The Make Water Work Podcast - Episode 41 Featuring George Schuler

Episode 41: Catalyst Collab - George Schuler

Most water networks feel like a tight-knit community. The data says otherwise.

In this episode of the Make Water Work Catalyst Collab, host Isaac Pellerin sits down with George Schuler — co-founder of Connecting for Change, systems strategist, and Catalyst 2026 guide — to explore what's actually happening inside the water sector's most critical relationships, networks, and institutions. George has spent nearly three decades mapping how influence, trust, and coordination move through complex systems. What he's found should change how every water professional thinks about collaboration.

In this episode:

• Why the formal structure and the lived structure of most water organizations have quietly drifted apart — and what that gap costs us
  
• How George built a board game with The Nature Conservancy to force the conversations that data alone could never start
  
• What a network analysis of the 2023 UN Water Conference revealed about how fragile the global water network actually is
  
• The institutional incentives that quietly prevent nonprofits, utilities, and funders from truly collaborating — even when they want to
  
• Why "relational infrastructure" is the missing investment in the water sector
  
• The Delaware River Basin story: what happens when the people who hold the relationships retire
  
• How Gmail's early growth is a blueprint for building bridges in the water movement

Attend Catalyst 2026 — San Diego, August 31–September 3 Reserve your seat at catalysth2o.org.