Many years ago, 2015 to be exact, I was invited to be the keynote speaker at the BOFA Film Festival in Tasmania.
For some reason – maybe because I’ve a face for radio or because I’m the consumate invisible man – I rarely, if ever, get asked to speak at events. In fact, aside from turning down a TEDx talk, I can’t recall been invited to speak since!
Long story short, I wanted to be inspiring but was mindful to be authentic. I was asked to talk about “creating change in communities” but, since no one knew this stranger in town, I didn’t feel I had the authority to preach to an educated audience.
So instead, I began by telling the fable of the man who planted trees, which goes as follows…
In 1913, a young man named François sets out on a solo hiking trip through Provence and into the Alps, enjoying the still-untouched wilderness.
Deep into his hike, he runs out of water in a desolate, treeless valley, where only wild lavender grows. There’s no sign of civilization. Desperate to find water, he finds a dried-up well. Just as things seem hopeless, a middle-aged shepherd appears and leads him to a nearby spring.
Intrigued by the shepherd and his solitary life, François stays with him for a while. After losing his wife, the shepherd has devoted himself to restoring the valley by single-handedly cultivating a forest – tree by tree. Each day, he makes small holes in the earth with his curling pole and plants acorns he’s collected from many miles away.
Eventually, François leaves, returns home and later serves in the First World War. In 1920, shell-shocked and depressed, he returns to the valley.
To his surprise, young saplings are taking root across the land. New streams now flow where the shepherd had built dams high in the mountains. The valley, once barren, is coming alive.
François finds peace and recovery in the quiet beauty of the reawakening landscape and begins visiting the shepherd every year.
Over the next four decades, the shepherd never stops planting. The valley transforms into a lush forest, vibrant with life.
Authorities, puzzled by the sudden greening of the region, assume it’s a natural phenomenon and grant it protected status after the war. They are unaware of the shepherd’s selfless deeds.
More than 10,000 people eventually settle in the valley, all of them unknowingly owing their happiness to the shepherd.
Francois tells one of his friends in the government the truth about the natural forest, and the friend also helps to protect the forest.
In 1945, Francois visits the now very old shepherd one last time. In a hospice in Banon, in 1947, the man who planted trees peacefully passes away.
After reading this passage out, I went on to explain how this fable offers many lessons for creating change in communities. My take homes were / are:
- Change can begin with the vision of a single person.
- Change doesn’t happen over night – it requires resilience and resourcefulness.
- Change isn’t achieved by a single governing authority.
- Change requires leadership but, sometimes, the best leaders lead quietly from behind (as Nelson Mandela once said).
- True change is selfless.
My talk went surprisingly well and I managed to convey, in my own way, the kind of change Made Open was aiming for. One person even told me afterward it was the best talk she’d ever heard. Wow!
One thing I didn’t reflect on during my keynote – but have thought about since – is that each of us has the potential to create change and inspire others in our own way.
We might all dream of being a bit more like David Attenborough or Nelson Mandela (and a lot less like Robert Woolf!), but what matters more is recognising our own unique strengths and leaning into that.
Back in 2001, as a fresh-faced 26-year-old, I went through an Apprentice-style interview process at Orange, where I was grilled by the Head of HR – he was like the Mike Soutar of interrogators! He meticulously scrutinised me and my CV, looking for flaws.
Luckily for me, my super strength (and weakness) is honesty. He found nothing to trip me up and later described me as a “strong force behind a quiet front”. I was offered the job (I should have said no 😂).
So here’s a question:
How would people describe you in one sentence (or better still: how would you like to be described)? This question is a good starting point for thinking about the kind of person you want to be and change you want to create.