The courage and sacrifice of making impact

Across the most recent episodes of The Impact Equation , from corporate whistleblowers to nature conservationists re-wilding Britain's rainforests, a clear pattern emerged. Despite vastly different domains; from biomaterials to biodiversity, from education policy to early childhood intervention, our guests demonstrated incredible courage and personal sacrifice. 

The Courage to Tell Uncomfortable Truths

Perhaps nowhere is this more evident than in our conversation with three corporate insiders turned truth-tellers: Rizwan Naveed , who challenged McKinsey's climate positioning; Holly Alpine , who exposed Microsoft's contribution to fossil fuels; and Jo Alexander , who challenged BP's climate commitment reversals from the inside.

"I was seeing the hypocrisy in action… I couldn't sleep knowing that. If I don't take a stand, how can I expect the world to change?" Rizwan reflected on his decision to leave McKinsey and speak out.

These weren't activists from the outside throwing stones. These were insiders with careers to lose, who chose integrity over comfort. Their stories reveal that real change often requires people to risk their position for their principles.

From Material Innovation to Market Transformation

At the other end of the spectrum, Alysia Garmulewicz of Materiom represents a different approach to systemic change: building the alternative from scratch. Her vision that "everyone, everywhere should have access to the knowledge needed to create materials from local, renewable sources", exemplifies what we might call regenerative entrepreneurship.

Garmulewicz embodies the shift from extraction to regeneration, using open data and community collaboration to reimagine how materials are made. "We realised there's a different kind of entrepreneurship - lean, mission-driven, and built for systems change," she explained. Her work with companies like Notpla and Sway demonstrates how breakthrough innovations can emerge when entrepreneurs think beyond profit to planetary impact.

The contrast is striking: while corporate insiders battle institutional inertia, mission-driven entrepreneurs are building new systems entirely. Both approaches are necessary, but they require fundamentally different forms of courage.

The Long Game: Nature, Policy, and Persistent Vision

Our nature roundtable with Tony Juniper CBE , Eva Zabey , Jessica Smith , and Merlin Hanbury-Tenison touched-on another important insight: the most intractable challenges require the longest time horizons. Tony's observation that "even those who want to act are trapped by a system that rewards short-term financial return" captures the fundamental tension between quarterly profits and generational stewardship.

Merlin's Thousand Year Trust, literally named after the timing of its ambition, represents a radical act of optimism. "We need to stop policies from swinging with every election cycle," he argued. "Nature restoration needs long-term certainty." His shift from sheep farming to temperate rainforest restoration isn't just ecological; it's a business model that proves environmental stewardship can be financially viable.

Eva Zabey's work at Business for Nature demonstrates how this long-term thinking is penetrating corporate strategy. When she describes engineering companies like Ørsted asking "how can we reduce marine noise, build artificial nesting sites, restock cod, use AI to monitor seabirds," we see businesses beginning to measure success beyond traditional metrics.

Early Intervention: The Multiplier Effect

Louisa Mitchell MBE work with AllChild illuminated perhaps the most powerful form of systems change: early intervention. Her insight that "you can't divide a child into education, health, and social care" exposes the fundamental flaw in how we organise support systems. Children experience life holistically, but institutions fund in silos.

The story she shared of an 8-year-old girl whose confidence and attendance issues were transformed through trusted relationships and arts activities, culminating in a choir performance at the O2, demonstrated the multiplier effect of early, holistic intervention. "The biggest shift? She's now thriving in secondary school - and still singing."

Louisa's approach of "deep listening" to understand community strengths and needs before designing solutions, offers a template for effective systems change. Rather than imposing external solutions, successful change agents become part of the community fabric, building trust relationships that become "the gateway to support, confidence, and transformation."

Policy, Influence, and Long-term Change

Sam Freedman 's perspective as a policy insider-turned-commentator provides crucial insight into how change happens at the institutional level. His observation that "the incentives for politicians are always short-termist - announce things fast, avoid scrutiny, skip consultation" explains why so many well-intentioned policies fail.

Sam's choice to influence "lots of people a bit, through writing" rather than seek direct power represents another model for change: the patient cultivation of better ideas. His approach suggests that sometimes the most impactful role isn't being the decision-maker, but shaping how decision-makers think.

This connects to a broader pattern: the most effective change agents often work through influence rather than authority, building coalitions and shifting narratives rather than commanding from above.

The Synthesis: What Makes Change Stick

Several meta-themes emerged from these conversations that transcend individual sectors:

Truth-telling as foundation: Whether it's corporate whistleblowing or community listening, sustainable change begins with honest assessment of current reality. As Rizwan Naveed puts it: "Markets cannot solve a problem created by markets… The sooner we're honest about that, the sooner we'll stop clinging to false solutions."

Financial sustainability as discipline: Most people grapple with the tension between mission and money. The most sustainable approaches find ways to align economic incentives with social outcomes, whether through Materiom's open-source model, All Child's systems approach, or the Thousand Year Trust's regenerative business case.

Community ownership as scale: The most impactful interventions become community-owned. Louisa Mitchell's emphasis on local ownership, Alysia Garmulewicz's distributed knowledge model, and Merlin Hanbury-Tenison's long-term land stewardship all argue that lasting change must be locally rooted.

Systems thinking as strategy: From corporate sustainability to child development to nature restoration, effective change agents see connections others miss. They understand that transformation requires shifting entire systems, not just individual behaviours.

The Courage to Begin

Perhaps most importantly, these conversations reveal that transformative change often begins with individuals willing to take personal risks for collective benefit. Whether it's leaving secure corporate positions to speak truth, founding organisations that challenge established industries, or dedicating life's work to thousand-year outcomes, change requires courage.

As Sir Ronnie Cohen noted in our earlier conversation about impact investing: "Start young. Think big. Stick with it. And you'll be successful." The leaders featured in these seven episodes embody this philosophy, each in their own domain, each contributing to what Cohen calls the "impact revolution."

Their stories suggest that while the challenges are systemic, the solutions often begin with individual courage; the willingness to tell uncomfortable truths, build alternative systems, and commit to change that extends far beyond any single lifetime. In an era of short-term thinking and institutional capture, they represent the patient, persistent work of transformation.

The revolution may be systemic, but it starts with personal choice: the choice to speak truth, build alternatives, and play the long game. These seven conversations reveal leaders making exactly those choices, across domains as diverse as climate action and child development. Their collective wisdom offers both inspiration and instruction for anyone seeking to build change that lasts.