Name: Possibility Lab - Community of Practice
Start: 0001-01-01
End: 0001-01-01
Location: National

Possibility Lab is a Community of Practice to support people working in community recovery

What might be possible if we connected together, across Australia, to learn, share and sustain ourselves as we do our important work in community recovery?

Possibility Lab was established to provide a space to learn together, workshop issues and challenges and form a supportive network with peers to explore working in community recovery.

Who is it for?

The Community of Practice professional development is tailored to people working for government, funded by government (auxiliary to government), or who have recovery in their job remit. This includes community development, community recovery or resilience roles, before or after disaster. Alumni, or those who have attended previously are welcome to attend.

'The possibility lab has been an integral part of my learning for the CRO role. The sessions provided me with a breathing space for understanding and clarity. Being able to connect and work through relevant topics with others experiencing the same role has been so valuable. It has been one of the best and most favourite parts of my role.' - Participant 2022

How does it work?

Every month there is a 90-minute community of practice session hosted via Zoom. This features a presentation or discussion around a central theme for everyone attending, as well as break out rooms where participants connect with other members in a smaller group setting.

The sessions are trusted spaces for participants to learn, raise issues, seek support, offer ideas and develop relationships with others in similar roles.

Possibility Lab sessions are based on the interest areas and issues that the group chooses to explore, which develops and adapts over time.

Hosts

Possibility Lab Community of Practice hosts bring significant experience designing and facilitating group processes and a depth of knowledge about community and disaster recovery.

Partners: Australian Institute for Disaster Resilience | Australian Red Cross | Reconstruction New South Wales | Social Recovery Reference Group

Meet the hosts

Catherine Gearing - National Consultant Disaster Recovery, Social Recovery Reference Group (Host)

Catherine is National Consultant Disaster Recovery to the Social Recovery Reference Group. Catherine supports the organisations who are members of the Social Recovery Reference Group across Australia as they collaborate to continue to grow human and social recovery and preparedness capability. This group shares policy and practice and advocates for the centrality of both individuals and community to successful recovery.

Prior to this role Catherine worked with the NSW government in recovery and with the Red Cross in Australia and internationally working in preparedness and recovery roles. She is keen to bring together people who work with communities in recovery to learn and share experiences looking at enhancing strengths based and collaborative approaches.

Sally McKay - Guest Facilitator

Sally comes from a farming background in Southern Monaro NSW, just below the snow line in the high country. She raised my family in East Gippsland near the stunning Gippsland Lakes, and now have grand kids and live in NZ.

Sally has worked across a diverse range of roles within Emergency Management for over 25 years. This has taken her to many places - primarily across Asia Pacific, working for the International Federation of Red Cross / Red Crescent, within Australia working for three levels of Government and in NZ with the Civil Defense. Sally have been responsible for managing all aspects of recovery being social, infrastructure, economic and the natural environment.

Sally is committed to social justice principles, whilst establishing programs which utilise a ‘strengths based’ and a ‘community centred’ recovery approach. She is looking forward to meeting you all!

Peter Pigott – Guest Facilitator

Peter is an experienced host and facilitator with an interest in good participatory practice and the sort of engagement and collaboration that keeps the community (and those who make up that community) at the centre. Peter worked for many years as a Landcare facilitator before moving into the disaster recovery and resilience space. He is fascinated with the concept of resilience and how it can be applied to support healthy functioning communities and ecosystems. Peter is passionate about supporting people to see what they already have before they explore what they need next. As one of the original design team for the Possibility Lab, Peter has witnessed this network of recovery practitioners show up again and again for their communities. Peter brings a passion for building the capacity of communities of practice and exploring what becomes possible when people come together to learn, connect and support one another.

Past Possibility Lab sessions

Session 1 - 28 June 2020 - Disaster Recovery – Dynamics of collective disruption and your work

Session 2 - 25 August 2020 - Exploring Community-led Recovery

Session 3 - 22 September 2020 - Ritual/Anniversary, Symbol/Memorial

In this session, guest speakers from the Red Cross and Creative Recovery Network discussed the topic of organising anniversary events. They provided short practice-based examples, and lessons learned. The session featured stories from Northern NSW after 2019, and Victoria after 2009.

Resources:

‘In remembrance: post-disaster rituals and symbols’ by Anna Eyre, Australian Journal of Emergency Management Spring 1999

Session 4 - 27 October 2020 - Monitoring and Evaluation in Disaster Recovery

This session focused on monitoring and evaluation in the recovery context. Linda Hygate, guest speaker, offered examples and tips for how best to do this at the local government level.

Resources:

National Disaster Recovery Monitoring and Evaluation Database

The Database provides people a list of disaster recovery outcomes that might be relevant to their work, and then lets them search for examples of:
- activities that can lead to these outcomes
- indicators that can show progress towards this outcome
- prior evaluation reports (and similar resources) that have assessed this outcome.
Users can narrow their search using various filters, letting them focus only on certain types of disaster (e.g. earthquake, bushfire), geographies, date ranges and types of indicator (e.g. crime, mental health, tourism).
The database was created in 2016 to support implementation of the new National Monitoring and Evaluation Framework for Disaster Recovery Programs. This Framework has since been updated (May 2018), and the database is now managed by the AIDR.

Session 5 - 25 November 2020 - Open Space Technology

This session focused on topics participants had requested – including:

Making the invisible visible – how to use mind maps to create shared understanding
Trees on private property

Session 6 - 19 January 2021 - Working with communities in conflict after disaster with guest Chuck Peters

This session featured guest Chuck Peters, from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, US. Chuck was involved in a number of significant community boards in the Cedar Rapids community prior to the Cedar Rapids floods in 2008. He was immersed in the post-disaster recovery, took a year off in 2010 and then returned to the community and influenced a number of social/collective initiatives in order to progress the recovery. Chuck provided insights into some of the deeper invisible aspects that underpin our understanding of community and therefore how we imagine where we might go collectively; even how and when that might happen.

Participants were posed a question before the session: what is the story that your community tells itself, about what is about?

Resources:

Article: Cedar Rapids flood recovery 10 years after 2008 disaster
Video: Cedar Rapids sees losses and gains from the flood of 2008
Book: The Way of Generativity: from dissonance to to resonance, Benjamin Smith, Chuck Peters and Nathan Senge 2017.
Slides: Communities in post-disaster recovery: working with conflict in and between
Document: A perspective on the effects of stress on decision making following disaster, East Gippsland Primary Care Partnership

Session 7 - 23 February 2021 - Asset Based Community Development with guest Michelle Dunscombe

This session featured Michelle Dunscombe from the Jeder Institute. She spoke to working with communities through an asset based approach.

Michelle Dunscombe is based in rural Australia and is an enthusiastic community development practitioner, facilitator and trainer. Michelle has experience working with disaster affected communities across Australia and internationally, happily sharing her lived and professional experience in disaster preparedness and recovery using ABCD principles and practices. Michelle is a Fairley Fellow, ABCD Institute Faculty member, the Vice President of ABCD Asia Pacific, and a member of the International Association for Community Development (IACD) with a wealth of experience working with communities and community organizations.

Resources:

Session 8 - 23 March 2021 - Preparation tools to assist you to host a conversation

This session focused on providing participants with the skills required to design a conversation. It was facilitated by Peter Pigott and David Newell.

Participants were posed a question before the session: How can we bring purposeful conversations to our work in recovery?

Resources:

Session 9 - 27 April 2021 - Working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Communities with Tim Muirhead and Grant Paulson

This session focused on working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Communities. It was facilitated by Tim Muirhead and Grant Paulson.

Participants were posed two questions before the session:

What is something you wonder about, or feel uncomfortable about, in striving for effective engagement between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people?

And/or one thing that stuck with you from the pre-reading.

Resources:

Session 10 - 25 May 2021 - Community process in disaster with guest Dr Rob Gordon

This session focused on what participants noticed helps their work, and what is challenging. Guest speaker, Dr Rob Gordon, discussed community process in disaster.

Dr Rob Gordon is a clinical psychologist and disaster trauma expert who has worked with communities after disasters since 1983 Ash Wednesday fires in Victoria. He takes a sociological perspective on the impacts of disasters.

Resources:

Session 11 - 22 June 2021 - Reflecting on the last 12 months: What is important to know about the work you do? Reflections of the group with guests Helen Goodman and Bob Stilger

This session was a reflection on the past 12 months. Participants were asked draw on lessons to date, and to think on whether there is something that would serve them or others into the future. Helen Goodman and Bob Stilger joined as guest speakers.

Helen Goodman who has worked with communities, using developmental approaches to practice and research and was involved for 3 years after the 2009 bushfires as Recovery Hub Captain for the Kinglake Recovery Hub. Helen co-authored Place-based and Community-led report which brought together people across sectors to have conversations about innovations, struggles, learnings and challenges. Helen brings powerful insights in regard to what happens in and between organisations.

Bob Stilger, the founder of New Stories, and author of AfterNow which for anyone in disaster recovery is a riveting and insightful read. Bob is at the leading edge of thinking and practice around ground-up community empowerment and change and how this might be supported, particularly in times of rapid upheaval.

Participants were posed a question prior to the session: What does it mean to do Community Recovery/Development work after a disaster?

Resources:

Session 12 - 27 July 2021 - Exploring - Where to from here for the ‘thoughts’ in our shared document and the Possibility Lab?

This session was a reflection and review of the first 12 months of the Possibility Lab. Participants were asked to consider the value of the sessions for their work, and discussed what Possibility Lab would look like, and what it would offer, going forward.

Participants were posed a series of questions prior to the session:

What would serve you and the profession into the future?
Who might this be for and how might it be offered and structured?
What do we imagine what might make this possible in the current environment?
How best to use the insights we have collected in our confidential document?

Given this, what process should we use to honour the confidential nature in which this data was captured?

To support the discussion, the group used the Community of Practice evaluation report.

Session 13 - 24 August 2021 - Coordination, Cooperation and Collaboration

This session focused on the question: how can we enable better agency coordination and collaboration when we see overlap and confusion arising in communities?

Participants were posed two questions prior to the session:

Are you seeing community confusion arising in regard to the supports agencies are offering?
What are you observing and what questions does this raise for you?

Resources:

The Co-production Journey to Community-led Recovery

Session 14 - 28 September 2021 - In Conversation together about Community-led Recovery – with special guest Steve Pascoe

Steve Pascoe has over 30 years experience in disaster management at local, state, and national levels, and is passionate about community based disaster management. In 2019, Steve’s small community of Strathewen and his own property were devastated by Victoria’s Black Saturday bushfires. In Strathewen, 80 out of 100 houses were destroyed and 29 people died. Within a week of the event, a small group of Strathewen community leaders (including Steve) met to discuss how Strathewen could lead its own recovery. Through an extensive process of community involvement, the Strathewen Community Recovery Association (Incorporated) was established, with a 12 person committee being elected through a formal process. Over the next 5 years, the Association undertook strategic planning, established working groups to address key needs, negotiated with government and recovery agencies, and managed a large budget. Steve was deputy chair of SCRA for 3 years, chair of a number of working groups, as well as chair of the 10^th Anniversary Working group.

Steve is passionate about community based disaster recovery and has worked in many communities to facilitate community based planning for bushfires and other disasters. He is a founding member of Disaster Recovery Advisors and Mentors Australia, an organised volunteer group, auspiced and supported be Australian Red Cross. Following the 2019 Black Summer bushfires, Steve mentored a group of community leaders in Mallacoota to discuss and initiate a community led process for the recovery of Mallacoota. Since then, he has provided mentoring support to other disaster affected communities, local and state government recovery practitioners, and supported East Gippsland Shire Council’s rebuilding workshop series in bushfire affected communities.

Steve is a founding member Disaster Recovery Advisors and Mentors Australia, which is facilitated by Australian Red Cross.

Participants were asked to reflect on: if Community-led recovery is seen on a spectrum between ‘wholly’ community-led (on the left) and ‘wholly’ government led (local, state, commonwealth) (on the right) – where along this spectrum do you think the communities in your local area would sit?

Resources:

Session 15 - 26 October 2021 - Jacqui Bell from the Foundation for Rural and Regional Renewal (FRRR)

Jacqui Bell from the Foundation for Rural and Regional Renewal was the guest speaker in this session and shared her passion for working with communities towards disaster resilience. Jacqui provided her deep knowledge and appreciation for working with communities in the sometimes-challenging space of grant making and supporting community-led approaches.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session: As resources and grants from philanthropic groups and government arrive or take root in the communities we work with, what are we noticing now about how this is being carried out? What roles can we play in this?

Resources:

Foundation for Rural and Regional Renewal

Session 16 - 23 November 2021

This was the last session for 2021. The session touched whether there were any emerging issues that the group would like to explore.

It then focused on the question: Imagine you are talking to yourself at week 1 of your working role in disaster recovery. What advice would you like to pass on to your future self?

Resources:

The co-production journey to community-led recovery

Session 17 - 22 February 2022 - Personal Frameworks for Recovery, Lou Mitchell in conversation with Anne Leadbeater, OAM

The session focused on what underpins communities in recovery practice. Anne Leadbeater OAM was the guest speaker for this session and presented on personal frameworks for recovery.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

We know community recovery takes years, 5-10 years for many who have been impacted. So how do we sustain ourselves as community workers in this. More than the substantial ‘doing’ - how is our ‘being’ in this work?

Resources:

Session 18 - 22 March 2022 - Local Government Recovery Planning for COVID, The Possibility Lab in conversation with Kirsten Jenkins, Maroondah City Council and Phoebe Quinn, Melbourne University

This session explored what one local government has done in its planning for recovery from COVID alongside a University doing community recovery work. Guest speakers Kirsten Jenkins and Phoebe Quinn presented a case study on how the Maroondah Council used the Recovery Capitals to produce the Maroondah COVID-19 Recovery Plan.

Resources:

Session 19 - 26 April 2022 - Connecting across continents – Connecting across continents –Conversation with Community Recovery Manager, Deb Borsos and Stephanie Masun on cumulative community led recovery.

This session explored how communities are impacted by cumulative events. The session featured guest speakers Deb Borsos Community Recovery Manager in British Columbia) and Stephanie Masun (Emergency Program Manager for the Cariboo Regional District) from Canada. They spoke to their experiences with wildfires, floods and landslips, and how community led initiatives from their wildfires recovery were re-activated and translated to the flood recovery.

Participants were posed the following question prior to the session:

What might I think about when starting in a new role working with communities impacted by cumulative or cascading disaster?

Resources:

Session 20 - 24 May 2022 - Conversations about recovery assessments and how it was used to reset the recovery in East Gippsland

This session focused on recovery assessments approaches and / tools, utilising an example from the recent work in East Gippsland for the bushfire recovery titled: Recovery Reset - social recovery assessment.

The session featured guest speakers:

Janette Schimleck, Coordinator Recovery Governance and Coordination, East Gippsland Shire Council
Kate Roy
Sally McKay, Recovery Specialist

This social recovery assessment was undertaken from late Jan to April 2022, led by Council with Bushfire Recovery Victoria (BRV) under the governance arrangements of the Social Recovery Working Group. This Assessment is designed to establish a stronger evidence-based understanding of the remaining social wellbeing recovery needs and the agencies servicing them in East Gippsland from the 2019/2020 Black Summer Bushfires. This process then supports advocating for services required to meet social wellbeing recovery needs.

The Recovery Reset assessment comprised of:

Survey – to a broad range of social recovery support services
Focus groups discussions with social service networks and Community Recovery Committee members
Interviews with key social recovery agencies and organisations

The Assessment to date is providing insights into how communities will be impacted by the cessation of social recovery services, what are the most pressing social service recovery needs, and where delivery gaps remain.

Participants were posed the following question prior to the session:

What tools and / or approaches might I utilise when trying to undertake a recovery assessment – needs and capacities
Who are the key partners and stakeholders to undertake a recovery assessment

Resources:

FEMA - Part 2. Recovery Planning: Disaster Impact and Unmet Needs Assessment Kit. These resources for Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) grantees provide a process for identifying and prioritizing critical unmet needs for long-term community recovery
Review of Post Disaster Recovery Needs Assessment and Methodologies - UNDP, including Overview of Recovery Needs Assessment Methodologies
PRE & RAPID: Community Impact Assessment for Disaster Recovery - Centre for Disaster Studies James Cook University
IFRC Recovery programming guidance 2012.
New Zealand National Emergency Management Agency, NZ Recovery Toolkit.
Guidelines for community participation in disaster recovery.

Session 21 - 28 June 2022 - Person centered approaches in emergency management for people who have disabilities

The guest facilitator for this session was Michelle Villeneuve, Associate Professor, Deputy Director, Centre for Disability Research and Policy, The University of Sydney. The session focused on the research on person-centred capability approaches to inclusive disaster risk reduction in Australia (2015 – now) undertaken by The University of Sydney and partners.

Participants were posed the following question prior to the session:

How can you, when undertaking recovery planning:

Provide person-centred resources, support, and advocacy for people with disability during recovery?
Assist recovery support services to understand and respond to the extra support needs of people who have disabilities?
Identify who takes responsibility for the extra support needs of people with disabilities in recovery approaches?

Resources:

Session 22 - 26 July 2022 - Aboriginal culture and healing in disaster recovery approaches

This session focused on Aboriginal culture and healing in disaster recovery approaches. The discussion was based upon the work by Bushfire Recovery Victoria, and the organisations implantation of an Aboriginal Culture and Healing recovery pillar following the 2019/20 Black Summer Bushfires in Victoria.

The guest presenter for this session was Sam Kirby, Recovery Coordinator (Aboriginal Culture and Healing) – Northeast Victoria, Bushfire Recovery Victoria:

My name is Sam Kirby, I am a proud Wiradjuri, Yorta Yorta, Barapa Barapa, Mutthi Mutthi, Gungarri descendant living on Wiradjuri Country in Albury NSW. I have spent the last 12 plus years working in Aboriginal community development in the fields of Natural Resource Management, Land Rights, Local Government, Cultural Heritage and Education. During my career I have had a strong focus on implementing cultural capacity building for government agencies to better align with Aboriginal/First Nations community values and protocols.

Sam spoke about:

Why BRV established the recovery pillar of Aboriginal Culture and Healing
What has been undertaken to date for this pillar and working with communities
The Aboriginal and Cultural recovery Strategy that Victoria is developing

Participants were posed the following question prior to the session:

How can you, when undertaking recovery planning:

provide resources, support, and advocacy for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in recovery approaches?
assist recovery support services to understand and respond to the needs of these people?
identify the Aboriginal agencies / groups within your communities which can take on leadership and support roles for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in planning, preparedness, response and recovery work?

Resources:

Stories of Bushfire Recovery – Aboriginal Culture and Healing - Read the stories of seven Aboriginal organisations to learn more about their recovery journey after the 2019-20 bushfires
Disasters within disasters: it’s time to address entrenched Aboriginal inequality | Bhiamie Williamson
Indigenous Peoples and Recovery Capitals

Session 23 - 30 August 2022 - The establishment, role and work of the Community Recovery Committees (CRCs) in East Gippsland

The session focused on the establishment, role and work of the Community Recovery Committees (CRCs) in East Gippsland following the 2019/20 Black Summer Bushfires.

The guest facilitator for this session was Eva Grunden, Coordinator Community Recovery, East Gippsland Shire Council:

Eva Grunden grew up in the small community of Mallacoota in East Gippsland, in a musical family and was immersed in an art’s rich environment through her involvement in the renowned Mallacoota Easter Arts Festival for over 25 years. Eva worked as a Kindergarten teacher, children’s services manager, and also worked on music and visual arts projects in remote indigenous communities.

Eva started work with Council in 2019 as the Community Programs Coordinator. She was visiting her parents in Mallacoota when the Black Summer Bushfires approached. She accepted the call from her managers to go to the community hall to support the coordination of the assembly area. This evolved into Eva being the Council representative in the emergency response, relief and recovery for Mallacoota for 18 months following this significant fire event. Eva then took up the position as Coordinator of the Community Recovery Team in Council, supporting the team who were working closely with the Community Recovery Committees and impacted communities across the region.

Eva will spoke to the group about:

Establishing the CRCs
The community planning approaches undertaken by the CRCs
CRCs development of projects and outcomes achieved; and
The role of the appointed Place Managers within Council, and their support for these CRCs.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

When setting up a recovery programme:

What structures and systems best enable community members to work together to plan for their recovery?
What processes can ensure those people who become members of these structures, are representative of their communities?
What does a co-designed community recovery planning process look like?

Resources:

Session 24 - 27 September 2022 - Recovery is built on effective communication – Conversations with Rebecca Riggs an Emergency Media and Public Affairs (EMPA) Board member and crisis communication and disaster recovery specialist

The guest facilitator for this session was Rebecca Riggs who is an Emergency Media and Public Affairs (EMPA) Board member and crisis communication and disaster recovery specialist.

Rebecca shared some of her experiences in working with impacted communities, councils and organisations in recovery and the important task of effective communication. She discussed what she has observed and learnt through her experiences, and how EMPA is working to lead and support the evolution of effective communication and community engagement before, during and after emergencies.

Bio: Rebecca Riggs is specialist communicator, lead trainer and managing consultant. Her work includes development of plans, systems, policy and procedural documentation; training in crisis and emergency strategic communication, crisis/ emergency communication manager, meeting facilitator, spokesperson, and creator of narratives in crisis and disaster. She has lectured at Universities in Queensland and NSW and her research project - Understanding Resistance to Disaster Messaging, with Dr. Lynda Shevellar (lecturer in Community Development at The University of Queensland) has been published in AJEM

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

How might you navigate the information overload that is often experienced after disasters and during recovery?
Is there a ‘source of truth’ when communicating in recovery?
Who are the key partners and stakeholders who can enhance and improve two-way communication in recovery?

Resources:

Session 25 - 25 October 2022 - Preparedness for people in recovering communities

The session this month focused on preparedness for people in recovering communities. Guest speaker John Richardson spoke to the challenge of balancing preparedness activities with recovery activities.

Bio: John Richardson has worked to improve the outcomes of people experiencing disaster in a role of roles over the past 25 years. For a period in the 2000s he was the State Recovery Manager in Victoria, before getting the opportunity to use patterns observed in people’s recovery experience to design the unique preparedness program for Australian Red Cross, Emergency Rediplan. He has a Geography degree and was a Registered Nurse for 10 years. He’s also an Honorary Fellow in Public Health at the University of Melbourne, where he’s been involved in the ground-breaking Beyond Bushfires research project.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

When has the call come for more preparedness activities in the communities you are working with?
How can you balance the need to motivate people to prepare, without using strategies that might trigger people and not result in a positive outcome?
What are good, sensitive activities you are seeing in the communities you are working in?

Resources:

Emergency Rediplan Comprehensive Guide | Australian Red Cross
When it comes to preparing for disaster there are 4 distinct types of people. Which one are you? | Agathe Randrinarisoa and John Richardson, The Conversation
Three litres of water | John Richardson
Human Biases and Under-preparedness | Howard Kunreuther

Session 26 - 22 November 2022 - Reflecting on the year 2022

About:

This session was an opportunity to come together and reflect on the past year.

Possibility Lab member and guest facilitator Pete Pigott took participants through the ‘The co-production journey to community-led recovery’ to reflect on the recovery journey with communities’.

Participants were asked to: Imagine you are talking to yourself at week 1 of your working role in disaster recovery. What advice would you pass on to your future self?

Participants discussed the co-production journey, where they were in their personal recovery journey and looked at next steps forward.

Resources:

Phoenix Australia – Disaster Self Care for Leaders
IFRC Psychosocial Centre – Video Self-care Exercises and resources for Caring for volunteers and staff
“ALL RIGHT” campaign developed after the Canterbury Earthquake disaster and the wellbeing at work toolkit
Lifeline – Reflect, Replenish and restore Corporate training
Social Recovery Reference Group

Session 27 - 28 February 2023 - Nimble and tailored approaches to community engagement in disaster resilience

In this session, guest speakers Melinda Brooks and Jeremy Hillman shared with us some examples from the ground as well as some practical tips and methods for connecting with and supporting our disaster impacted communities. The guest speakers are both from NSW and have worked in disaster events supporting recovery over the last decade.

All disasters are different and their impacts on communities and individuals also differ widely. We know that providing space for impacted communities to seek information, services and support is vital to their recovery but it’s a huge challenge to reach everybody, especially in more remote and isolated areas.

Some of the questions we’ll be talked about during this month’s Possibility Lab, included: What are some of the different ways to engage people in disaster recovery? How do we create safe and welcoming spaces? How do we connect with people who may not be comfortable accessing or accepting government support? What roles can councils and community leaders play in facilitating all of this?

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

How do you create spaces that are welcoming to all and reflective of community?
How might you organise a community meeting when you don’t know the answers to the questions and are concerned about the communities frustration?
How can we influence the social media space when there’s so much to do?

Resources:

Session 28 - 28 March 2023 - Talking with Kate Brady about the value of connections in supporting our recovery work

Working in community recovery has sometimes been described as 'the best and the worst job'. The highs are high, but it can be an exhausting and gruelling role. This is more amplified if you don’t have the connection to help in the sometimes challenging work.

Kate Brady is a National Recovery Advisor for the Red Cross and a Research Fellow in the Child & Community Wellbeing Unit at the University of Melbourne School of Population and Global Health. Over the past decade Kate has worked in disaster recovery operations, programming, training and resource development. Kate's work has had a significant influence on State and National emergency management policy and has an international profile in collective trauma, risk and resilience and disaster recovery program evaluations. Her research focuses on what people find helpful and unhelpful after disasters.

In this session, Kate talked to the formal and informal connections you need to navigate the smooth sailing and choppy waters of disaster recovery.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

Who are the important connections for you in your work?
Who might be able to support you further in your work? Could this be through academia, the private sector or a variety of community groups?
Who can you reach out to when things get different to navigate or emotionally tough?

Resources:

Session 29 - 18 April 2023 - Disaster recovery governance and influencing political decision makers

In this session, Sally McKay shared with us her advice on the political nous you need to be able to work within recovery governance arrangements and influence political decision makers.

Sally has a breadth of experience in senior roles across Australia, the Asia Pacific and New Zealand working in disaster recovery. Most recently Sally worked as the Tonga Operations Manager for IFRC.

Sally talked to her experience of significant disaster events, specifically the new governance structures that were established, the political appointments that were made, and the decision making that shifted as a result. Sharing with the group what work for her within these new governance arrangements, and how she was able to influence the political decision-making process.

Key points of discussion were the impact of decisions that are made and publicly revealed before recovery practitioners have the change to influence these decisions; and the difficulty of building relationships, and therefore influence, when you are limited to short-term funding.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

Decisions are often made for and by those with the most voice and apparent power.
Have you mapped the political decision-making process within the recovery you are working in?
Who has the most voice and apparent power in the recovery you are working in?

Resources:

Session 30 - 23 May 2023 - Social capital in disaster recovery and resilience with Professor Daniel Aldrich

This month we heard from Professor Daniel Aldrich on the critical role of social capital in rebuilding both the infrastructure and the ties that are the foundation of any community.

During the session, Professor Aldrich shared his international learnings on what he has seen are the key factors of social capital in disaster affected communities and how these can enhance local recovery and future resilience.

‘Social capital’ refers to the connections, reciprocity and trust among people and groups. There are three types of social capital: bonding (strong ties between similar people e.g. family and friends), bridging (looser ties between a broader range of people, often cutting across race, gender and class) and linking (ties connecting people with those in power, such as decision-makers).

Source: Szreter S, Woolcock M. Health by association? Social capital, social theory, and the political economy of public health. International Journal of Epidemiology. 2004;33(4):650–67

Professor Daniel Aldrich, Director of Resilience Studies programs, Northeastern University

Professor Aldrich received his Ph.D. and M.A. in political science from Harvard University, an M.A. from the University of California at Berkeley, and his B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His research into social capital in the disaster context has been funded by grants from the Abe Foundation, IIE Fulbright Foundation, the National Science Foundation, the Reischauer Institute at Harvard University, the Weatherhead Centre for International Affairs, and Harvard’s Centre for European Studies. He has spent more than four years conducting fieldwork on the importance of social capital before, during and after disaster in Japan, India and France.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

Are you aware of how the three elements of social capital (bonding, bridging and linking) are supporting your communities in their recovery or resilience?

Resources:

Session 31 - 6 June 2023 - Talking with Dr Rob Gordon about 'Social Process Theory' in community recovery

In the June Possibility Lab, we heard from Dr Rob Gordon OAM on the 'Social Process Theory' in community recovery.

During this discussion, Dr Gordon described the frequently occurring experiences that people, groups and communities may have during their recovery from disaster. Explaining how these behaviours are driven by the inevitable reactions people have to highly disturbing and unusual experiences, and the changes these cause to the brain, personality, social attachments and consequently to the social system.

Dr Gordon demonstrated how an understanding of these commonalities of experience during recovery, can allow recovery staff to anticipate what is likely to unfold as recovery progresses, and intervene to mitigate the destructive aspects while promoting the resilient aspects.

Dr Rob Gordon, Clinical Psychologist and Disaster Recovery Pioneer

Dr Gordon is a clinical psychologist and disaster recovery pioneer who, since the Ash Wednesday fires of 1983, has dedicated his career to supporting communities and emergency service workers in recovery post disaster. His kindness, generosity and expertise were recognised with a Medal of the Order of Australia in 2021.

Participants were posed the following questions prior to the session:

Have you read and considered Rob’s “Social Process Theory” and how it applies to the people, groups, and communities you are working with in recovery?

Have you observed and / or experienced peoples’ behaviours who were isolated and didn’t have communication for different periods of time during and following the disaster event. Did you observe any differences in how these people reacted to the same event?

Have you witnessed conflict emerging across the groups you are working with - can you think of examples?

Further Resources

Community Recovery Session - Dr Rob Gordon

Communities In Disaster – explaining the “Social Process Theory” – Department of Communities, Queensland | Communities in Disaster

Session 32 - 25 July 2023 - What conversations do we, as a community of practice, need to be having now for our sustained and successful work in disaster recovery?

Each month, the community of practice gathers to hear from experts in recovery and to learn and make sense of how this expertise applies to the group's situations. In doing so, the group answer the Possibility Lab calling question: What might be possible if we connected together, across Australia, to learn, share and sustain ourselves as we do our important work in community recovery?

During this session, the community of practice explored the topics, issues and questions that are important to them in their work in recovery. The group did this by using participatory practices that draw from the Art of Hosting and Harvesting Conversations that Matter suite of processes and practices. Participants were invited to host conversations in small groups, while others participated in one or more of these conversations based on their needs and interests.

Peter Pigott, co-host of the Possibility Lab, hosted the session. Peter is a freelance facilitator who after 15 years working in the natural resource management and community space as a Landcare Facilitator with the NSW Government, was seconded into working in Recovery following the Black Summer Fires. In his recovery work with the NSW Government Peter worked with councils, communities and individuals and is committed to building understanding and capacity in community centered, generative ways of working. He has trained Community Recovery Officers in NSW and participated in the creation of the Possibility Lab and other work to support recovery practitioners working locally with their communities. He is passionate about community engagement, working well in complexity, and looking after self and others in the process.

Further Resources

Overview of Open Space

Session 33 - 29 August 2023 - Hawkesbury model for building partnerships with the community sector to connect, prepare and support high-risk groups in the community.

In this session we looked at the work that has been undertaken over the past four years in the Hawkesbury area, to build community resilience through the use of disaster preparedness initiatives. This work was undertaken before, during and in the recovery phases of the 2021 and 2022 floods.

Through use of a case study, our guest speakers Meagan, Madeleine and Jessica described their experiences and learnings building partnerships between state and local government, emergency services and the community sector. Specifically, their presentation outlined work undertaken with long term residents of caravan parks (and the park managers) in the Hawkesbury area. Assisting them to be more informed, connected, prepared and supported in response to, and recovery from, flooding.

Discussed was how the group have worked collaborative to:

Understand the local context and identify the groups and partnerships needed to build community resilience.
Identify those who are living in and / or operating caravan parks, that are most at risk of the consequences of flooding within the Hawkesbury catchment.
Connect key stakeholders enabling them to share information, learn from each other and explore options.
Provide the skills and knowledge required to build the capabilities of key partners to take on new roles and responsibilities.
Drive focused initiatives that address the needs of those identified as most at risk.

Meagan Ang, Community Programs Coordinator, Hawkesbury City Council

Meagan's position at the Council focusses on sector development and support for the Hawkesbury local government area. she has extensive experience in the Home and Community Care Services sector, and is Board Secretary and Public Officer for Peppercorn who provide community services to people in the Hawkesbury local government area.

Madeleine Dignam, Community Outreach Program Manager, Infrastructure NSW

Madeleine is a highly experienced, passionate and values-driven community and stakeholder engagement practitioner with over 25 year's experience across state and federal government and the community sector. She is a strategic thinker, partnership builder and collaborator and is passionate about creating social change that is built on the principles of inclusion, equity and social justice.

Jessica Innes, Chief Executive Officer, Peppercorn Services

Jessica has extensive experience in the human services sector. Specifically, she is skilled in quality assurance, social services, program evaluation, case management, tender writing and change management.

Participants were posed the following questions:

What are the groups or sectors that are identified as being at the highest risk to disasters in your community and how well are they prepared?
Do you have any insights into the demographics of people who live long term in the caravan parks in your area? How do these compare to the ABS Census data? Vehicle ownership: Of all caravan park households, 29% had no car on Census night 1996, compared to 12% of households in the total population.”

Further Reading:

Hawkesbury specific

Broader information

Session 34 - 26 September 2023 - Talking with Tracy Reid and Fiona Beckwith about how the community guided allocations of recovery funding.

In this session, the Possibility Lab examined the collaborative efforts of Yarra Ranges Council and the Bendigo Bank's Community Enterprise Foundation, to amplify community voices following the severe weather event that struck Victoria's Dandenong Ranges on June 9, 2021. This event left a trail of destruction, rendering 79 homes uninhabitable and causing the downfall of tens of thousands of trees, which obstructed roads and disrupted telephone and power infrastructure. Consequently, a multitude of residents found themselves without power, phone, and internet services, and many faced the challenge of dealing with non-functional water and septic systems.

After the event, an allocation of funding was earmarked for the region to aid in the community's recovery efforts. Guided by the core tenet of community-driven recovery, the Yarra Ranges Council took the initiative to establish four Local Advisory Committees throughout the area. These committees were entrusted with the pivotal responsibility of disbursing the allocated funds to community-driven projects crafted to support the region in its journey to recovery. Throughout this process, the Bendigo Bank's Community Enterprise Foundation played a crucial role by safeguarding the funds in trust and offering invaluable mentoring to the committees.

During their presentation Tracey and Fiona described:

How the opportunity was established
How community members guided funding allocations
The systems that were established to do this, and
What participants may need to consider if adopting a similar approach.

Tracey Reid, Community Recovery Committees Coordinator, Yarra Ranges Council

Tracey Reid is the Community Recovery Committees Coordinator with Yarra Ranges Council. Tracey has extensive experience in the design, delivery and evaluation of community participation and engagement programs in the local government and not for profit sectors. She also has a strong commitment to facilitating deliberative decision-making processes with the goal of implementing systems change.

Fiona Beckwith, Manager Appeals and Donors, Bendigo Bank

Fiona Beckwith is the Manager for Appeals and Donors for the Bendigo Bank’s Community Enterprise Foundation. Her remit includes the Banks fundraising strategies, the response to natural disasters and over the last 3 years Fiona has been responsible for distributing $50 million into Australian Communities for natural disaster recovery.

Participants were posed the following questions:

Do you know of other examples where disaster affected people were asked to guide / support / direct disaster recovery funding?
What would be the challenges for your local arrangements in establishing an opportunity for this to occur – and how could those challenges be overcome?

Further Reading:

PowerPoint Slides and Video:

Session 35 - 24 October 2023 - Emergency and collaboration in recovery: who's doing what where?

During this session of the Possibility Lab, participants examined the question: what is possible for our work in recovery when we know who’s who in the zoo and what they do?

Louise Mitchell, previous national consultant with the SRRG and founder of the Possibility Lab, joined us. Louise was one of the external supports to the recovery efforts in the Bega Valley Shire, helping to set up some of the Recovery Network structures including the Health and Wellbeing Network and the Community Development Network.

Drawing on Louise's experience, participants had the opportunity to reflect on their own experience of community recovery work, the need for working well together and processes and structures that might be useful for multi-agency collaboration. Examples from Bega Valley Shire during the recovery after the 2019/20 bushfires, brought to life some of the processes used to work together. Particular attention was paid to the ways recovery practitioners set up their 'working together' to serve communities the best they can.

Louise Mitchell

Louise is a PhD candidate and has been a recovery professional educator and practitioner for 20+ years. As a regional recovery manager and when National Consultant to SRRG, she actively partnered and networked with all levels of government, not-for-profits, universities and private providers, along with community leaders and volunteers, enabling collective insights into progressing the field. She has a passionate interest in community wellbeing and connection, public participation in decision-making and understanding the organisational interactions contributing to the complexity of this space. Louise is a facilitator prepared by the Centre for Courage & Renewal, with skills in group facilitation and design of dialogue spaces. She feels a great sense of belonging on Dja Dja Wurung country and the community of Woodend, Victoria where she lives.

Participants were posed the following questions:

What has your experience of 'working together' been in recovery?
What have been the conditions when collaboration has been both fruitful (outcomes) and nourishing (experience)?
Have structures (like committees or other structures) assisted?
How have you been able to build relationships and relational trust in groups that you are part of
How do you think it is possible in recovery work to create collaborative work environments where we work well with and trust others in groups?

Further Reading:

Session 36 - 28 November 2023 - Resilience: more than a word

Every day, we are hearing about resilience and exploring ways in which we can support others to become more resilient. It’s also possible that you have experienced people who don’t like the word and start to switch off when resilience is raised. It is also highly likely that in your daily recovery work, you are seeing the variety of ways that people and systems show (or don’t show) resilience.

The Australian Resilience Centre and Stockholm Resilience Centre have spent time and energy understanding resilience at both an academic and practical level. In November’s Possibility Lab, we are going to hear from you and explore what resilience means to us through reflection and conversation around a simple (but not simplistic) definition of resilience.

“…it is more useful to think about resilience as being dynamic over time, responding to disruptions while focused on staying within a desired ‘safe operating zone’ (SOZ) or returning to that zone when pushed outside. That ‘zone’ shifts over time as does the context it is embedded in. The SOZ for a young family might look very different to that of an elderly person and both will differ over time as their lives progress and as the societies they live in change. The same can be said for an ecosystem adjusting to a changing climate or for an organisation recovering from a major natural disaster for example. Within that zone, sometimes life can just track along in Persistence mode, making small adjustments and coping with day to day events, at other times, in the face of larger disruptions some deliberate Adaptive action is required to stay in that zone. If that adaptive action is not sufficient to stay in the zone and things are heading to the boundary of the safe zone (sometimes called a threshold) or there is a desire to get into a different safe operating zone, then more substantive action - Transformative - will be required.” (Australian Resilience Centre, 2023, https://www.ausresilience.com.au/resilience-thinking)

Peter Pigot

Peter is fascinated with the concept of resilience and how it can be applied to support healthy functioning communities and ecosystems. Peter’s first deep dive into resilience thinking and resilience practice was in 2013 when Australian Resilience Centre’s Paul Ryan trained a group of NSW Catchment Management Authority staff in a process that would guide the development of the next 10 year Catchment Action Plan. Recently, he has been working with farmers in NSW exploring how farm businesses can become more resilient and ready for the future. Farmers are an audience who display many traits and capacities that support resilience but are often told they need to be more resilient. Peter is passionate about supporting people to see what they already have before they explore what they need next. Drawing on appreciative inquiry and using strength based approaches, Peter will host us in conversations about resilience to discover more about what it means for us, our systems and the communities we work with at this time.

Participants were posed the following questions:

How do I currently define resilience, for myself and others?
What am I noticing about my own, and others’, capacity to persist, adapt or transform to in the face of change?
How does this definition of resilience and the resilience principles linked here relate to the work of disaster recovery practitioners?

Further Reading:

Session 37 - 27 February 2024 - The co-production journey to community-led recovery

In 2021, a group of experienced community and recovery practitioners gathered around the task of creating a visual that could help decision-makers understand a little more about what the journey of recovery looks like and what it means for this to be community centred and for communities to be in a leadership role in their own recovery. The result was the Co-production Journey to Community-Led Recovery visual.

Two of the components of the Co-production Journey to Community-led Recovery are: having a voice and being heard. During this session participants played the 'Listen For' game, shared with us from Percolab Canada, a game to deepen our listening practice and experience the power of storytelling and listening.

Peter Pigot

Sally McKay

Sally has a breadth of experience in senior roles across Australia, the Asia Pacific and New Zealand working in disaster recovery. Most recently Sally worked as the Tonga Operations Manager for IFRC.

Participants were posed the following questions:

Where are you now in this visual?
Where would you like to pay more attention?
Is there a learning, practice or next step that would support you?

Further Reading:

Session 38 - 26 March 2024 - “Reimagining your Rebuild”: Placing people's needs and aspirations at the centre

We know rebuilding homes is one of the biggest challenges for residents impacted by disaster. It can take years for people to obtain a home again, not to mention the many other challenges these residents experience along the way. The planning and rebuild process is complex and long, often requiring new planning standards to be met.

RYR is a holistic and trauma informed approach that demystifies the planning process and rebuild journey. Predominately it assists people to navigate planning and building permit processes, with a particular focus on the provision of expert guidance, information and ideas. Support is also provided to residents for their mental health and wellbeing during their ongoing recovery and rebuild journey.

The RYR program met residents where they were at, ensuring they were ready, able and better equipped to understand, navigate, plan and tackle decision making throughout the planning application and rebuild / repair process.

The RYC Reimagining your Rebuild initiative was recognised at the 2022 Awards for Planning Excellence (VIC) – Improving Planning Processes.

Deb Sargentson – Community Recovery Officer, Yarra Ranges Council

With over thirty years’ experience and expertise in consultation, instructional design, facilitation, project management and improving processes – Deb has always been passionate about connecting with people where they are at, listening, understanding and helping them to build clarity, capability, confidence and resilience - so they can rise, as individuals, small teams or larger communities.

Moving into the world of emergency management in 2013, Deb found her professional purpose and place. Her passion was sparked to learn more about emergency relief and recovery and mental health, wellbeing and community resilience after disasters.

As a resident impacted by the devastating storm event in the Yarra Ranges on June 9, 2021, Deb worked with the local community for 3 months as a relief support volunteer. In September 2021 Deb joined Yarra Ranges Council as a Community Recovery Officer – to support, assist and work alongside the storm impacted residents and communities during their recovery journey.

Marcella Simone – Executive Officer, Yarra Ranges Council Planning & Rebuilding team

Marcella’s 30-year career encompasses a wide range of urban and regional planning projects, mostly working in the local government field as well as the private sector.

Marcella has been involved in a range of complex projects and uses her negotiation and project management skills to consistently provide the best outcomes for all stakeholders involved. She regularly manages large, complex projects through the ever-changing statutory planning landscape.

While working at Yarra Ranges Council (YRC), she has gained extensive experience in working in recovery planning teams following the 2009 bushfires, 2016 Storm and most recently the 2021 June storm event. The experience gained from these events drove Marcella to ensure the Planning and Rebuilding team and Community Recovery Team collaborated to support the impacted residents from the June 2021 storm through their recovery and rebuild journey.

Part of this collaboration included developing the Reimaging Your Rebuilding/Repairs (RYR) initiative / program with Deb Sargentson.

Participants were posed the following questions:

What do you believe are the major challenges facing people in rebuilding their homes after a disaster?
What experience have you had working with residents or communities facing rebuild (or major repairs) to their homes after a disaster?

Further Reading:

Session 39 - 23 April 2024 - Supporting the recovery transition. How can we support ourselves and others in transitions?

Transitions are happening everywhere all the time, and we all experience these in different ways. Transition theories can offer valuable insights into the experience of disaster recovery workers approaching the end of employment contracts.

For many disaster recovery workers, the role is deeply intertwined with a sense of purpose derived from helping communities rebuild and recover and build resilience. The prospect of no longer being directly involved in this meaningful work can evoke a range of emotions, behaviours and challenges and these will be different for each of us.

During this month's Possibility Lab, the group explored the various coping strategies that they draw on during times of stress. Strategies like seeking social support, engaging in self-care activities, exploring new opportunities, and reflecting on experiences.

Dr Kate Brady provided her insights and shared her experience. Collectively the group were encouraged to think of the adaptive coping mechanisms that can help navigating transitions with a sense of agency.

Dr. Kate Brady - Senior Research Fellow, UNSW
Dr. Kate Brady has had a distinguished career in disaster recovery operations, programming and research. Kate is the Senior Research Fellow for the UNSW How We Survive initiative, is an Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne and is the Technical Adviser to Australian Red Cross Emergency Services, where she established and led the disaster recovery program for 12 years.

Most of Kate’s work focuses on what people find helpful and unhelpful after disasters. Throughout her career, Kate has had significant influence on State and National emergency management policy and has an international profile in collective trauma, resilience and in disaster recovery programming and policy. Kate is a co-author on the Australian Disaster Recovery Framework, the Australian Community Recovery Handbook and was an advisor in the development of the National Disaster Mental Health Framework. In 2021, she became the host for ABC’s podcast ‘After the Disaster’.

Questions for you to consider as you come to this session:

What have you noticed about the feelings and behaviours expressed by your colleagues, community members and yourself when discussing the wind down of recovery services and a transition approach?
What tools or self-care supports have you used in the past when facing significant changes, and what’s been most useful for you?

Some resources that might be of interest in regard to this session:

Schlossberg’s Transition Theory
Anderson, Mary & Goodman, Jane & Schlossberg, Nancy. (2021). Counselling Adults in Transition: Linking Schlossberg’s Theory With Practice in a Diverse World. 10.1891/9780826135476.