Pathways for Children, Youth & Families held a strategic planning day on May 30th, 2009. This organization is one of the larger and more recognized organizations that work with at risk, homeless (or at risk of homeless youth). I was asked to make a short presentation on youth programming in York Region and the potential of social media as a tool for engaging youth.

Along with my presentation, the Pathways Board of Directors and senior staff heard from Jane Wedlock, Community Strategist for the York Region Alliance to End Homelessness (picture above).

I was very pleased to be asked to share my perspectives on youth programming and community development at the Pathways Board Planning  day. I think that my recent work with Street Kids International in managing the Streetjibe learning community project has brought me some recognition for capacity building in our very under resourced York Region.The Youth Community Mapping Project, a community based research project that addressed youth homelessness in York Region was another initiative that I managed and facilitated. In these programs and in my networking and committee work, I began using social media tools in service delivery and in my collaboration work with colleagues and organizations.     (A full picture of my career experiences are listed on a mindmap here)

In the summer of 2008, I attended the 1st Social Tech Training Conference held at the MaRS Centre in Toronto. This experience directly led to my decision to follow my passion for helping organizations and individuals participate more intentionally and effectively within the social web. What I learned from STT 2008 is that this work is all about people, relationships, creating well thought out strategies that address core goals, followed by selecting the right mix of social media tools to engage audiences and stakeholders in a variety of conversations.

It’s exciting to see the interest of York Region organizations in using online tools to extend their reach as community builders and change agents. I am constantly reminded that my decision to start my own social media consultancy is the right one as I experience (and learn) how social media is helping restore and strengthen York Region communities and organizations (citizens, structures, government etc.)

Helping organizations use the social web for engaging and building community requires a well designed web site that can be managed and maintained internally by key staff. With the social web, it is no longer necessary to call the IT specialist to change content on your site. The social web is all about conversation and online communication needs to be authentic, delivered by people within organizations.

I’m pleased to have an experienced partner who has a high level of knowledge and experience in web design. Alain Hurtubise is the owner of iautomate a consulting company that works with large Fortune 500 companies and mid size organization designing software programs that increase efficiencies and profits. He balances this work with his passion for giving back to the community through web design projects that build capacity of organizations and communities.

Together, we work closely with organizations to design the the right web platform, facilitate the building of a social media strategy that fits with Mission and support the implementation of social media tools to engage stakeholders.

My presentation to the Pathways Board of Directors was designed to give greater insight and awareness about using social media for engaging young people and working more collaboratively with stakeholders. I used my story and experiences in using social media over the past 6 years to illustrate how these tools can work. There was not enough time to go into much detail, however I’ve included my slideshare presentation for anyone interested in following up with the links I provided.

Brent Uncategorized yorkregion presentation