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Build climate confidence, invigorate organisation-wide strategy and creating cultural moments
- National Lottery Community Fund
At a glance
Everything we were looking for – and more!
- An ambitious new environmental strategy had created a capability gap, leading to anxiety and disengagement amongst staff.
- A small L&D team needed to engage 500+ colleagues with widely varying levels of climate knowledge.
- The training had to be easily scalable and cost-effective – and reignite enthusiasm for the new environmental strategy.
- Climate Fresk turned anxiety into engagement and gave people the “why” behind the new environmental strategy.
- The initial target of training 550 staff was exceeded and the training was rolled out to the whole organisation (800+ people).
- Through Climate Fresk’s train-the-trainer model, a network of 35 in-house facilitators was created, enabling a cost-effective and self-sustaining model for ongoing delivery.
- Staff ended up with a shared emotional connection to environmental issues, and greater collective confidence to make climate impact part of their everyday thinking.
- It became a cultural phenomenon, spreading organically through the organisation and giving staff a shared understanding and common language about environmental impact.
Interested in seeing how we can help your
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The Challenge
Embedding environment into every decision
When the National Lottery – the UK’s largest funder of community activity – launched their new strategy “It Starts With Community”, it marked a bold new direction. For the first time, the environment would be positioned not as a specialist topic, but as a lens through which all funding decisions would be viewed. Staff were excited by the new strategy, but anxious about their own levels of climate knowledge and their ability to discuss the topic with funding applicants.
The L&D team – just 4.6 people strong, with one team member working part-time – needed a solution that could reach everyone, quickly and sustainably. They needed to engage a workforce with mixed levels of climate knowledge and give them a shared understanding and common language about climate and environmental impact.
People were glad we were doing it but they were concerned about the extent of their expertise. We needed to build knowledge and confidence, and to reignite engagement. – Rachel Florence-James
The Solution
A unifying educational experience and a cost-effective rollout
Rachel discovered Climate Fresk when a colleague recommended that she check it out. She describes the pilot workshop as “a Eureka moment”.
“I came back buzzing,” she recalls. “From both a personal and a trainer’s perspective, it ticked every box. It was accessible, emotionally engaging and scientifically sound. It gave people the WHY – something our strategy document hadn’t managed to do. »
Unlike traditional training, Climate Fresk uses game-based, collaborative learning to build understanding of climate science and the interconnections between human activity and planetary systems. Its interactive format made complex ideas accessible, emotional and memorable – and crucially, it worked for all learning styles. “People remembered how it felt, not just what was said,” says Rachel. “That emotional connection was key.”
The initial plan was to deliver the training to the 550 funding staff, but demand grew quickly and organically, with senior managers and even funding committee members attending sessions. Ultimately, the programme was extended to all 800+ employees.
“We barely had to market it,” Rachel laughs. “The word of mouth was incredible. People were chasing us, asking when we were running the next session. In all my years in L&D, I have never seen enthusiasm like it.”
To make delivery sustainable and cost-effective, 35 internal facilitators were trained up across the UK, enabling the organisation to schedule and run their own sessions at minimal cost.
“We needed a scalable model that wouldn’t depend on external trainers forever,” says Rachel. “The facilitator network gave us that. It’s now a permanent part of our learning ecosystem.”
Key Results
Confidence, connection and lasting change
The impact of Climate Fresk went far beyond climate literacy. It helped the National Lottery staff to establish a shared emotional and intellectual foundation for environmental thinking. Staff reported that team conversations became deeper and more thought-provoking. It reignited pride in the organisation’s environmental mission and created stronger alignment – both amongst staff and between staff and leadership. It produced several new environmental champions inside the organisation, strengthening internal networks for climate action. And, it was such a success that it has become a mandatory part of the induction for new funding staff and is being used as a model for how the organisation shapes future training initiatives.
It’s scalable, cost-effective, and delivers well beyond what we anticipated. It’s now embedded in our induction. We needed a sustainable model… something we could continue to roll out under our own control — and Climate Fresk gave us exactly that.
“Climate Fresk was everything we were looking for – and more,” says Rachel, “a unifying, emotional, and educational experience that made climate action feel real, relevant and possible for everyone.”
The benefits have extended outwards too. Internal facilitators are now delivering workshops to community organisations who receive funding, helping them to understand climate impact within their own projects, and amplifying impact externally.
Key outcome statistics
👉🏼 Organisation size: approx. 800
👉🏼 Trained (thus far): 80% (approx. 650 people)
👉🏼 92% of participants rated the training “Good” or “Excellent”.
👉🏼 97% of participants rated their facilitator as “Good” or “Excellent”.
👉🏼 After the training, over 90% of participants reported greater knowledge of climate matters, greater confidence on the subject matter and greater connection to the organisation’s environmental mission.
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