Change isn’t coming — it’s here now.
Long gone are the days we could discount social media as a digital distraction for college kids and tech geeks. No longer can we simply broadcast our visions for better biking and walking and expect others to tune in and get with the program. And, while incredible progress has been made to advance the movement for bikeable, walkable places, no longer can we be content with the narrow range of perspectives and experiences that have gotten us this far and expect our movement to reflect and serve the growing community of color majority in America.
Now, that’s not to say the bike-ped movement has had its head in the sand. But with limited time and resources, we often consider a sophisticated online strategy and inclusive organizing as an admirable asset — after everything else on the priority list is accomplished. And, perhaps even more often, we have the desire but we don’t have the tools.
That’s why the Alliance is hosting its 2015 National Training on “Leadership, Organizing and Digital Strategy for a Stronger Movement” in partnership with the Wisconsin Bike Fed, July 29-31 in Milwaukee, Wisc. Led by the experts at Fission Strategy, this one-of-a-kind, custom training will help us navigate the complex and evolving digital and social landscape and move beyond our tried-and-true constituencies to grow a stronger, more inclusive, more effective movement.
So why did we choose Fission? What do their trainers bring to the table? More than two decades of experience using technology to advance social movements and build powerful, diverse constituencies for change.
First you need to know about Hemly Ordonez. A California native who got her start in environmental justice organizing, Ordonez specializes in working with non-profits to bridge emerging technologies and challenge inequality.
Before coming to Fission as its Vice President of Digital Strategy and Mobilization, she was the State Strategies Manager at Advocates for Youth. Within a few years, Ordonez had used traditional and new media strategies to build out massive network lists in red states like South Carolina and Texas; advance partner engagement in the deep south, like Mississippi and Alabama; and organize communities of color around reproductive justice in Colorado and California.
“It wasn’t why they originally hired me on,” she says with a laugh, “but that’s what I’m good at: Answering the question, how do we really reach underserved communities and build online?”
More recently she managed the launch of YesWeCode and led the mobile strategy to drive engagement on the film Documented. Now she’s working with the Sierra Club on field strategies to engage communities of color in California.
Next, you need to meet Austen Levihn-Coon, Fission’s Chief Technology Officer. Having studied social movement theory in college, Levihn-Coon cut his teeth in the climate change movement as one of the early organizers for what evolved into a global campaign that has mobilized millions: 350.org. He also worked as a field organizer for the 2008 Obama for America campaign, seeing firsthand how technology can be leveraged to social change.
For Levihn-Coon and Ordonez, digital engagement is simply indispensible in this day and age.
“You can’t really do organizing anymore without integrating online components,” Ordonez says. “Yes, it’s a tool — but it’s not one you can leave in the toolbox and still be effective.”
“We’re building on all the work that’s been done previously,” Levihn-Coon adds. “This just facilitates connections and enabling people to find each other and build movements more quickly. The trick is how to do that effectively.”
And that’s where the knowledge and insight from Fission’s work comes in. Because effective online strategy isn’t just learning how to use TweetDeck or having a killer Instagram stream. It’s just as much about listening and engaging in ways that truly meet people where they are — and allow them to drive the conversation.
“As platforms have democratized there’s been a huge shift in who has control and how they’re driving culture,” she explains. “Twitter is a thing — and that was true before we saw Black Lives Matter, before we saw what’s happening in the undocumented immigrant movement. We’re seeing a shift from needing to tackle policy first to make social change to people on the ground tackling culture first to influence the direction that policy is going. I think that’s really where the power is: Communities are starting to shift the narrative and national discourse in terms of the things that are impacting our lives.”
That culture and discourse is beginning to change in the bike-ped movement — but it’s met by years of history written by a relatively homogenous group of leaders. Other largely white movements, though, are intentionally working to overcome that inertia and address those structural issues head-on.
“The challenge isn’t bringing people into your movement but bringing your movement to the people — connecting with them in the ways and in the places that matter to them,” Levihn-Coons says. “One example that’s really interesting to watch is the climate change movement, and the environmental movement. It’s very much a reality for them that they started as an all white, all well-educated leadership and they’re realizing that’s a problem if they want to have success in changing policy on the ground. They’ve also realized that disadvantaged people are at the front lines of the effects of climate change in the long term. So what I’ve seen happen is really being able to fund and provide training and support for individuals in their own communities, to build leadership in the communities they’re looking to work with and not so much bring them on board but align with and build alliances with them, whether that’s tribal groups or urban communities most affected by coal mining or power plants.”
Sound familiar? How many cities see a disproportionate number of bicycle and pedestrian deaths in low-income neighborhoods or communities of color? How many bike-ped plans prioritize investment in high-return districts in an around downtown, rather than outlying areas where minimum-wage workers have to walk along the gutter to catch two buses to get to their job? Changing that paradigm takes leadership — a different kind of leadership.
“[Creating an inclusive organization] has to be a core commitment from leadership who are willing to change and make a very intentional shift — because it will not happen otherwise,” Ordonez says. “But the other things that’s been happening around engagement is that, as power is amassed toward a majority minority country, nonprofits are waking up to the new reality of ‘Oh my God, we haven’t been engaging these populations for decades and now they’re going to be huge! And we have no idea what we’re doing!’ So we’re seeing that, even if organizations are not intentionally making that shift they’re starting to get blowback.”
“And it’s not just about the front-facing organizers,” she adds. “The end goal is transforming leadership — what even the board looks like — in addition to doing more co-creation and co-leadership with the community you’re working with.”
But how do you even get that conversation started when you’ve got a to-do list that’s 100 tasks long? Never fear. From a distance, all those apps and platforms and analytics can seem overwhelming. But close up, there are easy, free tools wrangle those unruly streams into something that is eminently manageable.
“One of the challenges everyone faces now is how to keep track of it all and use it effectively,” Levihn-Coon says of digital media. “And we’ll definitely speak to how you can both do the planning for multi-channel communications, as well as the daily practices of what you can and should do to stay on top of that communications plan and actively engage supporters in your community.”
“We’ll also talk about meme generation and video creation,” Ordonez adds, “because more and more storytelling is really multimedia and there are easy ways people can do that, as well.”
And plenty of time will be set aside for practical application, giving you the chance to relate those tools and theories to current campaigns you’re working on back home. For Levihn-Coons, that’s the most exciting aspect of nonprofit trainings.
“It’s always amazing to help people see what’s possible and really give them the opportunity to go back in on Monday when they get back and implement some of the lessons learned — and really feel like they have a handle on it,” he says.
And for Ordonez, the most powerful part is watching those Monday morning changes turn into longterm shifts.
“The true test of advocacy for me, since a lot of my work is around diversity and inclusion, is seeing if the constituents change over time and if that’s represented in the digital story they’re telling about themselves,” she says. “Can people build those relationships, bring folks in to share that story and be authentically who they are. Folks at nonprofits have all of the good intentions in the world and giving them the tools to live out those intentions is one of the most special things for me in seeing the intersection of diversity and inclusion, and technology.”
