poverty

“If I am not for myself, who will be for me?

If I am only for myself, what am I?

And, if not now, when?”  –Hillel

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At the Community and Corporate Social Responsibility Conference held in Ottawa earlier this month, I along with Pamela Divinsky from the Divinsky Group, and Stephanie Michele from Social Bling, led a session on how multi-levelled collaboration can drive social change.  We picked a very complex social issue – Poverty – and charged participants to think of solutions to the various causes and effects of poverty.  The idea was to generate a shared value experience by looking at poverty through a cause and effect lens.  By having multiple stakeholders look at the issue – government, private sector and individuals – we could, in essence, develop marketable strategies that could be implemented.

The past few weeks has seen momentous change in North America's political spectrum.  From municipal elections across Canada (see Rob Ford in Toronto and Naheed Nenshi in Calgary) to the rise of the Tea Party movement in the United States.  Citizens are using their votes to voice their opinions. This leads to the question, how much time should pass before we, as a society should expect change? Read more »

I sit on several boards for a variety of charities and non-profit organizations. One of the groups that I am involved with is ChristmasFuture. What I like about them is how they collaborate with others and support the activities of organizations who are addressing some of the systemic social problems around poverty in the developing world.

The slideshow at the bottom of this post is about ChristmasFuture and Jay Baydala, their Executive Director. I share it with you for a couple of reasons, the most obvious is because I am personal engaged in the work that they do. The other reason is that this slide show is a great use of technology bridging the gap between the donor and the organization. For sure, without question this is a marketing tool. But, it is also an educational piece and an interactive storyboard. Viewers can comment, vote, share and connect with others who agree and disagree with the content and the process.

Societal fabric is created through storytelling. This is one story of many.

Enjoy the show!

Let's Talk Poverty