After the 2016 election, I started hearing more new EQAT volunteers asking questions like, “What will this action accomplish?” People seemed to have an increased sense of what was at stake and wanted to use their time well. My answer was, “By itself, this action will accomplish nothing, but in our first campaign, 125 actions together moved a bank that netted $4 billion-a-year.”

Vanguard recently withdrew from its biggest climate commitment, the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative. EQAT showed up in action at a Vanguard office last week to remind company leadership of the real-life stakes of their decision. The choice to continue to invest in fossil fuels or transition to a clean energy economy shouldn’t be about politics or short-term profits; it’s a choice with long-term consequences for our lives and the people and places we love.

It was chilly and damp when we left the house for an action at Vanguard’s headquarters in Malvern. Having my wife Amy as company helped ease my nervousness that everything would go well. I had signed on as action lead only a few weeks before. The planning team had done most of the hard advance work and my role as action lead was like that of a director of a play, making sure that all the people played their roles and that the props, signs, and PA system functioned as intended.