Summer campaigning links

Bit of a bias towards strategy and planning on this one, as that's where my head is to some extent at today.

Training resources on systems, power, leadership and campaigns from the New Economics Organisers Network.

Design thinking (read: campaign strategy resources) via Beth's blog and the Greenpeace Mobilisation Lab Campaign Accelerator model.

And bucketloads of more planning resources via the DIY Toolkit

Heroes Journey story-mapping ooojimy from the Dancing Fox

Jenny Ross from Bond on theories of change

Collaboration cards toolkit

Campaigning boardgame? Yes please!

8 top tips for planning a march/protest/equivalent event (Hatcher Group)

Article on non-linear planning in Nonprofit: Absolutely Fabulous which is particularly helpful on the catch 22 of data - you need data in order to commit resources to a project but you need the resources to get the data...

My boss Alice Fuller on how our organisation developed its local campaigning strategy (Prezi presentation)

The Powercube - a new way to understand power-relationships.

What does a globally connected, thriving, capacity-building ecosystem for modern advocacy look like? (Report from Greenpeace Mobilisation Lab)

Approaches to Co-creation (Joanna Levitt Cea/Jess Rimington, SSIR)

Civic engagement as a way of life (Kirsten Grimm/Emily Gardner, SSIR)

Huge list of UK politics datasets

Asset mapping - using community's strengths to foster social networks (National Voices)

Presentation from Chris Rose on Why Campaigning Matters which is also a lucid exposition on the Rosean model of campaigning with full speaker's notes.

Hahrie Han bonanza! Full video of talk on 'Organising or mobilising to build power'  plus reflections from Jim Coe, Natasha Adams and Tom Baker.

And it's a bit meta, but here's a link to more summer reading links from Tom Baker at the Thoughtful Campaigner.

Spring into action [PUN KLAXON]

With thanks to my colleagues and the E-campaigning forum, I'm just scrap-booking some interesting links and resources here to create an impromptu reading list.

Unless indicated otherwise, linking does not indicate support, endorsement or the adoption of a resource as my philosophy of living. :)

Community organising

Betsy Hoover's TED talk on community organising

Change Agency guide to community organising

Unlocking Networks - a resource for developing and getting the most from peer-to-peer networks.

Directed network campaigns

An interesting report from NetChange about balancing central direction and bottom-up participation in campaigning.

E-mail activism

Free report from More Onion about how you can make your e-mail activism aimed at MP's and other decision-makers as effective as possible.

More More Onion reporting: supporter journeys and how to automate them

And a contrasting voice about the limits of e-activism.

Mobilisation Lab archive

Where all their regular updates on campaign innovation can be found.

Facilitation resource banks, hints and tips

Training For Change
350.org
Conscious Collaboration
Seeds For Change
Fabriders
Radical Think Tank

The long view

Friends of the Earth look at lessons from campaigns throughout history. A nice companion piece to this is an ACEVO report making the case for charity campaigning in the here and now.

They call him The Ponderer

Tom Baker is The Thoughtful Campaigner (see for example his thoughts on leadership in campaigns or on campaigning in coalition)

48 Campaign Strategies? So close to Paul Simon, but not quite 

Thanks, Chris Rose

Or: More Onion on unconventional tactics.

Stories and listening

Great article on Open Democracy by Simon Hodges about respectful relationships being a key criterion for persuasion. See also Outrageous Impact on a similar topic.

Teamwork and coalitions

Creative coalitions: a handbook for change
How Google Docs became a key tool for social justice

Old school

Common Cause report on value-led campaigning

Welcome to the House of Links

Welcome to the House of Campaigning and Organising Links... which is not the House of the Rising Sun, not The House of Flying Daggers and particularly not the House of Endorsements. 

I'm in the process of going through e-mails from the eCampaigning Forum I've been saving this year, which is where most of these links come from. Thanks to everyone who shares their wisdom there.

Blogs, talks, reports

Beyond vanity metrics - towards better measurement of member engagement (Colin Holtz, Jackie Mahendra, Michael Silberman)

How do networks of people actually generate the power to change communities? (Esther Foreman, The Social Change Agency)

A miscellany of interesting sites and the resources they hold

350.org training resources for facilitation, strategising and organising
Bond theory of change resources (Jenny Ross)
Digital Tribes UK - meetup for people developing online communities
DIY Toolkit - all manner of planning and idea-generating tools
Exposing The Invisible - using social media for investigation
Interests.me - new national platform for community information sharing
Moodle - open source online learning platform
Nextdoor - the private social network for your neighbourhood
New Economics Organisers' Network resources page
Timeline - easy free-to-make timeline tool
Visualising information for advocacy

Story Of Self/Us/Now

Inspired by my Campaigns Contact Weekend follow-up (see last post), here's the first of an occasional series of noticeboard posts with handy links to more activist and organising resources I have used or otherwise come across.

Some of it still lives in one form or another on Campaign Hubs, Friends of the Earth's discussion space, but as that's not being used much of late I thought I might as well consolidate it here. 

Story of Self//Us/Now

What kind of stories do we tell people about ourselves as campaigners? How can we make them compelling to others while authentic and sustaining for ourselves?

The Story of Self/Us/Now structure allows you to present a compelling narrative of your own to other people when talking about your campaign or group. You can also ask questions of others to elicit the same material.

Here are a couple of explanations together with a workshop outline.

http://workshops.350.org/toolkit/story/
http://www.wholecommunities.org/pdf/Public%20Story%20Worksheet07Ganz.pdf

L'esprit de la noticeboard - some links from the Campaigns Contacts' Weekend

Back in July I helped out at the MND Association's Campaigns Contacts' Weekend - a get-together for the Association's marvellous campaigning volunteers.

I facilitated (or assisted with) sessions on mindfulness and involving others in your campaigning. Over the course of those sessions I referred to quite a bit of external material. While I've already shared the following links with the Campaigns Contacts I'm also adding them here as an aide-memoire.

L'esprit de la noticeboard and all that.

Mindfulness

Here is the mindfulness exercise we tried - why not give it a go yourself? http://www.meditationinschools.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Mindfulness-Relaxation-Exercise-Script.pdf

And here is the summary I shared with participants of what mindfulness is and how it can help with anxiety, stress and self-care: http://www.thesf.org.uk/documents/Emotional-Health/So%20what%20is%20mindfulness.pdf

Involving others in your campaigning

In this session I referred to a number of models and approaches about involving other people in our campaigning.

1. Lone wolves, organisers and mobilisers (Hahrie Han) - https://medium.com/organizer-sandbox/what-is-organizing-55dc0d05b522#.zgxv29b52

2. The three circles model of high-performing teams by John Adair - http://www.chimaeraconsulting.com/adair.htm

3. Circles of commitment for campaigns and groups - http://www.thechangeagency.org/circles-of-commitment/

4. Video (TED Talk) about the community organising approach and how that can involve people - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNdVx_s0SOs

5. Basics of community organising in one page! http://www.citizensnyc.org/sites/default/files/public-attachments/workshop/community_organizing_-_1_page.pdf collapse

The radical centre - a place to be?

From Rebecca Solnit's mighty Hope In The Dark. The quote relates to environmental activism, but could apply to any field of social change or anyone weary of simplistic left-right divisions.

It's also very much in keeping with a community organising approach.
 
'Arizona environmentalist-rancher Bill McDonald [...] may have been the one to coin the term "the radical centre", the space in which ranchers, environmentalists, and government agencies have been able to work together and see the preservation of rural livelihoods and the land itself as the same goal.'

'The radical center, as writer and New Mexico land manager William DeBuys defines it is "a departure from business as usual," is "not bigoted. By that I mean, to do this kind of work, you don't question where someone is from or what kind of hat he or she wears, you focus on where that person is willing to go and whether he or she is willing to work constructively on matters of mutual interest. 

Work in the Radical Centre also involves a commitment to using a diversity of tools. There is no one way of doing things. We need to have large toolboxes and lend and borrow tools freely. 

Work in the Radical Centre is experimental - it keeps developing new alternatives every step of the way. Nothing is ever so good that it can't stand a little revision and nothing is ever so impossible and broken down that a try at fixing it is out of the question."

Ask your Assembly candidates to champion MND

A quick post here to note that next Wednesday, the Motor Neurone Disease Association's campaigns for the Northern Ireland and Wales Assembly campaigns are launching. I've been fairly heavily involved in the preparation for these campaigns. 

And if posts here are a little sparse in the coming weeks it will be because developing a campaign is only half the battle  - you then have to make it happen (or, ideally, help others make it happen with you).

Currently my working life pre-launch is a little like this:

For now, though, here's a teaser for the two campaigns.

Ask your Assembly candidates to champion MND
 
We believe that politicians should understand the impact that MND has on people’s lives. And we know that this message will be loudest if it comes from local people.

That’s why we’re launching two campaigns this Spring:

- Every Breath Counts for this year's Northern Ireland Assembly elections
- MND Won’t Wait campaign for this year’s Welsh Assembly elections 

Take action from March 9 at www.mndassociation.org/everybreath and www.mndassociation.org/mndwontwait

Please take a moment to e-mail your candidates in your constituency to champion MND in the Assembly and in the community. 

Want to do more?

If you have a little more time, you might want to send candidates a personal letter, join in the campaign on social media, and perhaps ask a politician a question if you meet them.

An action guide and resources to do all that and more, as well as our Every Breath Counts and MND Won’t Wait policy briefings, will be available at
www.mndassociation.org/everybreath and www.mndassociation.org/mndwontwait

And if you have any questions about the campaigns, contact Tim Atkinson, Campaigns Manager on tim.atkinson@mndassociation.org or 01543 415121.

Reduce, reduce, reduce - simplifying complexity in campaign messages

The other week, I went to a very interesting event organised by the Directory of Social Change - Campaigning and lobbying in a changing political landscape. I'm still reflecting on what I heard, but here's a snippet from the talk by Chris Rose, independent campaigning expert, author and proprietor of campaignstrategy.org.

He spoke about a former head of communications at Greenpeace who made campaigners write out what their campaign was about. And then write it again, shorter. And again. And again, until the absolute crux of the message had been reached.

This matters because the 'front door' of your campaign - the basic proposition to people and decision-makers - needs to be as clear, simple and appealing as possible. No matter how much policy depth lies beneath.

I had a go with some of the ideas floating around for our Welsh Assembly campaign next year - see below - and found it really helpful in concentrating my focus and informing the writing of campaign resources. I'm not saying this is definitely what we will use - but it does feel a great deal clearer than it did.

And I'm sure the approach can work as well for a local campaign as it can for a larger one. Good messaging is good messaging.

Starting point

·         Helping candidates to understand the issues people with MND face – using the importance of timely and accurate diagnosis and the theme of time as a starting point.

·         Asking candidates to act as champions for MND in the Assembly and their local community – potentially signing a pledge or taking similar symbolic action.

·         Stressing the importance of political leadership in promoting best practice and the best possible care.

Reduce

Asking candidates to act as champions for MND in the Assembly and their local community – understanding the issues they face and making sure health and social care works in their interest.Keep going...

Asking candidates to champion MND – understanding the issues people with MND face and making sure health and social care works for them.Less is still more

We want Welsh politicians to champion motor neurone disease – making sure people with MND have the right health and social care at the right time.
 
Gone back up again! Keep reducing.
We want champions for motor neurone disease – making sure the system gives people with MND the best possible quality of life.Back on track, but keep cutting!

MND champions: politicians helping people with MND get the best possible quality of life.How low can we go?

Politicians can help people with MND to live with dignity.
10 words – awesome! And see how different on the surface but similar in essence it is from our starting point? 

The power of hello on Twitter

No, not a Lionel Richie reference - although it is an opportunity for a gratuitous photo of the reigning High King of Glastonbury 2015.

Photo by Georges Biard [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

Friends aside, I would say I'd had more actual conversation on Twitter in the past week or so than I've had in the past five years.

How? I've been saying hello to some of the people who've followed me by sending them a private message. Not all of them, but those I had something to say to.

Of course, it helps that I have a job for a charity which involves reaching out to volunteers about campaigning. That means I have had something to say and a general offer of help to tender. But the key thing here - as with any networking - is having a friendly interaction based on a common interest, not playing a zero sum game where every conversation has to get me somewhere.   

Unlike e-mails, Twitter messages are also framed as a conversation. Literally, in the way the screen is designed. So there's both more stimulus to respond and less pressure (because less formality) in doing so at the same time, perhaps compared to an e-mail. Certainly the freedom to go over 140 characters helps with responding compared to public Twitter conversation.

Worth saying too that the message content has not been a generic 'Hi - Thanks for the follow - Sign up here' affair either. People can smell that kind of phoniness, that pseudo-bot behaviour in what you write. 

So while my messages have often contained all of those things, it's been personalised to what I know of that person or that organisation and their interests. I've tried sharing some information I thought they would find interesting. I've offered help - and sometimes I've been able to help them, even if it's something as straightforward as retweeting the launch of their latest project.

So - why don't you try it? Who's started following you that you would like to build a relationship with?

Some caveats

Perhaps I shouldn't have to say this, but belt and braces:

• If you think a message from you could potentially be seen as an unwelcome intrusion, either in content, because it's a message from you, or even just because it's a message period, then don't send it.
• It's for that reason I'm restricting my messaging to new follows, organisations and accounts who RT me. And even then I'll be discriminatory.
• With the best will in the world, I have to say social media is still a place where abuse and creepy behaviour happens, disproportionately directed at women. People (especially women) are therefore rightfully cautious about strangers on the internet. So, I say again, if you think the act of messaging might possibly be misconstrued, don't message.

Campaigning 101 - and the first skill you should learn is...

Thinking ahead to an introduction to campaigning session I'm scheduled to run next week - my first for the MND Association - I asked my Facebook friends where people should start. 

What is the first skill you should introduce to people wrapping their heads around what activism is for the first time?

Julien's grassroots social media skill-share

Earlier this week, Julien Pritchard, the Campaign Support Worker for Birmingham Friends of the Earth, ran this rather excellent social media skill-share in his local group.

He's generously given permission for me to post his session plan here, while we think of an opportunity to share it more officially.

All thoughts welcome - especially if you can try it out and feedback your own experiences.

By GoogLiction (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

A thirty-seat strategy for environmentalists

This post starts with a disclaimer: I don't do political strategy for Friends of the Earth. But, I do get to think about grassroots organising a lot, and the two areas inevitably interconnect. This blog is also my personal space for thinking out loud, and what I write here is no way an official view from me or my employer. Capiche?

Bearing that in mind, here's a quick suggestion of one way environmentalists might begin to get the issues onto the political agenda over the next five years.

The problem

Whether you're a glass half-full or half-empty person, it's safe to say that the General Election confirmed the view that the environment needs to be higher on the political agenda than it is. Now, this isn't a party political point - in fact it's hard to imagine an election result earlier this month where this didn't hold true. 

And we can all discuss the undeniable merits of ignoring Parliament - at least some of the time - and getting on with making change happen on the ground, man. But I still believe we need, at the very least, the enabling consent of Westminster, its willingness to let a transformation towards a sustainable future happen.

And let's not forget that legislation (and campaigns for legislation) - like The Big Ask and the Climate Change Act - can be game-changing.

Map by Italay90, coloured by Cryptographic.2014, available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

A solution

One solution - I freely concede, a very partial one - would be for environmentalists to concentrate some of our grassroots organizing efforts in the areas where MP's (and later, prospective MP's) really need to listen to their public - the most marginal Conservative seats in the country.

Let's say - the top 30 most vulnerable seats, numerically speaking. as a starting point.

That would mean beginning a dialogue with those representatives going forward. Building a body of evidence that their constituents support the environment. Asking them to support local environmental projects and - ultimately - national campaigns.

It implies engaging local political parties, and yes, the local authority too. It would certainly benefit from finding and working with allies so that we can have this conversation with the best, most representative and loudest collective voice we can muster.

The local awareness raising on climate over the next 6 months leading up to the UN climate talks in Paris - that so many organisations support or are involved in - could provide an excellent framework for this. The great thing about this campaign is that it's as strident or as gentle as you want it to be (or your MP can cope with).

And from a grassroots organising perspective, it would of course also means building our strength in those areas. From now.

The seats

A big thanks to super volunteer Mandy Staunton, who pointed me towards this list of marginals here (all the way down to Enfield North - that's your top 30)

There's a good even spread across England and Wales - around half of them in areas where Friends of the Earth - never mind any other group -  already has a known presence. In some, a very strong active presence. In others, people who we can support and nurture. In still others, an opportunity to organise and find new allies.

Doubtless, some of the constituencies might prove unworkable, for political or practical reasons, or perhaps just ill luck. But if we can begin that dialogue, start to shift the political debate in even 20 of those constituencies in the next year, we would have made an investment which we can build on for the rest of the current Government.

As I said at the start - this is just a thought-piece. But it's certainly one on which I'd welcome your thoughts.

What we don't talk about when we don't talk about The Big Ask

It's been ten years, more or less, since Friends of the Earth's climate change campaign The Big Ask was launched in May 2005. The campaign that ultimately gave the UK the world's first Climate Change Act three years later.

Yet here we are in 2015, and I'm still in awe not just of its success but of its afterlife in other European countries. 

Did you know that in the intervening decade, our sister groups elsewhere in Europe have been (often successfully) pressing for legally binding climate emissions targets using the British model as a starting point?

This is - in short - one heckuva campaign.

So how come we the movement so rarely talk about it? More to the point, what are we missing out on, through this curious act of omission?

My experience of The Big Ask was at the grassroots - until the very final phase of the campaign I was active in my local group in London. And for me, it got so many things right at the micro level:

• Simplicity - you could explain the proposition in any notional elevator you might find yourself in.
• Broad-based appeal - as the marketing made clear, you didn't need to be a hardcore environmentalist to support it. It didn't assume we were fated to remain a clique. Or if we were, at least we were the kind of clique Thom Yorke wanted to get involved in.

• Recruitment - it followed that it was the best national campaign for finding new volunteers we ever had in our group.
• Actions were straightforward and social - quizzes, parties, public meetings, film screenings and more. Stalls were properly fun if you had the right crew and a polar bear costume.
• It had national and local milestones - you could see how far you could take your MP in support of The Big Ask - and each success built momentum. This was gamification avant la lettre.
• It brought groups together - teams of volunteers going into strange and unknown parts of London to campaign was tremendous for bonding and morale.

And did I mention that we won? :)

All of this - and more besides - combined to make The Big Ask a compelling, easy-to-replicate model for grassroots climate organising. Or - if you prefer the language of marketing - an extraordinarily potent meme. It was one of two times for me  (the other being The Bee Cause) that what we've been doing as Friends of the Earth has really felt viral.

A few qualifications

Having spoken to many more staff and local group members since those marvellous days, I appreciate that it didn't feel like that for everyone. For some of you, the campaign lacked depth. For others, a concentration on climate meant less time for other issues. 

That's fine - I'm not writing this to change your mind. This was my truth as a local activist and I don't expect it to be everybody else's. Nor am I implying The Big Ask is above criticism.

But I will anticipate one possible argument by being clear that none of what I've written should be interpreted as flying the flag for parliamentary petitions. This is about impact, not specific tactics. And I could have written a similar post using Transition Towns or The Bee Cause as a case study and presented you with almost the same conclusions as I do below.

What we don't talk about when we don't talk about The Big Ask

When we leave out The Big Ask from our conversation as a movement, we don't just leave out an occasion for nostalgia, we omit an opportunity to remind ourselves what it is to be successful.

When our national campaigns and grassroots activities have the kind of characteristics I've been talking about - the straightforwardness, the sociability, the score-keeping, the forward drive and all of that - then we have the kind of political and cultural reach that environmentalism needs. It's a prerequisite of making big changes to the world and then making them stick.

That's why The Big Ask matters to me, and why, all self-celebration aside, I think it's so useful that we look back before going forward.

Working out what 'the next Big Asks' will be will be a collective endeavour. It will almost certainly be different to what has gone before, and no one person, activist or staff member - will have the whole answer. The process we're going through to achieve an organisational goal will doubtless help at a strategic level. But that's different from a campaign or a grassroots mobilisation.

Perhaps in the meantime a thousand ideas can bloom around the country and we can see which ones stick, which ones have heft.

Talking about The Big Ask - for me - means all of these ideas stay in play. 

So, let's talk.

What can Friends of the Earth offer its allies?

At the moment, I'm being asked to do a bit of outreach to people outside the Friends of the Earth grassroots. Different networks with which we might collaborate, or which we might support.

So what is it that we have to offer to allies, then?

It’s an interesting question, and one which has provided an opportunity to clarify my own thinking on this point. And I think this works whether you're thinking about us at a national or a local level.

It all starts with listening of course - establishing a rapport and common interests, understanding your potential ally and how you can help them. But for me that help then falls into three broad categories - advice, opportunities and connections.

Advice and information (reactive) which could include:

• Providing resources.
• Providing expertise directly – information on campaigns, planning, organising and the law.
• Signposting people on to other providers of information and support.

Opportunities to learn/act/reflect (proactive) which could include:

• Offering participation opportunities – whether that's practical planting projects or being part of climate mobilisation events in the run in to the UN climate talks in Paris this year.
• Training – e.g. introduction to environmental action sessions.
• Coaching or mentoring.

Connections – recognising the importance of the medium as well as the message, e.g.

• Introducing an ally to our local group or activists – if initial connection staff driven (or vice versa if not).
• Regular communication updates .
• Invite to local and national events.
• Amplifying their voice through our networks.

Meet-up press release for local groups

Here's a bit of open source activism for you on a Sunday morning. 

I found this press release template in our files the other day to send to someone launching a new local Friends of the Earth group. What I like about it firstly is that it works as well for an existing network as well as someone trying to bring people together in an area for the first time.

What I also appreciate about the wording - and props to whoever among my illustrious predecessors wrote it - is that it doesn't scare the horses. It's not asking people to do too much too soon, it just offers people the chance to get together with like minds and explore the issues. 

The release also holds out the (eminently reassuring) possibility of linking up with people who've already been campaigning and are in a position to mentor new arrivals.

So feel free to use and remix as you see fit.

Press Release - Friends of the Earth

Embargo: For immediate release, day, date, month, year (delete as appropriate)

Contact: [YOUR NAME], Friends of the Earth [location or group] – [phone number]

EARTH SEEKS FRIENDS!

Environmental group WLTM enthusiastic [location] residents for a fun, active relationship. You will be either M or F, aged between 16-99, with a GSOH and desire to save the planet. Must have positive outlook on life and enjoy action rather than words.

People who want to tackle environmental issues are being invited to an open meeting on [time] at [location], where you can:

• Find out more about Friends of the Earth local groups and campaigning
• Have your say about local environmental issues which need addressing
• Find out more about the solutions to climate change
• Meet like-minded people your age

[this next paragraph to be tweaked depending on local situation]

A number of local Friends of the Earth supporters are looking forward to meeting potential volunteers and would like as many people as possible to be involved. The group has a strong background of campaigning on local issues around [location] and further afield as well as national and global issues such as climate change.

If you cannot make it to the meeting, but would still like to be involved, we would still love to hear from you on [number] or[e-mail]..

A formula to work to in 2015?

I wrote this flip a few years back - 2011? - for the first low-key piloting of Gamechangers, which fed into what became Campaign Organisers.

It still feels like a good formula for supporting grassroots action to me (give or take the campaign expertise that comes from other teams). 

Perhaps this is our formula to work to in 2015?

What is transformational change?

The following definition of transformational change owes a lot to a meeting of Friends of the Earth Europe I attended several years ago where a paper written by the ex-Exec of FOE Scotland Duncan McClaren, was discussed.

I came across it again it in a purge of paperwork just before Christmas and it felt worth citing again at the start of the year, as a reminder of what we're ultimately trying to achieve.

By transformational change, we mean a change that is not merely an extension or improvement over the past, but a state change.

This state change is at the personal, societal and political levels

• The change is bold and compelling - not simply a better version of business-as-usual.
• It excites people and unleashes their passion and creativity.
• After the fact, you will say that we have more than a large improvement, we have a transformation.

Introduction to campaigning #2 - notes and links

On Sunday 16 November in Newcastle we ran hopefully the second of a number of 'Introduction to Campaigning with Friends of the Earth' half-day trial training sessions. Thanks to everyone who came along, to Carla for co-facilitating and to Campaign Organiser Carol for doing an excellent grounding meditation to break the ice and get us started.

Our aim was to support new and existing activists to explore campaigns and engage their community. Here's the resources we shared and used on the day. 

We also showed participants these rather spiffing videos from The Bee Cause and Schools Run On Sun campaigns.

We got four people including Carol – which is less than we had expected based on e-mail replies and Facebook. But  they were all interested in supporting a Friends of the Earth group in Newcastle, so it definitely felt like the beginning of the rebirth of the group. 

And one was the local Greenpeace rep, so there was some networking and alliance-building right there. The material fit snugly but well into the time we had, and participant feedback was very positive. 

So, we’re still looking for further opportunities to trial this session – so do get in touch if you’d like to either give it a go yourself or arrange a collaboration with me on it. 

I think one big learning point from me from Newcastle is the importance of having someone in-situ like Carol around whom others can coalesce for the future. For future trials, I’d also like to be able to guarantee 2 or 3 participants from a local area before we go ahead with additional promotion. 

We’ve been lucky in both test sessions so far in terms of just enough people coming in to make it work, but I don't want to push my luck too hard. :-)

Campaign Organisers weekend #3

Introduction to Climate Change Campaigning

Pssst? Wanna try a new training workshop? 

Here's one we made earlier.

The session plan and accompanying resources from our half-day introductory training in Coventry are now available on Campaign Hubs here or at the end of this article.

NB Campaign Hubs down due to The Great Website Ragnarok of October 2014. For now, see the links at the end of the article.

The session went well for a first attempt - we tried to fit a lot in and just about managed it. It had a really good 'feel' to it in the same way that the Campaign Organisers weekend did: open, non-didactic and fizzing with creativity.

We didn't prescribe courses of action, but people came away from it wanting to take action on Schools Run On Sun and apply renewed focus to campaigning against shale gas exploitation in Warwickshire. 

It's pretty exciting (in a geeky sort of way) thinking about the opportunity this gives us to provide further peer-to-peer and staff-led support.

Things we'd do differently next time? Have another look at the timings for the different parts, natch. And proactively approach more people to help with local promotion, sure. But nothing insurmountable.

Given that it's early days for this training, I'd be interested in hearing whether anyone else wanted to pick up and try out this session or a variant on it. All the material you need is behind the link or below. 

I'm very happy to advise and support any willing guinea pigs. :-)

Training Resources

Here's the event plan we used and some relevant resources we gave out to participants.

The starting point is - as always - the free-to-download Local Groups Handbook, which is the Friends of the Earth equivalent of a Haynes Manual for organizing at the grassroots. It has individual sections on inspiring groups, teamwork, action (including campaign planning), profile-raising, finding and keeping people and fundraising.

A Personal Story of Climate Change - Self, Us, Now: see this handout about constructing an inspiring story of your commitment to action on climate change.

Handy ‘How To’ booklets

Engaging Different Audiences
Work with Community Groups
Making Campaign Events Work
A guide to planning campaigns with nifty campaign planning template.

Jannat Hossein (hi Jannat!) has also helpfully suggested the session should also reference our guide to local groups on embracing diversity, which will help us all think about how to be as inclusive as we can be when organising in our community.

Campaign Information

Climate Change gateway page (general information)
Schools Run On Sun campaign information and briefings
Fracking and shale gas campaign information and briefings
20 Things You Need To Know About Climate Change introductory booklet