Archive for the 'Community-Driven Tour' Category

I Left My Heart in Lincoln

Published
by
Hildy
on November 24, 2008
in Community-Driven Tour, My Inspiration and Travel Stories
. 2 Comments

(Part 8: Community-Driven Tour 2008. To read these posts from the beginning of this 2+ month tour, click here.)

From our first visit to Lincoln, Nebraska in April of 2006, it was love at first sight. And everyone we tell that to thinks we are insane.

If we were talking about somewhere romantic like San Francisco or Manhattan, they would understand. But falling in love with Lincoln, Nebraska?

Is it the weather? Nebraskans proudly inform visitors, “If you don’t like the weather, wait an hour - it will change.” During the single week we spent in April 2006, we experienced an ice storm, a 70 degree shirt-sleeve day, torrential rains and a tornado warning - all in one week. While our visit this past week was not as extreme - a 60 degree day followed by a 15 degree night - the weather is not why we love Lincoln.

Is it the food? Man do we love Lincoln’s food! Our host for this trip was Rick Carter, Executive Director of Lincoln’s Human Services Federation, Community-Driven Institute Adviser and joyful friend.  Rick ensured we only ate at locally owned restaurants, a mandate he and his wife Jessica (and Super Baby Eloise) live by in their daily lives. We had phenomenal Indian Food at The Oven (an eggplant dish to die for!) and we loved Pho Nguyenn so much, we went back for their authentic Vietnamese food a second time (try the Bun with tofu and mushrooms - heaven!). And while Lincoln’s restaurants rival cities twice its size, that is not why we love Lincoln.

Is our love for Lincoln due to the culture and feel of the downtown / capitol area? Yes, we love the area around the UNL campus, and yes, we spend as much time as possible in the restored Haymarket District with its fabulous restaurants and stores. And yes, Rick treated us to a tour of the art deco marvels of the Nebraska State Capitol building (a building about which Lincoln Food Bank executive director Scott Young insists, “It should be a misdemeanor for people who live in Lincoln not to go inside that building and look around once a year.”).

And even more, we wish we could attend every one of the incredible lectures hosted at UNL’s Lied Performance Center (Former Kennedy speechwriter Ted Sorenson was the attraction while we were there this time - the rumored author of the immortal words, “Ask not what your country can do for you…”). Their surprisingly rich cultural environment certainly makes us want to stay and soak it all in, but that, too, is not why we love Lincoln.

Perhaps it is the natural environment? Unlike the drama of the weather, the subtlety of the landscape in Lincoln continually blows us away. Spring Creek Prairie Audubon Center is just one of the local prairie preserves, nurturing these fragile lands back to their natural state. Even in its winter starkness, the sun pouring through the golden grasses was enough to make me lay down on my back, staring at the blue sky through a sea of tufts. A white-tailed deer leaped into the air, flushing out a pheasant in its path. What magic!

It could be all of that. But it’s not.

The reason we have fallen in love with Lincoln is the sense that Lincoln is ready to leap like that deer, reaching for the next level of what is possible for the community.

During this trip, in conversation after conversation with community leaders, the questions circled back to this:  What would Lincoln’s Community Benefit Sector look like if all systems were aimed at community change? And what would that take?

How could you not fall in love with a place where community leaders are excited to discuss such questions!? And how could you not love a community where the answers included these:

• Everyone would be involved in the discussion - funders, consultants, service providers, elected officials, businesses, individual community members, government departments
• Everyone would be learning from each other, building on their own strengths and each others’ strengths
• There would be tools / systems for measuring community change - meaningful indicators of long-term success
• There would be a sense of trust, a spirit of learning and reflection
• The context of the work would be the small picture within the larger picture, rather than solely the small picture
• There would be cross-pollination across different types of missions
• Community change would be a very present part of the dialogue
• Collaboration would not be seen as a superficial mechanism, but as a way of being
• Organizations would see themselves as catalysts for community change, and would know how to put that into practice
• There would be excitement and energy throughout the sector!

Over the course of our time in Lincoln, these themes crept into all our conversations.  How can we ensure our work is a model for the interconnectedness and strength-based approaches we want to reach for as a community?  How can we be sure to walk our talk? How can our efforts embody what it means to be the change we want to see?

And people wonder why we love Lincoln!

Among those who participated in many of these breathtaking discussions was our friend and colleague, Mari Lane Gewecke. Mari is the one who introduced us to Lincoln originally, and who connected the dots to make our first trip to Lincoln possible almost three years ago. During this current trip, Mari became an integral part of the Community-Driven work the Institute is doing. The ability to work so closely with friends like Rick and Mari has made this even more special.

Topping off our visit was a great morning-full of workshops, attended by an enthusiastic group of 70 representatives of Lincoln’s Community Benefit Organizations. From service providers to funders, and from arts organizations and human services to environmental and animal welfare groups - folks saw that they share a single vision for the future of Lincoln. They learned how to govern towards that vision, and how to engage the community in programs that embody that vision.

We have now packed the car, and have begun the journey home. It was on the way out of town that we stopped to spend a few hours at the Spring Creek Preserve. The woman at the Visitor’s Center asked where we were from, and then asked what had brought us to Lincoln. When we told her we had done some workshops for community organizations, she came alive. “Two of our board members were at that workshop! They were telling the board about it just last night at our board meeting. They said it was the best workshop they had ever attended!”

What a way to wrap up our perfect week in Lincoln! This trip has been remarkable, in every single way, but Lincoln has been the cherry on the sundae.

From there, it is time to set the GPS to Tucson. After 2 ½ months, it is time to go home.

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Community-Driven Tour 2008: Many Moons and Oil Changes

Published
by
Hildy
on November 15, 2008
in Changing the World, Community-Driven Tour and Travel Stories
. 1 Comment

(Part 7: Community-Driven Tour 2008. To read these posts from the beginning of this 2+ month tour, click here.)

Three full moons have passed since we left Tucson on September 12. We have driven two oil changes worth of miles. We have slept in 2 countries, in 12 US states and 1 Canadian province, visiting 17 communities for workshops and meetings. And we are not done yet.

We have driven as far north as Canada, as far south as North Carolina, as far east as the Atlantic ocean.

We visited Niagara Falls at night. We spent a whole day walking 7+ miles all over Toronto, including a stroll through the multi-ethnic wonders of Kensington Market.

We hiked waterfalls and gorges in gorgeous Ithaca, New York. We rode the metro in Washington DC and picked apples in Danbury, Connecticut.

We attended a reading by a sour New Age philosopher at Malaprop’s - a magnificent independent bookstore in the robust downtown of Asheville, North Carolina, where book after book ultimately leaped into my possession. We spent a misty night at the lakeside home of a friend outside Knoxville, Tennessee, waking up to the quiet beauty of the waterfront wrapped in fog outside the window.

We have photographed stream after stream, barn after barn. We have had home-cooked meals in the homes of old friends, and have spent hours playing with their dogs.

Autumn’s arboreal rainbow has been the backdrop for every moment of the 2+ months of this journey so far, like watching a movie forward, then backward, and then forward again. Leaving Tucson and heading north in late September, we watched the leaves begin turning from green to gold. In early October, heading from Connecticut across western New York to Canada, the leaves peaked in brilliant golds and reds. Driving through Ontario in mid-October, gold and then brown leaves began falling from the trees. Heading south towards Pittsburgh and DC, those leaves were now reattached to the trees. And arriving further south, in Williamsburg, Virginia in early November, we found the season back in the full peak of gold and red with bits of green still hanging in there. This single season circled back twice for us, and we have been filled with awe and gratitude at every step.

There have been traumas - Dimitri’s dad, and then watching from a distance as the mother of a dear friend, Mark Myers, suddenly passed away as well. There have been minor inconveniences like head colds and bug bites. And there have been the highs of an election that brought words like “vision” and “possibility” to the lips of everyone we have met, and whose results left us crying in our hotel suite, receiving and making joyful phone calls to our kids and friends spread across the country.

We have met almost 1,000 people at 27 workshops and meetings. And we are not done yet.

Through all the sights and sounds and tastes of this fabulous tour, the most energizing part has been the work we traveled all this way to do in the first place, and the result of that work. We came to share a singular message, whether we were teaching Governance or Community Engagement:

Visionary community change is not only possible; it is practical and doable.

It is possible because it is not scientifically impossible.  We have seen visionary results occur repeatedly in our work, and in the work of others.

It is practical and doable because there are easy-to-use systems for doing it, which is what our workshops shared - the practical side of creating visionary community change through the day-to-day work of our organizations.

Several people have asked us what we have observed across the diverse communities we have visited. Our response is this: Everywhere we have been, to the workshop, to the sponsor, and to the individuals attending, the desire for leveraging the work organizations are already doing, to create more significant community change, is undeniable. People are craving concrete, practical, doable approaches, aligned behind the intent of creating a more compassionate, vibrant, healthy, resilient world.

The result has been universal enthusiasm for the possibilities inherent in Community-Driven approaches. That enthusiasm energizes us to begin preparing now to do this tour again next year!

It also energizes us to have the Pollyanna Principles available to you by Christmas. It energizes us to begin the Community-Driven Institute’s classes for consultants next year, as the next step in changing how this sector does its work.

But for now, the tour continues, and we are most energized about our next stop - Lincoln, Nebraska. In Lincoln, we will not only do two workshops, but we will begin talking with community leaders about building a Community-Driven management support organization, to provide Community-Driven education and other resources for Lincoln’s community benefit organizations.

We are in St. Louis today, to spend the day with my darling friend, artist Jeane Vogel, who is always pushing me to think think think about the extent to which art is life is art. She has a show opening tonight; what a treat to be here for it!

And so, ten days before it is over, we can declare that the Community-Driven Tour 2008 has been a wild success. We have been honored to have been welcomed into so many communities, by so many incredible people, doing such extraordinary work. Each and every person who has had any part in this tour has our gratitude, beyond anything you can know.

Life is good indeed.

(Read the next installment of our adventures on the Community-Driven tour!)

I Heart Pittsburgh! (The Final Installment)

Published
by
Hildy
on November 8, 2008
in Boards / Governance, Community-Driven Tour and Consulting
. 0 Comments

(Part 6: Community-Driven Tour 2008. To read these posts from the beginning of this 2+ month tour, click here.)

Friday, October 24
It is Friday morning. Raining. Rush hour traffic from the North Hills into downtown Pittsburgh. My voice is gone. None of this bodes well.

All omens vanish as we approach Community Radio Station WYEP, the venue for the morning’s events. More than thirty people will be attending as part of the NLI’s normal day-long Leadership Academy. Almost fifty more have signed up just to hear my talk. The room barely holds 60 comfortably. It will now hold 80 uncomfortably.

Michael and I are on the stage, and he is beginning his over-the-top introduction of me. He tells of how he first found me, and of the influence my work has had on the very being of the NLI. As he is about to hand the microphone over to me, a woman quietly enters the room, seeking a seat. “Oh look,” Michael says, as if an announcement to the group but really as a cue to me, “Yinka is here!”

Dr. Yinka Aganga-Williams was a student in the class we taught for Duquesne - Creating the Future of Your Community. The organization she founded - AJAPO - helps ensure a smooth transition to American life for refugees and immigrants from the African Diaspora.  AJAPO is well known throughout the Pittsburgh area for getting more done on a shoestring than many organizations can do with million-dollar budgets. And that is all because of Yinka.

Through our time together over all the distance-learning miles of that semester, Dimitri and I have grown to cherish the wisdom we have found in Yinka. We have never met in person, and yet have learned so much from each other.

And so, with Michael’s words, my heart leaps from my chest, and I forget I am on a stage in front of 80 strangers.  As Michael is about to hand the proceedings over to me, I have already left the stage, and am now hugging the fabulous Nigerian woman I have grown to admire so much.

(Yinka later tells Dimitri and me that when she completes her degree, she is considering taking her new-found leadership skills back to the African continent, to help build community there. She shares that the  emphasis in our class on the “community” part of the phrase “community leadership” had a profound impact on her current work and her future plans.  Wow!)

The day is taking its shape from such moments. Liz Nilsen is here - a colleague, client and friend whom we last saw (and worked with) in Danville, Virginia. She has moved to Pittsburgh, and it is wonderful to reconnect after almost 4 years since our time in Danville. “I love it here,” she whispers, almost afraid to tempt the gods. “We love it here, too,” I whisper back to her. “The energy in Pittsburgh is palpable!”

Then there is the amazing conversation with a gentleman who listened to my morning talk about the role of vision and values, both in Building an Energized Board and accomplishing great community results. He has approached me with a smile that covers his whole face. “We always feel as if our board is the strange one. But as I am listening to you, I am realizing, we are doing exactly what you talked about!”

I am excited to hear more. “How is it working?” I ask him.

“So so well!  The organization’s results are incredible. But to be honest, as I was listening to all the board problems everyone else was talking about in the session, I could not believe that’s what being a board was like for them.  Our board may feel like we are the odd ones, but we are actually the ones who are on the right track!  Listening to everyone in that room bemoaning their inability to find people to serve - and yet we have a waiting list of people who want to join our board!“

I am thrilled at his words, as we know this is the case. When boards are doing Community-Driven work, people want to be riding that train!!

One after another, I am spending the morning talking with folks. If I did not have a voice before the first session, I have lost that voice entirely by lunch. We are breaking bread at a great middle eastern restaurant, joined by a small band of consultants assembled by Michael to hear my talk. Among them is Cindy Shapira, with whom we had lunched two days prior. And Cindy is excited!

“Last night I began planning work with one of the groups I was telling you about the other day. And it worked! It worked so well!” She is beaming.

“At first they told me they already have a vision. But I got them to appease me and discuss the questions you suggested. And you cannot believe the vision they came to - it was comprehensive, and community-focused, and - well - visionary! They stretched beyond just their narrow mission to include a real picture of community health that will begin to inform their mission and their programs in all kinds of ways. It was unbelievable!”

The more she talks, the more we cannot wait to get the Community-Driven Consultant education program up and running next year. Cindy has already committed to be one of the first in attendance. She cannot wait to learn more.

The afternoon session will be an exclusive event, just for the grantees of PACE - Pittsburgh’s Program to Aid Citizen Enterprise. PACE assists community-based organizations that work with economically disadvantaged communities, and today is the first meeting of this round of grantees. They were part of the group who heard my talk in the morning, but this afternoon, it is just me and them - no larger group to get lost in.

The talk this afternoon is Building Engaged Support for Your Mission. We arrive and find they are still eating lunch. As any afternoon speaker will tell you, this is not good news - I can almost guarantee folks will be nodding off during my talk. Small group, speaker with virtually no voice left, food still heavy on their stomachs… I am doomed.

To top it off, there is no microphone.  We have learned, though, that Michael’s staff - and in particular, Elaine Franks, who I have come to believe is also single-handedly responsible for keeping the earth spinning on its axis - never sees obstacles.  They see only possibilities.

And so, while we were eating lunch, Elaine had gone to a nearby music store, where she had shelled out $50 for a cheap guitar amp (”We needed this anyway - good to have, when you do as many workshops as the NLI does!”).  She ran back to the radio station to borrow the wireless transmitter I had used that morning.  And by the time I am 10 minutes into virtually whispering my talk to this room full of community leaders, Dimitri has hooked up this system and I am at least whispering into a mic!

Given all that, the group is lively, and the talk is fun, with lots of laughing and even more aha moments. Afterward, folks respond in earnest, awakening from their post-lunch lull and hugging me, thanking me.

One woman shared, “It was inspiring. We do indeed have so much to build upon. Thank you so much for that message!”

And then she adds the icing on the cake: “But it’s not just your message - your phrasing is like poetry.” Wow!

Saturday, October 25
And with that, we are packing up our boxes and bags, stuffing the car with everything we own, and moving on - as quick as we showed up, we are gone. We are on our way to Washington DC.

In DC, we will spend time catching up on weeks’ worth of work piled so high we cannot see. We will do a workshop in Baltimore that has been sold out since just 2 hours after it was announced. We will have lunch with a man I have worked with closely under the extreme circumstances of plagiarism, and who has become both a colleague and a friend - Glenn Cook, the editor-in-chief of the American School Board Journal.

And best of all, we will get to spend time with my daughter, not sightseeing, but even better - just hanging out, discussing and watching the campaign, cooking, doing laundry, and just being together.

In the afterglow of this intense, stimulating, inspiring, energizing week at Duquesne University, we are ready to rest and recover. We are quite sure, as our time in DC passes, that every few hours we will remind ourselves of the marvelous encounters we had in our visit to Pittsburgh.

And who knows what next week will bring?

The next installment along this amazing journey is here.

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