Part of: Climate Commitments

A problem shared is a problem halved - UKGBC's Collaboration Cafés

In 2022, as part of UKGBC's role as an Accelerator to the UN-backed Race to Zero campaign, we launched our Collaboration Cafés. The events brought groups of UKGBC members together to discuss their organisation's progress on the road to net zero. Conversations in small groups allowed for insights on goals, strategies, and challenges to be openly shared, and highlighted how collaboration can unlock exponential solutions.

Collaboration Cafés are a unique series of events that leverage UKGBC’s convening power, bringing actors across the built environment value chain together to tackle critical sustainability issues. Here we share key insights from our pilot series of Collaboration Café events to raise awareness, share knowledge, and inspire and accelerate action being taken by organisations across the industry.

• What is a Collaboration Café? Read on below!
• What have UKGBC members achieved on their journey towards net zero to date? Find out here.
• What are the challenges still ahead for UKGBC members? Find out here.
• What are the next steps? Find out here.

Key Statistics

596

recorded data points

have been analysed to highlight key insights from members who attended the events.

118

individuals from UKGBC’s membership

attended the series of events.

109

UKGBC member organisations

attended the series of events.

6

industry sub-sectors

were represented at the events.

What is a Collaboration Café?

UKGBC’s Collaboration Cafés follow the World Café Method, a global movement creating collaborative dialogue around questions that matter. They offer an informal and uncompetitive space to share insights, synthesize lessons, and tackle shared challenges faced by organisations across the built environment value chain. Our pilot series of Cafés brought together six groups of sub-sector peers across a six month series of events:

• Designers & technical advisors
• Contractors
• Finance
• Developers, owners, occupiers
• Real estate agents & services
• Construction product & material producers

Why did we launch Collaboration Cafés?

UKGBC is dialling up its convening power by bringing members together more frequently to knowledge share on topics of interest and expertise. We believe radical collaboration is key to empowering organisations to make and act on ambitious commitments, and that UKGBC is uniquely placed to facilitate this. As an Accelerator to the UNFCCC’s Race to Zero campaign, we saw this challenge as a springboard for such discussions. Our pilot series of Collaboration Cafés offered a supportive space for members to knowledge-share about their organisation’s journey towards net zero.

What did we learn?

We collected nearly 600 data points from the roundtable discussions and post-it notes written by the groups. When analysed, the main factors influencing the speed and scale of organisational decarbonisation were found to broadly fall into four categories – structural or systemic factors; behavioural or mindset-related factors; knowledge and awareness; and methodological factors.

Discover more:
• What have UKGBC members achieved to date? Find out here.
• What are the challenges still ahead? Find out here.
• What are the next steps? Find out here.

What has been achieved so far?