January Project Update

Social Prosperity Wood Buffalo hosted several events in January.  The level of engagement, attendance and community buy-in was at an all-time high!  The Change Lab, which took place on January 22nd, was the first time SPWB was able to report back to the community since its’ first meeting back in February, 2011.  As you may recall, 75 community leaders gathered together at a kitchen party to talk about the nonprofit sector, its challenges and opportunities. Participants identified more than 100 ideas that were then grouped into five main themes: Arts & Culture; Building Capacity; Harnessing Great Ideas; Shared Space and Social Planning.

Volunteers from Wood Buffalo and Waterloo Region were recruited to serve on Action Learning Teams (ALTs)  to develop transformational solutions.  The idea behind this collaboration was to build on the experience of community leaders from two of Canada’s greatest economic engines.  At first, organizers were nervous about how this partnership would unfold.  Wood Buffalo did not want anyone telling them how to conduct their business and Waterloo did not want to appear that they had all the answers.  The two groups quickly found common footing in their shared desire to strengthen communities and improve nonprofit social impact.  By welcoming diverse perspectives and openly sharing success stories and failures, the groups enjoyed a rich discussion that enabled them to learn from each other.  They also discovered that nonprofits in both communities were facing similar challenges around sustainable funding, lack of adequate office space and volunteer and staff retention and burnout.

The process became exciting when organizers began noticing areas of focus that were common to all five themes. Discussions quickly moved from a narrow viewpoint to something much broader. Strategies began to emerge that overlapped from one ALT to the next.  These strategies were grouped into four areas of focus: people working in the nonprofit sector; nonprofit organizations, networks and communities. A framework for building prosperous communities began to  emerge. It offers practical ways to build human resources and effective organizations, increase nonprofit social impact and how to cultivate engaged citizens. Broader than the original five themes,  the framework has the potential to change society for the better by supporting the nonprofit sector in new and innovative ways, elevating its role in addressing complex social problems and becoming a magnet for talent attraction and retention.

By mid-December, the Framework was ready for community input. The Change Lab provided the perfect venue to seek feedback and direction moving forward.

Organizers are now reviewing the feedback which will inform action plans for the coming year.  Thanks to everyone for trusting the process and for being a leader in social prosperity.

Plans are currently being developed for the top priority strategies that were identified at the Change Lab.  These plans will be shared in June where the real work begins!  We hope that community leaders will continue to support this project by volunteering on committee work and by embracing the Social Prosperity Framework and its goal to build stronger, more proactive nonprofits who have greater capacity to serve the community.

A Theory of Change Logic Model is being developed for the SPWB project.  Nonprofit leaders will be invited to help identify indicators and the development of baseline survey questions.  Organizations already enaged in capacity building work will be invited to participate in the pilot test for the Baseline Survey (May 2012) and to help facilitate the completion of surveys by other nonprofits who will be invited to complete the online survey in June 2012.