Who are you?

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Permalink Reply by Emma Lees on December 9, 2010 at 10:42

Hello all. I'm Emma, also based in Sheffield (when I can fight my way there through snow and car troubles). Working for CDX at present. I'm the Development Officer - Policy.

Like Sophie I started working with Big Society in the North and have become involved with Our Society through it.

Outside of work I suport Mansfield Town Football Club (please do not get me started on our troubles..), a mum of two, School Governor, wannna be actor, love films, theatre and reading.

Emma

Permalink Reply by Toby Blume on December 9, 2010 at 12:10

I'm Toby, i'm the CEO of Urban Forum - helping community groups across England (we've got 800 members mostly local community groups) to have a greater say of decision making.

We've been working closely with our members to help them (and ourselves) make sense of the Big Society agenda and have held around 25 events in partnership with our local members to discuss the challenges and opportunities it creates.

i've also been blogging a fair bit about Big Society and following the development of Our Society/Big Society in the North with interest (and many of our members have been more actively involved).

i'm a keen (obsessive?) tweeter - @tobyblume - a part-time vegetable grower, full time parent, cricket lover and bank reform zealot. I see myself as an activist stuck in the body of a policy wonk.

Toby

Permalink Reply by Jon Beech on December 9, 2010 at 12:59

I have been working in and around social inclusion since the mid nineties - in a variety of do-gooding contexts.

I have a particular interest in using using asset-based approaches to improving health and challenging inequality and exclusion – by focusing on what people can do, rather than just listing their needs or what they can’t do.

At the moment, I do this by managing various community development projects for Touchstone, a health and wellbeing charity, based in Leeds. These projects focus on building the capacity of communities – especially black and minority ethnic communities – to take greater control of their lives and health by challenging the unfairness, apathy and disorganisation which keeps them poor and sad.

I've taken a similar approach in all the work I've done, as a volunteer in homeless projects, managing housing services, working in squats and with people who sleep rough and whose lives revolve around using drugs and alcohol to get by.

I like to think I combine a strong sense of mucking about with serious thinking, and an ability to help people join the dots of their experiences, in ways that help us both deepen our understanding of the stuff going on around us. I think this is as important to people who run services as much as those who use those same services. People are too often trapped in worlds they have not made, and learn to direct their anger and disappointment in ways that further entrench them.

At the risk of sounding overly worthy - I believe critical thinking, allied with approaches like action learning and appreciative inquiry are the tools we can use to dig ourselves out of our holes.Most of all, I believes the solutions to ill-health and poverty often lie outside of services, and can be found in membership of communities that feel confident in their own ability to include, to care, to manage risks, and to hope for better.

When I'm not at work, I like to break things and travel on public transport. I'm also prone to getting lost in abstract thought - so tell me to shut up and get a grip

Permalink Reply by Simon Denton on December 9, 2010 at 21:06

So a little about me…

By day I’m employed to re-engineer parts of society for the better. Now before you jump to the wrong conclusion I’m not employed by some dastardly shady organisation with plans for total world domination. By day I’m a Civil Engineer and so by definition I deal with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment. My work includes bridges, roads, canals, railways, power supplies, communications and buildings. My work features in all levels of society: in the public sector from local through to national government, and in the private sector from individual homeowners through to international companies. I get involved in a whole manner of subjects from finance and law through to design and management theory.

In my spare time I’m a Trustee of a fledgling Charity and you can learn more about the charity I represent here Hartlebury Castle Preservation Trust. Now I say spare time… My role fills every spare moment and would consume my day job if unchecked.It is through my role as a Trustee that I became interested in ideas like ‘Big Society’. I rapidly made the link between my day job, my spare time and wider society. I’m not here to push my day job far from it. I’m here thanks to the power of Twitter and currently unguided enthusiasm. I think I’ve got something to offer but what perhaps only time will tell.

You can follow my exploits on twitter here @castlebod .

Permalink Reply by David Wilcox on December 9, 2010 at 22:46

Thanks Sophie for getting us going. I've been inspired by the Big Society in the North approach, now reflected in the About Us section here ... and I'm proud to be the only southerner so far in the launch group for Our Society. I did spend some early years in Mansfield, and gather that just about counts ....
Anyway, I've been blogging a lot about Big Society and more recently at Socialreporter and bigsociety.amplify.com not least to bemoan the lack of a neutral non-partisan space for people to share stories, ideas, experience ... and also find opportunities for themselves and their organisations.
I did a couple of months work with Big Society Network in the early days, and hoped they might do something like this, but so far it hasn't turned out that way, and I think an independent initiative is what we need.
I live in London and make a living reporting from events, helping organisations with social media, and doing work around collaborations of various sorts.

Permalink Reply by Toby Blume on December 9, 2010 at 23:42

Ahem....Only southerner?
Hmmmmmmm
:)

Permalink Reply by David Wilcox on December 10, 2010 at 7:37

... I believe the aim is to have more inclusive governance arrangments now such rich talent is flooding in :-) Any thoughts?

Toby Blume said:

Ahem....Only southerner?
Hmmmmmmm
:)

Permalink Reply by Drew Mackie on December 11, 2010 at 14:42

Hi all

I'm Drew - originally an architect and urban designer working mainly on community based regeneration projects throughout the UK. Spent a while in academia in UK and US and now a consultant based in Edinburgh but working all over the UK. I also design games for government, local government, corporate and community clients and have worked with David Wilcox for over 25 years on various gaming and consultation projects. I'm also interested in group storytelling as a way of getting communities to reveal perceptions, particularly in community cohesion work and have applied these methods in Bolton, Blackburn, Pendle and Belfast.

I'm a founder member of Gaia Planning in Edinburgh and also of the EcoCity team who work with primary school children to build a huge model of their town - we've done about 10 of these in locations ranging from Halifax to Belfast, and have just finished one in Dunfermline.

Biggest interest at the moment is the mapping of delivery networks and identifying network assets (skills, resources, etc.). I've mapped the web of community organisations and agencies in Belfast, Stranraer, and Glasgow as well as the organisations involved in the Big Society Network and the Big Society oop North.

I suppose I have a claim to Northern roots having been born in delightful canalside resort called Warrington.

Permalink Reply by John Popham on December 11, 2010 at 17:31

Hi all

 

I worked in community and economic development for a long time, and in social enterprise development long before it became fashionable. I was Chair of an organisation called Community Enterprise UK for a couple of years in the early 1990's, and I've worked in local government, for a national voluntary organisation, and for a couple of private consultancies.I spent 10 years working in the further education sector, including 6 years as director of a consortium of FE colleges.

 

I am trying to make my way in a difficult environment as an independent facilitator, using the skills and knowledge I've gained over the years. I'm doing all sorts of stuff around community and economic development, particularly where it uses technology and social media to facilitate progress.

 

I was one of the founding group of Big Society in the North, which we formed because we saw that communities in the north needed somewhere to find mutual support which was not forthcoming from London-based politicians and organisations, because they clearly don't understand what life is like in them.

 

It soon became apparent that the approach we were taking was finding resonance beyond the north, hence the decision to launch Our Society.

 

Spare time? What's that? Some of the things which distract me slightly from my screen [;-)] are Notts County Football Club, the England Cricket team, and classic rock music, particularly Rush. Oh, and I like baiting X-Factor fans on twitter. If Our Society / Big Society does nothing else, surely it can show those poor people more productive uses of their time.

 

Permalink Reply by Nick Denys on December 14, 2010 at 22:37

Hello everyone,

 

My name is Nick and I am policy geek living in London. I help run the progressive Conservative website Platform10.org. We love all the modern Tory stuff such as local empowerment, transparency, opening-up government contracts to SMEs, being socially liberal ect ect. At the moment our two main purposes seem to be holding Cameron to account to his Big Society/Post-bureaucratic age agenda and showing the world that Conservative Home isn’t the only voice of the grassroots.

 

In my professional life I work as a Policy Adviser in the Government Relations Department for the Law Society. Thanks to the Legal Services Act 2007, which was all about empowering consumers and open-up the legal market to more competition, the profession is going through humongous change. My job is to help try and shape this change, predict how the environment will evolve and think about what help lawyers need.

 

My dad passed on to me the family affliction of supporting Norwich City, though we do seem to be on the up at the moment.

 

I’m happy to chat to anyone about anything.

 

Nick

 

Permalink Reply by Sophie Ballinger on December 15, 2010 at 10:35

No such thing as the 'wrong place' on here, just alternative locations ;-)

Welcome, Justin!

Justin Kirby said:

Whoops, looks like I introduced myself in the wrong place.

Permalink Reply by Isabel Livingstone on December 15, 2010 at 11:10

Hi all,

 

I'm Isabel and work at South West Forum, leading our voice and influence project which supports the voluntary and community sector to have a stronger and more inclusive voice. South West Forum supports voluntary and community organisations across the South West by:

• Providing information and improving communication
• Lobbying, influencing policy and decision making
• Supporting and strengthening local support services
• Making connections and supporting collaboration
• Promoting the social and economic value of voluntary & community action

We are also working with the Regional Empowerment Partnership to develop Empowerment Works, a campaign to make the case for community empowerment. See our blog at www.empowermentworks.blogspot.com

 

Previously I worked at Women's Resource Centre heading up the National Equality Partnership, and have a keen interest in ensuring that equality groups have their voices heard.

 

I'm interested in the 'Our Society' idea though I confess still somewhat skeptical, but I think that one of the most important things it can do is point out that without proactive steps to ensure any 'big society' activity is inclusive and targets marginalised groups, the most vulnerable will miss out on power and resources just at a time when they need it more than ever.

 

I'm another Southerner joining Our Society, originally from London but now an enthusiastic convert to Cornwall! As others have said I'm also impressed with Big Society in the North and keen to see what we can do down here too to address the danger of the geographic margins of the country being overlooked by London.

 

Isabel

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