Adventures in Cross-Canada Travel and Training

In May and June 2023, I had the wonderful opportunity to travel across Canada and lead workshops on fundraising, equity, ethics, and decolonization for international cooperation organizations. These workshops part of the Building Equity series, which my team and I offered with Spur Change, the Global Affairs Canada-funded program focused on building capacity of small and medium-sized organizations working in the international cooperation sector across Canada. Each individual workshop was offered in partnership with regional or provincial councils for international cooperation, who organized the venue and logistics, invited participants and co-hosted workshops in their communities.

The in-person workshops began in Charlottetown on May 17th , continued in Toronto and Winnipeg on May 24th and 26th , and wrapped up in Edmonton and Saskatoon on June 4th and 6th . The workshops took place in a variety of venues, from community centres to business incubators. It was incredible to be facilitating in-person learning again! These workshops were followed by 2 sets of online workshops en francais and in English, which sparked meaningful and thought-provoking conversations.In each location, I was deeply appreciative of the engagement and enthusiasm of the participants, all of whom are working hard to make change for communities in Canada and around the world.

Participants represented a diverse group of organizations, everyone from financial literacy to youth leadership to women’s rights focused groups. We had engaging conversations on how to integrate principles of community-centric fundraising, localization & decolonization and ethical storytelling with effective tactics and practical strategies. We explored the challenges of communicating clearly about complex and nuanced international issues, while centering the voice, leadership and impact of local communities. We explored how to thoroughly and thoughtfully integrate anti-racist and decolonizing principles into our fundraising work. We practiced giving elevator pitches on our organizations and presenting a compelling case to different donor audiences. And we had lots of fun—laughing, learning and pushing ourselves to do better in all our work.I love facilitating trainings and engaging with participants.

At JN Clarke Consulting, we are increasing our training and workshop offerings focused on government relations strategy and content. We are also happy to create custom trainings for your team or organization based on your specific needs!

Feel free to reach out to learn more!