Evolving the South West

Evolving the South West
Simon Davey, preponderate.net

Project COSMIC in South West England have developed the Evolve project, a twelve month pilot funded by Capacity Builders, to support voluntary organisations in rural South West England. They cover a large area of the country (Devon, Cornwall, Somerset and Devon) and have a mission to help you improve and be more efficient and effective through ICT (Information and Communications Technology). But the way they go about it isn’t as technical as you might think…the key message is about sustainability through use of ICT.

Learning about an organisation is critical – there’s no simple template for an ICT plan or strategy. It needs to match the organisation and handholding (rather than simple ‘hands-on’) is absolutely vital. If you don’t talk to an organisation and find out exactly what they do, how can you offer them advice? After all, one of the biggest issues in small, isolated organisations is people “don’t know what they don’t know”.

Evolve South West have an excellent website but much of their marketing is through other infrastructure organisations – so called ‘trusted intermediaries’. It means they have a much better reach into a wide variety of communities. They also get out and about – a lot – and link up with clients and other organisations to help spread the word. Just because this is the ‘internet age’ doesn’t mean we can rely on electronic communications to make contact for the first time.

Working with small organisations in rural and urban areas, they have a very good idea of what works in dispersed communities. Their clients are keen on email newsletters and websites as well as getting funding for ICT and fundamental to overall success is good computer housekeeping. They recognise that whilst ICT supports communication and is great for sharing information, there’s usually a lot of legwork and partnerships involved in making the first contact and effort in keeping things going.

So what do Evolve do? There are seven steps to success:

  1. Learn about your organisation
  2. Discover your current and future ICT needs
  3. Formulate a plan alongside your organisation to help satisfy these needs
  4. Source the information you need from key organisations you can trust, including COSMIC, ICT Hub and Lasa
  5. Share with you useful documents such as good practice guides and templates.
  6. Provide the necessary ‘hand-holding’ support as required and make sure you have access to the right ICT support and training in your area.
  7. Provide free support workshops centred around key issues such as internet & email, spam & virus, backups, accessibility, etc.

Evolve are building on ten years of experience at Project Cosmic, a community ICT project which has grown dramatically over the last decade. They take the best from other organisations and make sure there is hands-on support locally. In other words, most of what they do has very little to do with ICT. It’s about making sure your ICT fits, helping you to improve what you do and how you do it.

As Simon Duncan, Rural ICT Coordinator says, “Our approach is more ‘hand holding’ than hands on. We do not breeze in, fix it, then breeze out again. We help our clients become more knowledgeable, more aware and more sustainable, and we do it on their terms. It is crucial for all concerned that we take the time to understand our clients, their organisations and how they operate. Only in this way can we truly help them by working with them in a way which is appropriate to their needs and their approach.”

Computers can make a difference but they will only make the right difference if they fit with what you need as an organisation, if you have the right infrastructure and support and if you can make the best use of them. Too many organisations have suffered from having big grey boxes dumped on them with little clear idea of what to do next. Yes, websites and email can help link remote communities but not if those communities don’t know you’re there. A new PC works well for a while but it will soon hamper your activities if you don’t look after it and do your housekeeping. And sophisticated communications strategies will always rely on people wanting to talk to or hear from you in the first place.

Take aways

  1. ICT only makes a positive difference if it’s been planned and fits around an organisation’s goals
  2. There are no simple templates for ICT – what you need will be unique to you and what you do
  3. Don’t confuse websites with marketing and communication – people need to know you’re there and you need something relevant to say
  4. If you can’t communicate directly, use other organisations to help build links and relationships

Resources and related articles

Contact details
Simon Davey
www.preponderate.net
simon@preponderate.net

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