We’re pleased to share that our senior community organiser Siân Lewis is appearing on the latest episode of Grounded—a podcast about how people work to change places. We know a bit about that here in Coventry and Warwickshire!
Our team of nine community organisers work across a spectrum of shifting power work. From Connecting for Good in Coventry, to hyperlocal work with Nuneaton communities, to disabled campaigners Coventry Youth Activists, and back to Coventry with the Green For All programme.
Since adding community organising to our ways of working over 20 years ago—in the run up to the global financial crisis and ensuing cuts to services brought about by austerity—we have learned that when communities work towards change together they grow powerful and resilient enough to keep challenging systems that aren’t working for them and keep improving their lives.
Siân says: “Organizing comes from challenge. It comes from people saying, I’m being pushed to my limits and I need to have a different route forward.”
Reflecting on the time and commitment the work of organising takes, she adds: “When you’re doing place based community organizing, you’re so embedded in a place, right? You know people, they trust you. And that could be really challenging to hold, because you are not only showing up as an organizer, I’m showing up as Siân.
“Community organising takes time. I know funders know this, but I don’t think they quite understand how much time it takes to build relationships, to build trust.
“You can’t do anything in a year. People aren’t going to trust you.”
Five leadership practices in communities drive change:
- Deep listening and empowering storytelling
- Building relationships
- Creating structure
- Developing strategy
- Taking action.
Our CEO Clare Wightman summarises the ultimate aim of community organising in this process: “Our ambition is to create a thriving ecosystem of regenerative, self-organised and community-led initiatives that make people feel stronger, connected and able to make change.
“The ecosystem will eventually include those with an understanding of policymaking, research and the law so that ordinary people have relationships with and support from other changemakers and their tools.
“So that their call for equity is as powerful as it can be.”
Listen to Siân’s conversation with host Anna Waldie on the podcast now.
Read the accompanying Place and Evidence blog for more about Siân, our shifting power work through community organising and the principles underpinning those methods.
Visit the Connecting for Good website to explore our city’s ecosystem of community-led change, supported by Grapevine’s community organising team.