Better Global Future · Module 5 of 5
Module 5: Taking Action
Move from vision to action. Change starts with you, and grows when others join in.
Ideas only change the world when someone acts on them. This final module looks at the step many of us find hardest: actually starting.
The film argues that we already know much of what needs to be done. What is needed is an inner change in our attitudes and priorities, then new habits, and then the confidence to invite others to join us. You will hear how participants deal with putting things off, overthinking, and the challenge of leading by example.
Your worksheets for this module ↓
Three short worksheets go with the eight steps. Print them, fill them in on screen, or keep a notebook beside you.
In this module you will
- Notice how you respond to the idea of putting your ideas into action.
- Consider how small personal actions add up when many people take them.
- Explore how to influence others without imposing on them.
- Bring your commitments from the whole course together into a plan.
What you can take away
- Insight into what helps you act, and what holds you back.
- An understanding of how individual change can spread through example and influence.
- A personal action plan that draws on all five modules.
Your worksheets
Read each worksheet online first; download the fillable PDF only if you want your own copy. Your answers stay with you.
Reflect
Step 1: Your initial thoughts
Listen
Step 2: Hear what others think
Participants are refreshingly honest about the urge to put things off, about writing as a natural first step, about needing the right inner relationship with a task before you can do it well, and about the puzzle of how eight billion people can ever decide things together.
Challenge
Step 3: Challenge your thinking
The film argues that carrying on as we are is leading to disaster, and that wherever you live you are either making things better or making them worse. You do not need new ideas, it suggests. You need to start the actions that are new for you.
It gives examples of how small changes, in what people eat or in a workplace's use of plastic bottles, add up when many people make them, and how changing your own habits gives you the standing to influence others. The figures in the film are from around 2022.
React
Step 4: Your reaction
Listen
Step 5: Explore the reactions of others
Participants respond: explain the reasons and the evidence behind what you do; you can be a leader without a title; and influence comes from giving people good reasons to follow you, not from telling them what to do.
Reflect
Step 6: Your AHA moment
Listen
Step 7: Hear the AHA of others
Commit
Step 8: Let's do something!
Make your final commitment, and this time turn it into a plan. Look back at the commitments on your five worksheets. Which did you keep? Which matter most? Choose one action for the coming month, and one person you will invite to join you.
Congratulations on reaching the end of the course. Answering these questions honestly is not easy, and taking the time to do it is an achievement in itself.
Go further
Suggested activities
Optional tasks to deepen your thinking after the eight steps. Pick one that suits you; there is space for it at the end of the worksheet.
From commitments to a plan
30 minutes
Use the last page of the course journal to gather your five commitments. For the one that matters most, write down the first step, when you will take it, what might get in the way, and who could help.
Explain your why
15 minutes
Write three sentences explaining why your action matters, including one piece of evidence. Then practise saying it aloud to a friend.
Lead by example
5 minutes a day for a week
For one week, write a single line each evening: what did I do today that matched what I say I care about?
You have completed the course
Bring your five commitments together on the final page of the course journal, and keep it somewhere you will see it.
Course journal: My Better Global Future →
When you have finished
If the course has sparked something, there are more ways to grow as a leader with WYSE.
The films were first published on YouTube between December 2022 and January 2023. Where they quote statistics, these reflect the data available at the time. Videos play in YouTube's privacy-enhanced mode, and nothing is loaded from YouTube until you press play.