Category: Neighbourhoods

A perfect description of a perfect social media surgery? Bearwood.

This video is shot by the Lorna Prescott – who’s the surgery manager for the enormously successful Dudley Social Media surgery –  and she’s talking to Coral Musgrave who organised last night’s first social media surgery in Bearwood. It is wonderful to see surgeries seeding with people who run one helping others develop there’s – and all working along the keep it simple lines that started with the recipe.  Lorna (of Dudley CVS)  learnt this from her first surgery:

  • Never underestimate the power of sharing knowledge, skills and experience (crucial in community development practice)
  • Social media surgeries are to help active citizens to join the massive conversation which is taking place on the internet
  • Social media surgeries are not basic IT training – we can signpost to adult learning for that
  • Individuals working in the public sector, voluntary sector and involved in community groups are willing to give their time

Well done and lets hope those organisations come back for more help in Bearwood. Can I make one suggestion Coral?  Put some more dates in – so people who are enthused can book to come to another.

May I also say it’s a top notch piece of social reporting. Lorna came to one of our social reporter training programmes a year of more ago – and is a natural in the business of keeping things relaxed, simple, and get them online quickly.

Wolverhampton LNP, Social reporting and finding their feet on Twitter.

We have recently been doing some work in Wolverhampton with the Local Neighbourhood Partnership (LNP), talking to their neighbourhood wardens about how they can use Twitter to communicate on their patch, the sorts of conversations they could be having and showing them practically how to use it.

As I live in Wolverhampton, sit on the board for my local LNP and use twitter in my neighbourhood with @WV11, one of the examples I used when training them was live tweeting from our meetings.

Bi-monthly in each LNP area Read more

Engaged Communities – Social Media Improving Neighbourhoods

 

The above exchange took place recently between Wv11 a hyperlocal blog in Wednesfield (*disclaimer* I am the co-founder of Wv11 – but this wasn’t me tweeting this time), Wolverhampton Parks and Wolverhampton Homes, the ALMO  (Aram Length Management Organisation) that looks after housing for Wolverhampton Council. It was a simple and common complaint involving litter.  There wasn’t an immediate solution as someone had to physically get out to the park  to deal with it but because the message was not only acknowledged positively but there was also a response given about the planned action, any other residents following this exchange knew something was planned to get the litter cleaned up and later on when it was dealt with they could see that the promise was carried through.

This wasn’t the first conversation of this sort to take part online and it surely wont be the last but to  my mind at least this kind of engagement can only improve communities.

It may start as small as getting rubbish collected from the park put just imagine the possibilities. If lots of people can take part in a wider conversations with service providers and local partners, if they are responded to as individuals and if they can see that not only are things are getting done as a result, but also see the processes in place that get them there they are more likely to engage in the future and feel part of the bigger picture that makes their neighbourhood tick.

 

 

 

 

Social Media Surgery movement wins the Prime Minister’s Big Society Award – hurrah!

Big Society Awards 2012 logo looks like a street name plate

I’m very excited to be able to say that the Prime Minister has recognised social media surgeries with a Big Society Award for 2012.

The Big Society Awards were set up by the Prime Minister in November 2010 to acknowledge individuals and organisations across the UK that demonstrate the Big Society in their work or activities. The aim is also to galvanise others to follow.  David Cameron said this about the surgeries:

“This is an excellent initiative – such a simple idea and yet so effective. The popularity of these surgeries and the fact that they have inspired so many others across the country to follow in their footsteps, is testament to its brilliance.

“Congratulations to Nick and all the volunteers who have shared their time and expertise to help so many local groups make the most of the internet to support their community. A great example of the Big Society in action.”

Thank you for such kind words – to which we responded formally with:

“It’s wonderful to have recognition for everyone who has organised a social media surgery or turned up to volunteer their help.  I think the surgeries work because they are simple.  They are very easy to organise, fun to do and not in the least bit intimidating for people who want some help. They give active citizens and community groups the confidence and skills to use social media to campaign, organise and hold power to account.  They’ve grown because of the passion and energy of bloggers and voluntary groups up and down the country.”

Background

The idea of a social media surgery originated with Pete Ashton – who used them with people who were looking for free help from his consultancy supporting arts organisations. We then applied the relaxed approach in a new way, scaling it up and putting together two sets of people – lovely helpers from the Birmingham Bloggers group (started in 2007) with the fab active citizens I’d had met through Read more