Walter Faaij

In 2010, Walter spent three months living in Greenland, where he witnessed the impact of climate change on a society firsthand. He met resilient, self-reliant people who were increasingly unable to provide for themselves or knew how to care for their children. As the ice melts and the sea warms, fish are moving further north, profoundly affecting the local way of life.

Mission

The transition towards a sustainable society is, first and foremost, about people. Sustainability is not simply a policy or technological challenge; it is fundamentally about people, behavior, and culture. Making an organization more sustainable requires a shift in mindset among employees, behavioral change, and cultural transformation.

Walter believes that cultural change is best approached as building a movement. It starts with a compelling change narrative that inspires people to get involved, combined with the power of peer-to-peer engagement. It means having genuine, courageous, and challenging conversations, enabling people to collectively discover new solutions, rethink existing structures, and create meaning around change.

Career

Walter is an experienced speaker at in-company events and conferences, with extensive experience facilitating courageous dialogues. He has guided more than 25 organizational culture programs, covering both cultural research and cultural change. His clients range from multinational corporations to SMEs, and from hospitals and engineering firms to energy companies, housing associations, NGOs, municipalities, provinces, ministries, and other public-sector organisations.

Walter is co-author of Antropoloog Gezocht and its English translation, Anthropologists Wanted. As a guest author, he contributed the chapter Why We Need Better Conflicts to Build a Sustainable Society to Herstelrecht door de ogen van. Walter is also affiliated with Human Dimensions, founded by Jitske Kramer.