Date fo the event: Thursday 24th February 2011, 9.30am – 1.00pm
Organised by: Target Wellbeing's Regional Support Network
Venue: Oldham Sports Centre, Lord St, Oldham, OL1 3HA
Delivered by: Rhiannon Davies, Target: Wellbeing’s Communications Officer
This post is by: Rhiannon Davies
In this session we covered how to identify the most relevant platforms for the attending organsiations' stakeholders, and how take advantage of free ways to boost their profile and communicate online.
The session covered:
• An introduction to social media (We started from the very beginning for those who didn't knwo their facebook from their elbow!)
• Social media In context - how it fits into existing marketing activity
• Picking the right tools for your objectives
• How to use the most popular platforms: Blogging, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, Facebook
It was a really lively session, with about 14 people with a huge range of experience in social media, from those on the verge of creating their first social media strategy to those who were just starting to think about dipping their toes in the water by setting up a YouTube or Twitter account.
I've led this session a few times over the last few years and it's really interesting to see the numbers of people signing up swelling each time. Clearly more and more organsiations are getting excited about how they can use social media to engage with their beneficiaries or funders, or is it that they're just starting to realise that they can't afford to ignore social media anymore?
I've asked everyone who attended the session to leave a comment, so I hope that we'll get some feedbacka botu what they foudn most useful, and if they've actually put into action all the brilliant ideas they had during the training.
Thursday, 24 February 2011
Wednesday, 16 February 2011
North West Health and Physical Activity Forum Conference: Innovation in Physical Activity
Date of the event: Thursday 10th February 2011
Organised by: North West Health and Physical Activity Forum
Venue: The Westleigh Conference Centre, Preston
By: Rhiannon Davies, Communications Officer
This incredibly energise
d conference that covered everything to do with Physical Activity in the North West took place in the beautiful surroundings of Westleigh conference Centre, a beautiful 19th century mansion house, and Maggie and I were pleased to see our first snow drops of the year (pictured) sprinkling the lawn!
Unusually for a conference of this kind, all the key note speakers were both interesting and relevant:
Dr Ruth Hussey, the Regional Director of Public Health kicked off the day with Physical Activity and innovation – The Regional perspective, and drew our attention to Public Health England – A new service to get people healthy, from the Department of Health, and focused on innovation in the North West, such as the sports and physical activity challenge http://www.sportandphysicalactivity.nhs.uk/ for employees of NHS healthcare establishments.
Next, Dr Harry Rutter (@harryrutter), Director of the National Obesity Observatory, won us all over with his presentation Nudge, Budge and Fudge. Referring to Thaler and Sunstein’s well known book on behaviour change, Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness, he talked about the governments plan to advocate encouraging or 'nudging' people to make healthier decisions for themselves. With the help of some very complex (or is it complicated?) diagrams and mind maps he succinctly conveyed that it takes more than individual interventions (e.g. changing doughnuts for biscuits at meetings, cycling instead of taking public transport) to change people, when it’s so easy to slip (rewarding yourself with double helpings of dinner), and his belief that a whole new outlook, including infrastructure to make making healthy decisions easier, is what’s needed. He was so convincing I even dusted my bike off at the weekend!
The last speaker in the morning was Denise Hampson, a Health behaviour Economist and the Managing Director of Hampson Solutions, who took a very different approach with her presentation: Why public health should be more like the best theme park in the world, and less like your local bank. Denise’s presentation was based on her popular theories (at least at the last few NWHPAF events I’ve been too!) about behaviour change, where she explains decision making as a process using the “hot” (emotional, habitual) and “cold” (logical) parts of our brain, and went on to use the extended metaphors of the experience you get at a bank (boring investments – save now and you’ll get the benefit much later) to that of going to Disney World (immediate fun and pleasure) to demonstrate why people make the health decisions they do. Leaving us with the question, “What if Walt Disney was your boss?” she raised an important question about marketing the experience of health interventions (such as the fun of playing football and the feel good factor of yoga) rather than the long term benefit. It reminded me a lot of what marketers, selling everything from cars to concert tickets, do all the time.
Next came the parallel sessions (which sandwiched a great lunch). I attended a session led by Nick Cavill (@cavilln) on the Department of Health’s forthcoming new Physical Activity guidelines. Apparently they’re going to be very similar to Canada’s, released last month. The group raised several issues with the proposed change from 5 x 30, to 150 mins a week, and the general consensus in the group seemed to be that 150 minutes might be off putting, as it sounds so much, or that people may feel their long bike ride on a Sunday might be enough. On a more positive note it was suggested that there will be specific guidelines available for early years, children and older people for the first time. I also went to a fun and interesting session on how music can increase your performance while exercising, and I know Maggie loved being top of the scoreboard for the session on Street Soccer by Play Innovation (see the video to see how it works).
As I’m a bit of a Social Media advocate myself, I was also really pleased that the use of Twitter was encouraged throughout the day. You can look back on the conversation by using the #nwhpaf hashtag, with lots of input from @nwhpaf @harryrutter @cavilln @denisehampson @Playinnovation @Human_Kinetics and of course, @targetwellbeing
All in all it was a very worth while day and we were very grateful to the NWHPAF and Events Northern team for organising it!
Organised by: North West Health and Physical Activity Forum
Venue: The Westleigh Conference Centre, Preston
By: Rhiannon Davies, Communications Officer
This incredibly energise
d conference that covered everything to do with Physical Activity in the North West took place in the beautiful surroundings of Westleigh conference Centre, a beautiful 19th century mansion house, and Maggie and I were pleased to see our first snow drops of the year (pictured) sprinkling the lawn!Unusually for a conference of this kind, all the key note speakers were both interesting and relevant:
Dr Ruth Hussey, the Regional Director of Public Health kicked off the day with Physical Activity and innovation – The Regional perspective, and drew our attention to Public Health England – A new service to get people healthy, from the Department of Health, and focused on innovation in the North West, such as the sports and physical activity challenge http://www.sportandphysicalactivity.nhs.uk/ for employees of NHS healthcare establishments.
Next, Dr Harry Rutter (@harryrutter), Director of the National Obesity Observatory, won us all over with his presentation Nudge, Budge and Fudge. Referring to Thaler and Sunstein’s well known book on behaviour change, Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness, he talked about the governments plan to advocate encouraging or 'nudging' people to make healthier decisions for themselves. With the help of some very complex (or is it complicated?) diagrams and mind maps he succinctly conveyed that it takes more than individual interventions (e.g. changing doughnuts for biscuits at meetings, cycling instead of taking public transport) to change people, when it’s so easy to slip (rewarding yourself with double helpings of dinner), and his belief that a whole new outlook, including infrastructure to make making healthy decisions easier, is what’s needed. He was so convincing I even dusted my bike off at the weekend!
The last speaker in the morning was Denise Hampson, a Health behaviour Economist and the Managing Director of Hampson Solutions, who took a very different approach with her presentation: Why public health should be more like the best theme park in the world, and less like your local bank. Denise’s presentation was based on her popular theories (at least at the last few NWHPAF events I’ve been too!) about behaviour change, where she explains decision making as a process using the “hot” (emotional, habitual) and “cold” (logical) parts of our brain, and went on to use the extended metaphors of the experience you get at a bank (boring investments – save now and you’ll get the benefit much later) to that of going to Disney World (immediate fun and pleasure) to demonstrate why people make the health decisions they do. Leaving us with the question, “What if Walt Disney was your boss?” she raised an important question about marketing the experience of health interventions (such as the fun of playing football and the feel good factor of yoga) rather than the long term benefit. It reminded me a lot of what marketers, selling everything from cars to concert tickets, do all the time.
Next came the parallel sessions (which sandwiched a great lunch). I attended a session led by Nick Cavill (@cavilln) on the Department of Health’s forthcoming new Physical Activity guidelines. Apparently they’re going to be very similar to Canada’s, released last month. The group raised several issues with the proposed change from 5 x 30, to 150 mins a week, and the general consensus in the group seemed to be that 150 minutes might be off putting, as it sounds so much, or that people may feel their long bike ride on a Sunday might be enough. On a more positive note it was suggested that there will be specific guidelines available for early years, children and older people for the first time. I also went to a fun and interesting session on how music can increase your performance while exercising, and I know Maggie loved being top of the scoreboard for the session on Street Soccer by Play Innovation (see the video to see how it works).
As I’m a bit of a Social Media advocate myself, I was also really pleased that the use of Twitter was encouraged throughout the day. You can look back on the conversation by using the #nwhpaf hashtag, with lots of input from @nwhpaf @harryrutter @cavilln @denisehampson @Playinnovation @Human_Kinetics and of course, @targetwellbeing
All in all it was a very worth while day and we were very grateful to the NWHPAF and Events Northern team for organising it!
Thursday, 18 November 2010
North West Public Health Conference 2010
Date of the event: 4th and 5th November 2010
Organised by: Event North and Cumbria and Lancashire Public Health Networks
Venue: Lowood Hotel, Ambleside
By: Maggie Moody, Portfolio Manager
I was at the NW Public Health Conference on 4th and 5th November in Ambleside, followed by a lovely long weekend in a log cabin near Ullswater (and then a nasty cold), which is why I've only now got round to sharing my summary of the conference highlights.
Organised by: Event North and Cumbria and Lancashire Public Health Networks
Venue: Lowood Hotel, Ambleside
By: Maggie Moody, Portfolio Manager
I was at the NW Public Health Conference on 4th and 5th November in Ambleside, followed by a lovely long weekend in a log cabin near Ullswater (and then a nasty cold), which is why I've only now got round to sharing my summary of the conference highlights.
First to say is that it was a really good event in a lovely location, well attended by a mix of people from health, local authorities and the voluntary sector which made for interesting and informed discussion and perspectives.
The highlights for me were:
- the presentation by Ruth Hussey who highlighted the positive opportunities in this time of significant change,
- Andrew Lyon who gave a lively and engaging presentation explaining "3 Horizons"
- Prof Bengt Lindstrom who talked about salutogenesis, an assets approach (although I confess that I did google salutogenesis before the presentation so I some idea what to expect!)
- Oliver James who talked about the evidence from the Human Genome Project concluding "It's the environment, stupid"!
- Steve Wyler really inspired me in his workshop too, which gave examples of community owned facilities and buildings.
Also, one of the Target: Wellbeing projects, Pre School Nutrition in Knowsley, won a NW Public Health Award - excellent!
Here's 
a photo of us receiving the award, and you can see the rest of the photographs here.
You can see all of the presentations from the day here.
Tuesday, 19 October 2010
Big Lottery Wellbeing Portfolios in the North
Date of the event: 13/10/10
Organised by: Gillian from the NW Healthy Living Network
Venue: Stockport MBC
Report by: Maggie Moody, Portfolio Manager
Rhiannon, Lawrence and I went to a meeting of the four BIG Lottery Fund funded wellbeing portfolios in the North of England last week.
Represented at the meeting were:
North West Healthy Living Network (NW),
Altogether Better (Yorks and Humberside),
New Leaf New Life (NE),
and, of course, Target: Well-being (also NW).
The opportunity to share experiences, challenges and solutions was invaluable, and the openness of the discussions and willingness to share information was very refreshing. Networking at its best!
Whilst the portfolios are all working towards the same objectives to increase physical activity, increase healthy eating and improve mental wellbeing, the diversity of the portfolios and their projects is amazing. There's also huge innovation around evaluation and communications, just to mention a couple of examples, and the Altogether Better work with Health Champions is an inspiration.
I will endeavour to highlight forthcoming events and opportunities, but I encourage you to visit their websites (links above) and sign up to their newsletters, etc. to find out more.
Organised by: Gillian from the NW Healthy Living Network
Venue: Stockport MBC
Report by: Maggie Moody, Portfolio Manager
Rhiannon, Lawrence and I went to a meeting of the four BIG Lottery Fund funded wellbeing portfolios in the North of England last week.
Represented at the meeting were:
North West Healthy Living Network (NW),
Altogether Better (Yorks and Humberside),
New Leaf New Life (NE),
and, of course, Target: Well-being (also NW).
The opportunity to share experiences, challenges and solutions was invaluable, and the openness of the discussions and willingness to share information was very refreshing. Networking at its best!
Whilst the portfolios are all working towards the same objectives to increase physical activity, increase healthy eating and improve mental wellbeing, the diversity of the portfolios and their projects is amazing. There's also huge innovation around evaluation and communications, just to mention a couple of examples, and the Altogether Better work with Health Champions is an inspiration.
I will endeavour to highlight forthcoming events and opportunities, but I encourage you to visit their websites (links above) and sign up to their newsletters, etc. to find out more.
Listen, Value, Invest Conference
Subject: Listen, Value, Invest conference
Date of event: 3 weeks ago
Organised by: VSNW
Venue: Manchester Conference Centre
Report by: Rob Squires
Date of event: 3 weeks ago
Organised by: VSNW
Venue: Manchester Conference Centre
Report by: Rob Squires
This conference was attended by lots of emminent people from the Voluntary and Community Sector. One of the main objectives of the day was about how the profile of the sector
can be raised in these difficult times.
During the day I gate crashed the ED's workshop, which was jammed with EDs and other gate crashers like me. The main topic of conversation was EDs expressing dismay at the "Big Society", and the various threats it presents for their organisations.
However, at the end of the day, Neil McInroy from CLES really stole the show with a very witty, relevant and ultimately optimistic presentation on the role the Voluntary and Community Sector has to play.
All the presentations from the day are available here.
Places Training Preparation Event
Date of the event: 14.10.10
Organised by: Target: Wellbeing and Mark Ellison from GONW
Venue: Foxton Centre, Preston (a Target: Wellbeing project)
Report by: Nancy Brown
Organised by: Target: Wellbeing and Mark Ellison from GONW
Venue: Foxton Centre, Preston (a Target: Wellbeing project)
Report by: Nancy Brown
This session was to develop the information we need to tell the story of
the Foxton Centre for the training on place based data we're running on 22nd November.
It was a session involving local service users, volunteers, workers, and
staff to look at how the Foxton Centre has worked within the local
community.
We'll use this to provide a case study for our training in November all
about how our projects contribute to neighbourhoods and how to use data to
show this. The highlights were learning about the work in the centre and the way
people see their neighbourhood.
You can find out more on the training on the events section of our website!
Fit as a Fiddle Conference
Date: 5th October 2010
Organised by: Age Concern
Venue: Burnley Football Club
A week or so ago I was lucky enough to attend the Fit as a Fiddle
Conference in Burnley. This programme, like Target: Wellbeing is funded by
the BIG Lottery Fund, and is currently in its 4th year.
It was really interesting to find out more about their projects that are helping older
people to be more active, eat healthily and to feel positive and engaged
with their community. From food tasting and cooking sessions to tai chi,
the range of activities was impressive! There was a lot of synergy with
Target: Wellbeing, and there were opportunities for me to "borrow" some
great ideas around activities and evaluation too!
Organised by: Age Concern
Venue: Burnley Football Club
A week or so ago I was lucky enough to attend the Fit as a Fiddle
Conference in Burnley. This programme, like Target: Wellbeing is funded by
the BIG Lottery Fund, and is currently in its 4th year.
It was really interesting to find out more about their projects that are helping older
people to be more active, eat healthily and to feel positive and engaged
with their community. From food tasting and cooking sessions to tai chi,
the range of activities was impressive! There was a lot of synergy with
Target: Wellbeing, and there were opportunities for me to "borrow" some
great ideas around activities and evaluation too!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)