Notes from my week
30th January — 3rd February 2023
As a team of Community Organisers at Grapevine we are committed to our practice through regular reflective opportunities. Week notes are a new addition to our tool kit. We take 30 minutes every Friday to come together on zoom to write about our work. Here is the first of (hopefully) many notes from my week…
Newsletter
One of my monthly tasks is to gather the stories and updates for the Connecting For Good newsletter. And boy does that bring me joy!
Its an opportunity for me to reach out to our Change makers and the other community Organisers on the team to see what they have been up to and what they have in store
Considering we are at the start of the year A LOT of action has already been happening! And lots of amazing community powered actions lined up
From the brand new Cov Cares Awards launching to a collaboration with local people from Ball Hill and Warwick University to look into air pollution. I’m not going to spoil it though so you will have to have a gander yourself. Click here to see what all my hype is about
You never know after reading it something may spark inside you compelling you to join the movement and create your own change maker journey. Then next month I could be writing about you!
Haha maybe the newsletter should come with a warning:
“Reading this could seriously change your life!”
If you would like to sign up to receive a helping of community love in your inbox every month click here
Community Organiser POW WOW
Every month the 12 Community Organisers meet up for a POW WOW. This year we have introduced a new structure. The final POW WOW in December was dedicated to us working together to work out what we needed and what we could bring to future sessions
Sound the klaxon! As we now have structured time to learn from each other, share resources, opportunities to practice our coaching skills on real life scenarios and looking at the bigger picture (Community Organising)
I am loving the new format as we all take on different roles: host, notetaker, timekeeper, sharer of knowledge, coach, cheerleader
Although we are a team we all bring our own unique experiences and knowledge about Community Organising and that’s what makes the meetings so juicy! I feel that we have all the right ingredients to super charge our learning
One of the questions asked at my supervision this week was about professional development. It actually felt good to say that I feel I am being developed more in our monthly meetings. For me collaboration is a key to success!
Supervision
Our supervision format has also been tweaked. This week was the first time I sampled the brand new reflective questions. These are in addition to the normal format
Before going into my supervision I block out time to sit down and reflect. I find it helpful to make some notes under each heading. Mainly because my memory is not always very reactive but also because I want to make sure I have covered everything I need to
The questions I liked the most were:
- Tell me about your recent wins
- In 18 months time when the project closes, what would you have liked to achieve?
I felt that they really helped me to unpick where I am now and where I want to be. Now I have identified these I can start to work on the actionable habits and steps I need to take to achieve my goals!
Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoy the brief insight into my life as a Community Organiser on Connecting For Good. I am going to leave you with an illustration I created that sums up why I feel this way of working is important for local people…
