Place-based Approaches & Community Participation Training

with Dimitrios Papalexis and guest speaker/facilitator David Lilley: Place-based Leadership.

Human and community services have always been delivered on a place-basis. However, their massive expansion during the 20th Century came with an increased tendency to: divide different types of services into different organisations or silos; centralise decision-making; deliver services from population centres; and de-emphasise the importance of place differences and community participation.

Place-based approaches are collaborative aiming to build thriving communities in a defined geographic location. Place-based approaches are ideally characterized by partnering and shared design, stewardship and accountability for outcomes and impacts.

Place-based approaches seek to address community needs and create systemic change by bringing together efforts across the community and by harnessing the vision, resources, and opportunities of community to work towards shared long-term outcomes.

Place-based approaches are often used to respond to complex, interrelated, or challenging issues such as social issues, disadvantage, natural disasters such as the bushfires or pandemics such as Covid-19.

While many professionals from different disciplines, such as urban planning, social work, community health, public administration are involved in place-based work and deliver services, their language, assumptions, principles, and practices can vary enormously within and between these approaches.

This training will delve into place-based leadership and different ways of thinking about the nature of places themselves so we can move from a mechanical to a more effective leadership that is participatory, emancipatory, and grounded in critical reflection.

This training is suitable for professionals who engage in place-based work, community leaders and anyone else who is interested in place-based initiatives and leadership.

The training will provide you with a common reference point when it comes to understanding place, place-based leadership and how you can better collaborate to facilitate positive and sustainable people-led change.

It will equip you with the theory, tools and case studies to think about place, leadership and the key principles of place-based initiatives.

Learning outcomes:

Understand different ways of thinking about place, and why our assumptions matter.
Learn how anyone can be a place-based leader, not just those with formal authority
Get familiar with the key principles of place-based approaches.
Learn about neighborhood ecology and how different elements of communities relate to each other.
Learn practical tools and methodologies such as world café and asset mapping to increase community participation.
Learn a great tool to reflect on your place project or place of interest.
Discuss different case studies.
Network.

Where: HopeStreet Youth Centre, 130 Dowling Street, Woolloomooloo, NSW

When: Friday 11th of February, 2022

Event is catered. Please advise of any dietary requirements.

Contact: info@soul-gen.com.au

The event is open to everyone given the lift of all restrictions from the 1st of December. In the case of any additional restrictions, participants will be notified and, for inclusivity reasons, given an option between attending the training online, postponing for mid 2022 or getting refunded.

About Dimitrios

Dimitrios has spent more than 12 years in Australia and internationally working on community development and creative initiatives that seek to improve the health and wellbeing of individuals and communities. His roles have spanned the public sector, social sector, consulting, and social enterprise with experience in asset-based community development, arts, community health, appreciative inquiry, storytelling, and arts.

Dimitrios is the founder of Soulgen, he has been involved in numerous collective impacts, health, and creative initiatives in many different LGA and diverse communities and won the 2019 NSW Youth Worker of the Year Award and the Score More Foundation Award “A Cause for Applause” in 2020. You can connect with Dimitrios here or enter in contact via email: dimitrios@soul-gen.com.au

http://www.soul-gen.com.au/

About David:

David has spent 20 years working on place-based initiatives that seek to improve the health and wellbeing of individuals and communities. His roles have spanned the public sector, the social sector, academia, and consulting, with experience in public policy, community development, service coordination, social planning, place management, and collective impact.

David Lilley is a PhD candidate investigating the prioritisation of health and wellbeing in urban policy, a Senior Researcher developing a typology of place-based approaches at the Health Equity Research and Development Unit (a partnership between the University of New South Wales and Sydney Local Health District), and a freelance consultant. You can connect with David here.

Listen to a podcast episode on Place-Based Approaches with Dimitrios and David here.