A great woman once said: “It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan.”
Summer is upon us and so too is the last session of “Becoming a Community Builder”. In this sixth and final session, Ian will explore “Building Communities Through Effective Planning”.
The community development approach to planning has proven to be the most effective in creating great plans that have stakeholder buy-in and actually produce meaningful solutions to real problems. So if we want to be a Community Builder, we better know how to be a catalyst and convener for effective planning to occur. Join us and enhance this much needed tool in your tool kit!
LEARNING OUTCOMES:
· Participants will learn practical and actionable insight on how to ignite the planning process
· Participants will gain insight into planning approaches that ensure that our stakeholders influence decisions that affect them
· Participants will leave the session with practical steps to get a planning process started for the bottom up
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So this is the end… kinda. Because, really, just because Ian’s webcast series has been completed, that doesn’t mean that there still isn’t work to be done. The final step in the process seems to be effective planning.
I should, however, stop using words like ‘the end’ or ‘final’. One thing that I will take away from this experience is that, when it comes to community building, there is no end. There are no final steps. If we are going to become effective leaders and successful community builders, the process must be ongoing.
Just because we are making the plan doesn’t mean that we have stopped the engagement of others. We still need to advocate for our cause and commit to continual improvement… for ourselves and for our communities. The six competencies for community leadership is not a checklist, it is a continuing, evolving circle.
I believe a successful plan had the stamp, the flavour, of many people and many diverse ideas. It needs to be owned by the community it is affecting – much in the way we must own our own journey to becoming a better community leader.
So I would like to thank all of those who taken this journey with ACE, Ian, and myself. I feel comforted that there are others who are working alongside us, in different parts of the world, striving to make this world a better place. Because, in the end, we are all interconnected and everyone is ultimately only as strong as the neighbour beside them.
I commit to bettering both my community and myself and I have faith that you will as well.
So good luck and let us know how you journey is progressing.