Psychosocial Centre
Understanding
Resilience
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
Contents
Introduction3
What do we mean by Resilience
4
Building Resilience 9
Summary and Recommendations
16
References19
Author: Dr Lee Devaney
© This document and the related toolkits are copyright of British Red Cross –
please do not distribute or copy without consent.
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
Introduction
It seems incontrovertible that the world’s climate
is changing, and that this brings unpredictable
and extreme weather which poses direct threats
to communities abroad and at home. One more
specific outcome of climate change is the increased
incidence and severity of flooding, which research
shows has wide ranging and serious impacts on
people’s health as well as their social, financial
and emotional wellbeing (for a in depth qualitative
analysis see British Red Cross reports living in Fear
of the Rain, 2010 & Cut off by the Floods 2012).
Work with communities affected by this intensified
flooding has found that best outcomes in terms
of withstanding and recovering from floods is
achieved when the communities’ themselves are
highly involved in preparing for and supporting
each other through these incidences. Thus interest
in community resilience within government and
relevant NGO’s has significantly increased in
recent years. This document seeks to explore what
community resilience is, how it can be built and
how this can be applied to a community residence
programme. These recommendations form the basis
of our subsequent community resilience toolkits.
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Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
What do we mean
by Resilience?
The term resilience has of late become very
popular and widely used. Despite this there is
no single agreed definition of what resilience
precisely is. Some of this disagreement is certainly
a little cosmetic and many similarities can be
found between many definitions. However,
very real differences can be found between
conceptualisations largely due to the level at which
resilience is being measured or assessed (Cutter,
Burton, & Emrich 2010; Shaw & Maythorne 2013).
Resilience as a concept is used by a wide variety
of academic disciplines, governmental and nongovernmental agencies, practitioners and individuals
and each usually mean subtlety or not so subtlety
dissimilar things. For our purposes here we will
examine resilience at the individual, system and
community level and identify differences and
similarities, and assess their potential utility to
building community resilience.
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Individual/Psychological Resilience
The term resilience has its roots in physical
science where it referred to the capacity
of a material to return to equilibrium after
disruption (Bajayo, 2012). It has since spread
and become quite popular in the social
sciences, particularly psychology, where
a similar conceptualisation is applied to
human functioning. Many of these definitions
tend to be complicated, including some
of the pioneer’s in the field Ann Masten’s
own, for example one definition she uses
is: “classes of phenomena characterized by
good outcomes in spite of serious threats to
adaptation or development”. However more
grounded definitions infer that individual or
psychological resilience is about adapting to
and recovering from difficult circumstances.
Williams (2007, p. 268) is an example of
such, even if many other definitions describe
slightly more positive outcomes to resilience
than adapting reasonably well: “a person’s
capacity for adapting psychologically,
emotionally and physically reasonably
well and without lasting detriment to self,
relationships or personal development in the
face of adversity, threat or challenge”.
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Systems/Social Resilience
Macro level resilience is often of at least
equal, probably more, interest to large
organisations, government agencies and
national and international NGO’s. At a societal
or system level, resilience is not about specific
individual’s ability to recover, but rather the
maintenance of the collective’s purpose,
and the structures and capacity to achieve
this purpose. Longstaff et. al. (2010) defined
systemic resilience as the ability of a system
to absorb, recover from or adapt to changes,
whilst retaining its essential functions,
structure and identity. Its heavy focus on
infrastructure, inter-agency communication
and the scale of is attention at the larger
national level makes system resilience integral
to disaster preparedness and recovery. The
definition of resilience adopted by the United
Nations International Strategy for Disaster
Reduction (UNISDR) states that resilience
is: “the capacity of a system, community or
society potentially exposed to hazards to
adapt, by resisting or changing in order to
reach and maintain an acceptable level of
functioning and structure (UN 2005, p. 4).
The UNSIDR definition stress, that is a
function of the degree to which the social
system is capable of organizing itself to
increase its capacity for learning from past
disaster, for better future protection and to
improve risk reduction measures. Regarding
urban resilience a World Bank report (WB
2003, p. 7) points out the measures that are
part of resilience building: (i) soft measures
such as land use and urban planning,
community awareness and preparedness,
monitoring of hazards and risks, early warning
systems, emergency and evacuation plans;
and (ii) hard measures such as retrofitting
of critical infrastructure, adapting buildings
and urban spaces, managing retreats and
relocation and maximization of ecosystem
services. However it is often beyond the
scope and influence of community resilience
programmes, to incorporate all different
infrastructure and institutional aspects of
resilience at system level. What is of the
upmost importance and relevance the specific
literature on community resilience.
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Community resilience
Perhaps the most contested characterisation
of resilience is that of Community Resilience.
There is an unresolved disagreement amongst
theorists and practitioners, not only as to
a definition of community resilience, but
even more fundamentally as to the role of
the individual in the conceptualisation of
community resilience.
It will be no surprise that there is no agreed
definition of community resilience, however
many definitions demonstrate some real
similarities. Most of these definitions
prescribe that resilient communities are those
which can recover well from some form of
adversity. For example Landau and Weaver
(2006) see community resilience as “the
community’s capacity to withstand major
trauma and loss, overcome adversity, and
to prevail, usually with increased resources,
competence and connectedness” (Landau &
Weaver, 2006:11). This definition captures the
positive nature of recovery.
To be resilient a community must be seen
as being functional, even highly functional
at some early but undefined time after an
adverse event. This functioning may not be
exactly as before, it may be quite different,
but the community must be functional. What
is not specified in this definition is who the
actors in community recovery may be, who
delivers the resilience? Others however
specify that there must be a very significant
input from the community themselves in
its own recovery, for it to be considered
resilient. For example Paton and Johnston
(2001) believe a resilient community should
use “its own personal and environmental
resources” to recover. Coles and Buckle
(2004) go further by characterising resilience
as the “capacity, skills and knowledge” that
allows a community to recover, rather than
being the process of recovery. Indeed the
IFRC in its definition specifies in order to be
considered truly resilient a community must
have the capacity to lead in its preparations
for, response to and recovery from adversity;
“Community Resilience is the ability of
communities exposed to disasters, crises
and underlying vulnerabilities to anticipate,
prepare for, reduce the impact of, cope with
and recover from the effects of shock and
stresses without compromising their long
term prospects” (IFRC 2014).
Although many general definitions of
community resilience demonstrate broad
parallels, this belies a deep controversy in the
fundamental philosophy of what community
resilience actually is and where it resides.
Different theorists and practitioners disagree
about at what level community resilience
belongs, and thus can be measured at. Some
believe that community resilience equals
the sum of the resilience of its individuals,
some think it includes the resilience of its
individuals but also includes more systemic
considerations, yet others maintain it has little
or nothing to do with the resilience levels of
its individual members and only exists within a
community’s organisations and structures.
Bajayo (2012) proposes that it is fundamentally
flawed to approach to community resilience
as simply its individual members’ aggregated
level of resilience. He suggests that it is
possible for a community to consist of very
individually resilient members, but who
because of a lack of interconnectedness
and shared resources, cannot work together
to recover from a disaster which affects
them as a unit. Instead he promotes a view
of community resilience as discrete from
individual resilience.
However a closer examination of this
proposal, particularly when we look at how to
build resilience with people, shows that this
conceptualisation of community resilience
is also fundamentally flawed. The reverse
of Bajayo’s thought experiment; trying to
imagine a resilient community is which no
one individual demonstrates any level of
individual resilience, seems just as unlikely.
If no individuals in a community possess the
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
knowledge, skills, or resources to enable
resilience, how could the community as a
whole demonstrate any appreciable level of
community resilience? We also argue that
individuals within communities should not
be forgotten. It is highly desirable that the
higher level functioning of any community
should be able to recover speedily after a
disaster; however each resident’s recovery
also matters. Additionally we need to be
particularly cognisant of the resilience and
recovery of vulnerable members of each
community. Finally it seems clear that when
building resilience a very substantial portion
of the work will be increasing individuals’
awareness of risks and the steps that they
themselves can take to prepare for these risks.
Instead we propose that community resilience
resides both in the individual resilience of its
members and in the communities structures,
organisations and social connections.
Indeed many definitions share this view
of the aetiology of community resilience.
Pfefferbaum (2005) offers us a definition
which really highlights how individual
members of a community cannot be detached
from the community as a whole. Instead
individuals work together to create something
that is greater than the sum of its parts.
Collectives can achieve things greater than
any individual could, but it still needs these
individual parts to operate. For Pfefferbaum
community resilience is “the ability of
community members to take meaningful,
deliberate, collective action to remedy the
effect of a problem, including the ability to
interpret the environment, intervene and
move on”.
Campaigns such as “Making Cities Resilient”
(UN 2014) identifies the characteristics
of resilient communities: ability to avoid
disasters by improvement of infrastructures,
services and building codes; ability to
anticipate disaster and protect assets; local
government engagement in sustainable
urbanization and community participation;
adequate understanding of risks both by
// 8
local authorities and communities; public
participation in the decision-making process,
and the local knowledge is valued. Manyena
(2006) emphasise that adaptation to adverse
circumstances, must aim at enhancing not
only the assets and resources, but also the
understanding about the communities culture,
particularly its ‘non-essential attributes’
(Manyena 2006, p. 439). An example is a
flooding which can generate disastrous direct
and indirect effects whose severity can be
more serious that the direct flooding itself.
Hard measures schemes for communitylevel flood protection (storage basins, river
embankments & coastal defences, floodwalls
and barriers, tend to intervene more on the
flood hazard than on the flood vulnerability
dimension. However, non-structural
measures like insurance and early warning
are also important, and such measures
often require multi-sector and multi-level
approaches, for example by involving
non-civil protection actors to assure the
effectiveness of evacuation and emergency
response operations. Especially capacity
development is considered as a critical factor
for the success of non-structural measures in
addressing flood resilience because it require
multi-stakeholder communication at different
geographical scales and decision levels
(Schelfaut et al., 2011).
The proposal that community resilience
should be considered to reside both in the
collective resilience of its members and also
existing in its group levels structures and
organisations, will become much more clear
when we examine how community resilience
can be built.
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
Building
Resilience?
The thus far philosophical argument as to whether
community resilience is the aggregate of its
members resilience or a very distinct macro level
phenomena becomes much more practical,
important and thankfully transparent when we
examine approaches to building resilience.
We shall begin by looking at how resilience can
be built at the individual level before looking at
the macro or systems level. Through this we will
identify potential applications for community
resilience programmes.
Building Individual resilience
At the individual level personal resilience is about
adapting to a certain risk to allow a (to some
degree) positive outcome. The outcome here is
determined by the individuals’ ability to assess
the risk and apply their own assets against this
risk (Luthans, Vogelgesang & Lester; 2010). These
assets include human, social and psychological
resources. Human resources take in knowledge,
skills and ability whilst social resources comprise
a person’s social network; with all the problem
focused and emotion focused advantages these
confer. Looking at both these types of resources it
should be immediately apparent how resilience
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could be improved to those in communities at risk
of flooding. Beneficiaries of community resilience
programmes could have their level of human
resources boosted by facilitating their access to
information around the risks to them of flooding,
how they can physically and emotionally prepare
as well as giving them opportunities to practice
skills which will be of use should their community
become flooded in the future (e.g. first aid training,
sandbag wall training etc.).
Communities’ social resources could be improved
by facilitating to connections to flooding services,
connect with other at risk communities to share
resources, practices and knowledge, and optimise
their interconnectedness in their own area by
helping them develop means to better engage its
members, particularly more vulnerable and isolated
members (much more on this later when we look at
building community resilience).
At the psychological level research has shown
that resilience can be boosted by addressing and
increasing an individual’s level of hope, optimism
and self-efficacy. Hope refers to developing a goal
and a series of specific strategies or paths to reach
these goals. Optimism is the expectation that you
will receive a positive outcome from you efforts
toward a goal. Finally self-efficacy is the personal
belief that you have the capabilities (knowledge,
skill, energy, contacts etc.) to achieve a certain goal
given a specific pathway to that goal.
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Targeting human and social resources will
help build psychological resilience to a very
significant degree themselves. However
psychological resilience can be improved
through the processes in which we engage
with the community and deliver the training.
So for example hope will be enhanced if we
allow a community to set its own flooding
resilience goals, and permit the greatest
possible input(s) in how they reach this goal.
For optimism community resilience
programmes can include presentations
which share the evidence for the efficacy of
the program and its specific components,
allow practice of elements, and provide
positive feedback on the communities’
efforts. For self-efficacy Albert Bandura’s
work identifies five sources which can be
reliably used to increase this psychological
capability; mastery experiences, vicarious
experiences, verbal persuasion, positive
emotional and physiological states, and
imagined experiences. Using imagined
experiences about flooding is impractical
and may even induce anxiety, therefore we
can rule that out for inclusion in a community
programme. However as part of your
process of you can integrate some or all of
the others. Mastery experiences refers to
actually having the opportunity to practice,
hone and preferably perfect (or as close to
it) skills or understanding. As already alluded
to in this document, this suggests that you
should be facilitating practical workshops
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rather than simply bombarding participants
with information. Additionally you should
be careful to build in to the programs early
successes for the participants. Vicarious
experience refers to observing other peoples’
efforts using the same modalities we are using
and witnessing their success. This builds
confidence that the process works and that
specific goals are very achievable. You could
include this into your programme by showing
any videos or promotional material from
successful similar projects, by guest speakers
or visits to other successful programs. Verbal
persuasion simply means giving positive
feedback that the participants are doing well,
have the capabilities they need to meet their
goals and have you confidence. Therefore
this informs about how you interact with the
participants; a reminder to be honest about
potential outcomes but maintain positivity.
In looking at emotional and psychological
states both Bandura and Barbara Fredrickson
found that some states are not conducive
to building self-efficacy (negativity, stress
and tension) whereas positive emotions (joy,
humour, fun etc.) can boost our confidence
in ourselves. This should be integral to how
you run your programme. While should not
aim to be play down risks of flooding nor
invalidate participants’ anger or be flippant
with their fear, however you should be
structuring and approaching all events with
the intention to maximise positive emotions of
the participants.
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Building resilience at the macro/systems level
Resilience can also be built at a much higher
level of structures, organisations and systems.
Much of this research is not applicable to a
community resilience programme however
there are lessons to be learned from this
approach. Part of the Driver project on
defining resilience summaries resilience
at the societal level as being the “ability of
this complex, adaptive system to cope with
threats and disruptions”. Initially resilience
at the societal level will involve the society
attempting to resist disruption to its systems
and structures to maintain functioning, and
then recovering this function should the
stressor temporarily overcome the ability to
resist. Both the society’s ability to resist and
recover will be influenced by each systems
redundancy, diversity and performance.
Performance refers to the contribution of a
specific component to the overall functioning
of the system (e.g. Transportation could
be seen as vital to the overall functioning
of a society), any disruption to this would
have a huge impact on overall resilience.
Diversity means that a system does not
rely on a specific component to perform
a specific function and the example given
is that a community has different sources
of income or diversity in livelihood, or else
if say an oil spill messed up fishing and
fishing was 90-100% of a villages income,
that village is in serious difficulty and thus
not resilient. For your community resilience
programme this may you will need to think
about, or help communities think about
different contingencies should plan A not
work (e.g. they can’t access sandbag bunker
1). Redundancy refers to the level of backup
a component enjoys, so should a specific
component fail there is a replacement ready
to fulfil its function. You will need to be
cognisant to build in redundancy to your
programme, for example one or two flood
wardens in any specific area would prove
problematic should they move, be on holiday
etc. Similarly connections between different
communities and communities and statutory
and non-statutory agencies should probably
not build built on a relationship between just
two individuals.
These issues will make a re-appearance
when we come to examine how community
resilience can be built, and additional system/
macro level factors will be introduced.
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Building community resilience
Practical attempts at building community
resilience have usually combined both
individual level interventions as well as a
wide range of higher level interventions. At
the individual level programs have focused
on building human capital (i.e. individual
community members knowledge, abilities
and skills), and at the macro level most
models include building networks within
communities, between communities and
between communities and statutory and
non-statutory agencies which can provide
services and assistance. Additional common
macro level factor include access to economic
resources and infrastructure. Much of this is
beyond the scope of a community resilience
programme, however some will be useful and
we will cover these aspects accordingly.
// 12
In practice many of these programs teach
skills such as first aid, learning to conduct
damage assessments, understanding warning
signals, creating emergency plans etc. These
help prepare residents for potential disruption
from disasters. In our community resilience
programme we addressed the following
topics:
• Understanding warning systems
• How to protect property and possessions
• Building Community Emergency plans
• Demonstrations of sandbag use
• First aid
• How to contact emergency services
• Emotional first aid
• River Alert systems
Individual level (human Capital)
Macro level
Programmes to boost community resilience
have targeted individuals’ knowledge,
skills and abilities in much the same way
outlined in the section on building individual
resilience. Goodman (1998) argues that all
other resources (connections with agencies,
economic resources, physical resources etc.)
are only useful if members of a community
have the understanding and skills to deploy
these resources effectively. To use a more
concrete example there is little point in
supplying sandbags, first aid kits or other
physical resources if you also do not give
them the information/training to apply these.
Building community resilience by targeting
Macro level factors can be more complicated,
may take more time and resources, and
eventually many may well be beyond
your programmes scope. However many
will be within your power to work on and
an overview of this area will inform your
efforts. More specifically we will review how
physical resources, economic resources,
interconnectedness within communities,
between communities and with service
providers can significantly contribute to a
community’s resilience levels.
The IFRC itself has been involved in applied
resilience building programs specifically
targeting natural disasters (CBDRR:
Community Based Disaster Risk Reduction).
Components of these programmes aim to
increase individuals’ level of human capital to
resist and recover from disasters. They believe
that communities in which residents are
healthy and knowledgeable are more resilient.
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Physical resources
According the IFRC’s work resilient
communities are able to access the
physical resources they need enjoy more
resilience. Building these assets then helps
the community to withstand stressors. The
example they give is a public facility to
evacuate to should this be required. Other
physical resources we aided communities
with in our programme included:
• Grab bags (whatever may be in them).
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Interconnectedness within
communities
Almost all models of community resilience
stress the importance of communities being
strongly interconnected. When members
of a community are tightly bound together
they are better able to, and more motivated,
to share practical and emotional support
with each other. It is through both better
organisation and increased social capital that
these are achieved.
• First aid kits.
Organisation
• Access to sandbags and plastic sheets.
In terms of organisation, the IFRC advises
that a more organised community is better
able to communicate internally to identify
any problems and establish their priorities.
Better organisation also allows community
members to share their needs and opinions
Pfefferbaum (2005) as well as enables more
full risk assessment and analysis of options.
Thus improved organisation leads to better
quality and often speedier action to resist
and recover from disaster. A final element of
this improved organisation is the building of
strong local leadership, to provide direction
and facilitate decision making (Goodman,
Speers, Mcleroy, Fawcett, Kegler, Parker,
Smith, Sterling & Wallerstein, 1998:262). It is
better if these leaders emerge naturally or
democratically from communities as they are
likely to possess the greatest local knowledge,
actually be communicating the views of the
collective and as well as enjoying the greatest
legitimacy and therefore power (Tephra
Report 2012).
Economic resources
Arguably this could come under physical
resources, but many programmes or models
keep it separate. Norris et al.’s (2008) paper
argues that a community which can adapt
and thus is resilient needs to have a strong
economic base with which to do this, this
will determine many of the resources it
can access. Therefore it seems likely that a
practical on the ground community resilience
program will not be able to target this aspect.
The implications for your programme
project are obvious; you should be
empowering the communities to build,
or more likely, consolidate and expand
their existing organisation structures. The
Community Emergency/Resilience Plans will
be key to helping communities organise their
resilience activities, please see the model
resilience plan and associated community
workshop for more details.
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
Social capital
Related to, but still distinct from, the issue
of a community’s level of organisation is the
issue of its social capital, or the physical and
emotional support that can be liberated from
relationships with others.
Landau (2007) and Norris et al. (2008)
argue that the degree of community
connectedness is a strong factor in
determining if the community shares
information, pools and distributes resources,
provides support and ultimately fosters selfreliance. Drury’s Social Identity model of
community resilience (2012) adds the benefits
of greater connectedness of increased
collective identity with its further benefits of
increased ability to reach consensus, ability
to organise and act, as well as increased
altruism. Thus communities in which members
are more connected are better able and more
motivated to help each other.
How to achieve greater
connectedness in communities
Given the value of increased social capital
in communities most researchers have
stressed the importance of building strong
bonds within communities well before any
disaster strikes (Bajayo, 2010; Norris et al.
2008). Therefore we now turn our attention
to methods which may foster these bonds.
Over and above the improved organisation
within a community already addressed we will
introduce two new methods: building sense of
community and developing place attachment.
Sense of community is defined as a “high
concern for community issues, respect for and
service to others, sense of connection and
needs fulfilment” (Norris et al. 2008). Landau
and Weaver (2006) propose that this sense
of community can be re/built by connecting
its members with its people, politics, culture
// 14
and folklore. With some creativity it may
be possible to integrate some of these
interventions in your programs. For example
you could embed a community resilience
road show event within a greater community
celebration, or incorporating a celebration, of
local culture and history.
A similar method to improve
interconnectedness within a community is
to increase its members place attachment.
Whereas sense of community referred to
people, culture, history etc. place attachment
is more directly linked to the physical space of
a community; its geography and architecture.
Many of us feel some attachment to the
places we live and work and we share this
fondness with the others who live and work
in that space. Therefore place attachment
can be highlighted to foster bonds between
community members. You could use this by
including local pictures of landmarks etc. and
maps in your promotional materials as well as
your road show and workshop paraphernalia.
Interconnectedness between
communities
It seems logical that if interconnectedness
within communities has significant impact
on its resilience then interconnectedness
between different communities may share
some of these benefits. In your programme
you may want to creating bonds between
members of different communities
(community groups) and this would allow
the sharing of information including best
practice, but may also facilitate the sharing of
emotional or physical support.
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
Interconnected
with service providers
According to the IFRC resilient communities
are able to access technical advice and
additional support from external agencies.
Therefore communities should understand
the external support that is available to them,
who provides this support and how to contact
them reliably to access this support.
An important consideration on building these
relationships is that of trust (Norris et al.
2008; McCullough 2003). Communities have
to be able to trust the information they are
being given by these agencies. This does not
mean that an agency should be able to offer
all the support that a community requests,
rather the relationship should be built on
clarity, consistency, and transparency. In
your programme of work this may include
introducing communities to government
agencies, contact with emergency
responders: as well as creating activities
to build connections and/or trust.
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Further Process and structural
considerations when building
community resilience
As well as the concrete actions that
can be taken to help a community build
resilience there are a range of factors which
should guide how any program should be
implemented. Generally new structures need
to have a degree of redundancy, diversity
and able to be deployed rapidly (Norris et al.
2008) (see the above discussion on building
macro level resilience). On top of these
considerations the manner in which any
resilience program is delivered should permit
the greatest degree of collective efficacy and
community empowerment.
Through your community resilience
programme you have a particular opportunity
to build collective efficacy and community
empowerment by allowing the greatest
possible degree of participation by
community members in building, shaping and
choosing their own resilience program. They
should have their voice heard and actually
be able to influence decisions to a very
significant degree. Research has shown that
programs which are excessively top down and
pushed on communities are often disregarded
(Longstaff, 2005). Conversely programs which
allow and encourage participation and real
empowerment are most successful in terms
of outcomes and sustainability §(Landau &
Weaver, 2006)
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
Summary and
Recommendations
Whilst there is no standard definition of resilience
there is a significant degree of commonality underlying
many of these competing characterisation. Definitions
usually agree that resilience is about being able to
withstand and recover from a disruption or stress
event. When we examine resilience a little more closely,
however, we do find some differences particularly
between conceptualisations of the term when it is
applied to the individual, social/system and community
levels. Although some theorists argue that community
resilience should be seen as completely distinct from
individual level most practitioners when attempting
to boost a community’s resilience appear to apply
interventions at both the individual and collective
level to achieve the greatest success. The review of
the literature in this area identified a range of factors
which can be targeted to maximise community
resilience including; psychological capabilities, human
capital, physical resources, economic resources,
interconnectedness within and between communities
and improved connections between communities and
service providers. Whilst not all of these factors can be
targeted by your programme, we have identified some
examples of interventions that we applied and you can
learn from:
// 16
Nimbus Conference 2016 // Understanding Resilience Report
Psychological capabilities (hope, optimism & self-efficacy)
• Allow communities to set their own flooding resilience goals.
• Permit the greatest possible input(s) or at least choice(s) in how they reach this goal
(choice of workshop, drawing answers out rather than giving them etc.).
• Present evidence for the efficacy of the programs and its specific components.
• Show any videos or promotional material from successful similar projects, invite
guest speakers from other successful programs or arrange visits.
• Give participants the opportunity to practice, hone and preferably perfect (or as
close to it) skills or understanding.
• Deliver practical workshops rather than simply bombarding participants with
information.
• Build early successes for the participants in the programs.
• Provide positive feedback to the participants that are doing well, have the
capabilities they need to meet their goals and have our confidence.
• Structuring and approaching all events with the intention to maximise positive
emotions of the participants.
Human Capital (knowledge, skills, abilities)
• Provide practical programs which increase knowledge, and vitally skills, on how
communities’ can better prepare for flooding including:
o Understanding early warning systems
o How to protect property & possessions
o Building Community Emergency/Resilience plans
o Demonstrations of sandbag use
o First aid
o How to contact emergency services
o Possibly the Serious game?
o Emotional first aid
o River Alert systems
o Leadership Skills
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Physical resources
• Help communities identify safe evacuation places.
• Give out:
o Emergency Grab bags
o First aid kits.
• Help communities access sandbags and plastic sheets
Interconnectedness (organisation, social capital, building bonds)
• Leadership training for local leaders to increase their ability to positively represent,
organise and influence their communities.
• Help build a sense of community by :
o Embedding celebration or road show events within a greater celebration or
incorporating a celebration of local culture and history.
o encourage communities to create more of their own historical/cultural events
themselves depending on the advice of any community building experts that
may come to give a workshop
• Help build place attachment by including local pictures of landmarks etc. and maps
in our promotional materials and well as road show and workshop paraphernalia.
• Create workshops/events in which members of the different communities engage
with each other to foster inter-community connectedness.
• Additionally you could find ways to make these intercommunity relationships more
structured and thus sustainable (a once a year meet up for discussion, decision
making and skill refreshing)
• Introduce communities to emergency responders etc. with a particular emphasis on
building continuing relationships and trust.
// 18
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// 19
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