project, the
Sydney opera house and a horse race and Simon learning the power
of Twitter through this
Learning clarity of communication and present information in
a way that makes people engaged and willing to listen and not
switch off?
Two concepts that we haven’t stopped thinking about since this
conversation is one: First The trim Tab from Buckminster Fuller
(listen in to hear this context, small things like a trim tab can
drive large scale changes), and second the Henry David Thoreau
quote “There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to
one who is striking at the root.”
So be a trim tab and a root striker.
Thank you for your support of the 150 episodes to date, this has
been the most impactful and enjoyable work our host Vidit
Agarwal has done in his life, and is excited for what’s ahead. As
always, his details are in the show notes and he loves hearing
from you.
It’s now time to explore your curiosity. Please enjoy
***
Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn or Twitter
Get in touch with our Founder and Host, Vidit
Agarwal directly here
Contact us via our website to discuss sponsorship opportunities,
recommend future guests or share feedback, we love hearing how to
improve!
Thank you for rating / reviewing this podcast on Apple Podcasts
and Spotify, it helps others find us and convince guests to come
on the show!
***
The High Flyers Podcast re-imagines the traditional
notion of a "high flyer" and is a premier product of the
Curiosity Center. The podcast showcases the journeys of
relatable role models from their sunrise (childhood) to today.
Listeners love the unique and direct inside access to these
relatable role models, companies and industries in every walk of
life to help us all be 1% better everyday, together.
150+ guests have joined Vidit Agarwal on the
show from around the world including Heads of state, Olympians,
Business and cultural leaders, Social Advocates, Investors,
Entrepreneurs and more.
The Curiosity Center is widely recognised as a
leading on-demand intelligence network for founders, investors,
executives and students with an audience of
over 200,000 across this podcast + Association Series
Newsletter and 7-Star Events. Find out more at
www.curiositycenter.xyz
***
Kommentare (0)
Melde dich an, um einen Kommentar zu schreiben.