For the past few decades I’ve worked with non profits on community development projects.

These projects varied.

They ranged from working with neighbourhoods on resident driven initiatives to working with a community of youth workers on building their skill capacity so young people experiencing  poverty and homelessness would have more relevant services.

Now that I’m helping non profit groups create their online communication strategies, I am learning how community development and social media work are so closely connected.

Here is how I  see social media and community development strategies overlapping in the pursuit of social change.

In both cases you:

Approach the work with an attitude of respect for the the community’s (or client’s) ability to learn and find solutions to their challenges;

Support the community’s (or client’s) desire to make improvements or changes to their situation by listening deeply and as non judgmental as possible;

Provide the community (or client) with a larger and more detailed (organized) vision of their challenges and an outline of possible strategies;

Help the community (or client) identify their strengths and the assets of the key people that can address the challenges in a way that will lead to a high degree of success;

Help the community (or client) identify and understand on deeper levels the barriers and limitations to the challenges they face;

Help the community (or client) define their vision, mission, values, strategies and goals (using legacy documents if available) that will act as an infrastructure or solid platform for implementing strategies;

Help the community (or client) define their policy for addressing their challenges and create clear procedures for using any tools in the strategy;

You assist the community (or client) in identifying what success might look like and then help them create a monitoring tool to measure their progress;

Foster and encourage the community (or client) adopting a culture of learning, listening, innovation, experimentation, adapting and openness;

Help the community (or client) adopt practices that lead to deepening authentic relationships with their peers, supporters, partners and stakeholders;

There are no doubt many more values and principles that apply to working in a social media and community development framework. What strikes me the most as I put this list together is the lack of any reference to social media strategies/tools or community development.

Do you see anything in the list that I left out? Please add your ideas in the commenting panel.

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I went to the film Inception a few days ago and was mesmerized by the complex plot and the ideas that gurgled and sometimes exploded into my awareness.

I liked the movie but I experienced some confusion as I felt the ideas about dreams and dreaming where very relevant, however I couldn’t quite understand what did the movie have to do with my world.

Two days later I began reading a series of posts by Brian Solis because I was searching for his ideas on the concept of “pay it forward”. What I discovered on his web site were a series of posts about the movie Inception.

Here is how he introduces why the movie triggered his thinking about the movie’s connection to social media.

Inception served as a catalyst for rethinking social media and how we use it to socialize not just our marketing efforts, but our business overall.

The way in which he linked the ideas in the movie to how social media can be applied in the business world, helped me understand social media adoption within organizations and the cast of actors that is needed for success. He also has numerous links to other very relevant, resonant and significant (RSS) posts and articles that he covers in his new book Engage.

Below is an excerpt that talks about how the concepts of inception and extraction relates to listening. The concept of listening is a subject close to me as I’m searching for more effective ways to explain why social listening is so important to the development of social media strategies.

I love this explanation as it gets past the tools of listening into the figuring out of what to do with what you are hearing.

Such is the framework necessary to lead the socialization of business. While today social media is led by a champion or team of evangelists that “get it,” its path remains a bottom-up process of forcing transformation through evangelism and experimentation. Eventually social media will lose momentum before its promise can be fully realized however. A team consisting of a visionary leader supported by capable specialists across the fabric of the organization is imperative to fully realize the opportunities and responsibilities that unfold with social immersion.

The Production of Social Media Requires a Dedicated Cast

Penrose Stairs illustrate the impossible objects that can be created in lucid dream worlds

As discussed in Engage and also Charlene Li’s new book Open Leadership, it is this listening, really listening, that opens leadership to change and ultimately true collaboration and co-creation. It is through this unique understanding of the cultures, landscapes and the themes that fuel connections and communication. This incredible insight inspires relevant engagement and supporting constructs that galvanizes and empowers customers and peers to become stakeholders in all you do.

The “extraction” is the research, listening, and sifting for insight. It’s not enough to monitor conversations through keyword searches. It’s not enough to measure “automated” and mostly inaccurate sentiment. It’s not enough to track activity in terms of mentions, followers, likes, and comments. There’s a difference between listening and hearing and to extract the information and intelligence necessary to inspire your ideas requires you to hear what it is that moves individuals and communities.  Extraction is the guiding light to create more meaningful engagement strategies based on the recently introduced concept of relevance, resonance, and significance (RRS), social media’s critical path. And, it’s through extraction where we uncover opportunities for inception.

Listen to Brian Solis talk about his new book here.

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This is a  beautiful picture that showcases the grandeur of the Alberta prairies and the important role that the farming industry industry plays in this part of Canada. I’m posting this picture because we used it in a a day long social media strategy session that my partner Mark (Mark Holmgren Consulting) and I facilitated.

Mark and I are assisting a group of communities in southern Alberta called Return to Rural (R2R). We are helping them develop their social media strategy and supporting them as they learn why, how, who, what, when and where of the social web landscape.

R2R is a ground breaking initiative that is re-branding their community as a place where young people and young professionals can reconnect with their rural community roots and values. It’s more than re-branding of course. It’s a long term community transformation process that will take careful nurturing by the lead organization, the  SAMDA Economic Partnership.

For generations, young people left their rural country communities to find work, new experiences, fame and fortune in the bigger cities across Canada.  For many their move to large urban centers worked out, but for others, their search for a place to call home didn’t materialize. In general terms, many of these immigrants to the big city felt a pervasive sense of disconnection from from that special, hard to put your finger on feeling of belonging to a home community. R2R is calling to them with a message that rural life is an economic and socially satisfying option, an option that once chosen, can reconnect you to that special belonging feeling.

Return to Rural is an ambitious and timely project with great promise for success. The issues faced by members of Return to Rural are shared by small farming communities across Canada. I am very keen to chronicle the lessons learned as I believe the Return to Rural story can be a very useful aid for many community leaders who are who are seeking innovative solutions to complex challenges in their rural community.

Stay tuned, I will  be posting again about the progress that Return to Rural is making as they engage their constituents inside and outside the SAMDA catchment areas.

Oyen Inland Grain Terminal [1 of 3], originally uploaded by neutralhills.

Brent Presentation, networks, purpose rural urban farming

I really enjoy reading books about emerging technologies, social media, learning and professional development. I also read plenty of fiction, especially fast paced, well written crime fiction in settings I’m not too familiar with such as South East Asia, Britain, South Africa, the far north etc.

I’m very pleased with the books I bought this summer and I few that I’ve received as gifts.  I’m reading these books simultaneously and employing many of the ideas in projects I’m involved with.  Perhaps in the fall when I’ve digested theme properly, I’ll take the time and write a post about what these books meant to my learning and work. Here are a few of my summer reading books with a few comments to go with each book.

Community: The Structure of Belonging: Peter Block – This book has changed my thinking about community and community work. I’m finally recognizing (after all these years) that you can’t problem solve your way to building community. I sailed into uncharted territory when I read this book, but by doing so, it’s awakened my sense of discovery and personal commitment towards building a community that I want.

Trust Agents:Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust, Chris Brogan and Julian Smith - Lessons about trust as the cornerstone of your practice. A very timely book to guide my work with non profit organizations.

The Diamond Cutter: The Buddha on Strategies for Managing Your Business and Your Life, Geshe Michael Roach and Lama Christie McNally – My daughter Meghan gave this to me on Father’s Day. She knows how much I enjoy Buddhist teachings and this one promises to be an excellent read. It’s about an ancient book based on the diamond industry and how you can practice your business successfully by following key life principles. I’ve put it aside for now but I keep it close by for quick references and inspiration.

Open Leadership: How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead,  Charlene Li - Charlene’s book, The Groundswell introduced me to social media strategies for engaging your communities and stakeholders. Her newest book takes the next step and is helping me understand the changing role of leadership in the world of the social web.

Six Pixels of Separation: Everyone is Connected – Connect Your Business to Everyone, Mitch Joel – Understanding the changes brought about by the social web and how the businesses (other sectors as well) are  implementing successful strategies to survive and thrive.

The Abundant Community: Awakening the Power of Families and Neighbourhoods, John McKnight & Peter Block – This book is deepening my understanding of communities and the strengths of residents to change  their lives and their communities. Like Peter Block’s book on Community, the Structure of Belonging, this book will be a constant reference for me in my social media work.

Drupal for Dummies, Lynn Beighley – Drupal is the platform of choice for my partner Alain Hurtubise (iAutomate) and I’m glad he chose Drupal. I’ll never be a web design and developer but with this book I can learn the basics of supporting Drupal based web sites and teaching staff and volunteers how to manage their web site – without paying costly outside experts who don’t know anything about your business.

P.S. The bookends are core samples taken from the mines in Sudbury Ontario, my home town. Having worked in the mines before starting my career in community & social media work, the bookends remind me of the lessons learned from growing up in a mining town.

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One of the reasons I embrace social media is that it enables conversations to continue. Indeed, I am of the opinion that a community is a continuous conversation.

The Planning Forum for York Region sponsored the first Community – Funder Roundtable. The goal was to begin an ongoing dialogue with funder and policy makers about building our York Region community. Michael Johnny, Manager of the Knowledge Mobilization Unit at York University welcomed everyone and explained what we hoped to accomplish.

To help participants understand the challenges and envision a future where funder groups and community groups work in sync with eachother, the planning group brought in Liz Weaver from the Tamarack Vibrant Communities organization. Liz is also the lead spokesperson for the Hamilton Round-table on Poverty. The Hamilton Round-table has done incredible successful work combining support from the grass roots, government, corporate and community service sectors. The collaboration amongst stakeholders in Hamilton is a success and we (the planning group) felt that we could emulate their process or  at least learn from their experience.

Read more…

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Are you a leader in your social benefit organization? Are you interested in learning more about the basic building blocks necessary for supporting a dynamic, engaging web site that reaches out and deepens relationships with your stakeholders? Are you thinking about how to move your organization on to the social web dance floor but not sure where or how to start? Read on!

I’m sure you appreciate the impact social technologies are having in all sectors locally and around the world. Your leadership role now includes managing how your organization connects, networks, and collaborates with your diverse stakeholders. Also, your new role includes learning how to listen to your stakeholders in new ways so you can adapt and respond to a rapidly changing environment.

Read more…

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At a recent meeting, half a dozen of us were setting plans for an upcoming community meeting. We wanted to set the stage for a dialogue in which participants attending the meeting could speak freely and openly about potentially contentious issues.

We became embroiled in a discussion about the difference between a person attending the meeting on behalf of their organization and the person who comes to the meeting without representing anyone except their desire to contribute to a better community.

I was fascinated by the indignation expressed as to why we would consider the Agency representative less valued than the resident. What button was pushed here? I’m not sure to this day but the conversation stayed with me.

I and a few others felt that having a person attending who didn’t represent any group or agency was preferred over the agency representative. It was not that we would exclude or didn’t want the Agency representative to attend. It was more a case of viewing them as not motivated in the same way as the citizen coming to voice their points of view.

I think those at our planning meeting that were indignant about our viewpoint believed that we were insulting the character of the agency representatives. “How can you say my presence and voice is less valid than someone”?

Some of you know how much I’m learning from Peter Block’s book, Community – the structure of belonging. I think in this quote, Peter Block unpacks this issue very acutely.

The conversations that build relatedness most often occur through associational life, where citizens show up by choice, and rarely in the context of system life, where citizens show up out of obligation.

I highly  recommend Peter Block’s book for anyone who is interested in community restoration and development. His lens is helping me wade through my associational and system life.

Most of all his book has helped realize the limitation to constant efforts to problem solve the building of community. Put another way, the futility of constant efforts to improve relationships between organizations.

There is need for problem solving and relationship building but restoring our fragmented community needs to be the starting point. I’m sure that across the country, countless organizations are mired in collaboration (negotiations) efforts in the name of building community.

What’s your take on focusing on our fragmented community rather than improving our organizational relationships

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This is an excellent video (slideshare below) from Tim Davis, a consultant in Britain. He is one of the founders of UK Youth Workers Online site. It is a bit long (20 min.) but very worthwhile. I think the video is quite useful for youth workers who are struggling with how to address risk issues of youth participating in online social networking sites. Download the fullYouth-Work-and-Social-Networking-Final-Report

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The Community – School Roundtable was an event that brought over 80 people from very diverse organizations and sectors together. The Roundtable was organized by a group of school and community partners in York Region. It was an Open Space session in which you can choose your own topic to lead or select a topic that you wish to participate in. With the “rule of 2 feet” you can find another topic to participate in if you don’t find the session right for you. Here is how the workshop organizers framed the session.

Goals

The goals of the School Community Round Table are to bring our collective wisdom together to:

• Increase achievement and success for all our children and youth;
• Share perspectives on community engagement;
• Explore a different conversation about school/community relationships; and
• Discover new ways to strengthen our school/community relationships.

Our overarching question for the open space conversation is:

How can school and community partners work together over the next ten years to support children and youth in reaching their full potential?

I have 3 videos from the session. The first one is on this post. You can view the opening words of welcome from the Directors of Education from our respective York Region Boards of Education and an excerpt that shows a bit of the topic setting process.

I had a great time leading a discussion titled “changing the nature of the conversation for civic engagement”. I adopted the question format used in Peter Block’s community restoration approach to civic engagement. It was just a snippet from his model but it did prove to me that powerful results can come from powerful questions.

I like his approach because it frees up the participants to think of what’s possible instead of what do we have to fix and going down that problem solving road. The people in my group shared some very personal and insightful comments about what is community and what is civic engagement.

Brent Learning Community, networks openspace roundtable

An interview with Will Davis on Social Capital and Digital Inclusion I have looked at and read many accounts of the UK online learning centres. In Britain, they are so far ahead of Canada in terms of understanding the importance of digital literacy for everyone, especially those that are disenfranchised, without family supports, the unemployed or those experiencing poverty and homelessness (or at risk of). We can learn from their experience.

Will Davies reflects on Social Capital and Digital Inclusion from Tim Davies on Vimeo.

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