The Power of Community, in its Truest Sense

As I write this I am overwhelmed with emotion, from the incredible outpouring of true community that I have recently been a part of – that deep down I feared no longer existed in such an intrinsic way. Much of what I do for a living surrounds the idea of leveraging community from a social marketing perspective –and using it to rally people behind a cause, or a company, or a movement for change. That is social media at its finest. The whole idea of social media in fact brings us back a couple generations to the small-town lifestyle where everyone knew everyone else in their community, where there was a constant social engagement, and everyone intrinsically helped their neighbours in times of need. Those days have sadly changed in most neighbourhoods today…. Or at least I thought they had. Gladly, I was proven wrong.

My young son attends a daycare, a part of a network of 3 childcare centres in a suburb outside of Toronto. About 2 weeks ago, we were told about a little 3-year-old boy who attends one of the 3 centres, who had been diagnosed with cancer and was immediately rushed to SickKids for surgery, and is now starting chemotherapy. It was every parent’s nightmare becoming reality for this boy’s family.

I had never met, and will likely never know, this boy or his family – and yet they are a part of our community. The daycare is a core part of our life – where my little boy, just like theirs, spends a majority of his waking hours. His daycare is a part of our daycare network, and therefore a part of the extended family. As I’m sure with every parent, his story really hit home, his pictures bringing tears to my eyes, and my compassion immediately reaching out to his parents. While life as they knew it stopped for this family, to tend to their boy, the daycare staff at the 3 centres immediately jumped into action to develop a fundraiser to help them out. They hosted a dance-a-thon where all the children of the 3 centres went out into the May sunshine and danced. For almost 90 minutes, the children had fun outside dancing, with contributions from their family and friends through purchases of cancer-society bracelets for the kids and donations to the family. I must admit – at first I hesitated on what (if anything) to give as a donation. I didn’t know these people. There are lots of causes out there. Did they really need financial support? Were there more “worthy” choices? My son is too young to collect donations… all of the typical barriers to action every non-profit faces. But of course I knew that this was a family, just like my own, whose lives had just been stopped in time. A family whose only focus right now was on saving their little boy. We are their community – and of course we should help. I wondered though if others in the daycare network would feel the same? They did.

This brings me back to the start of my story. Where I am sitting here in tears as the understanding of community truly washes over me, and the realization that it still exists in the real world, in this day and age, and in an off-line way. The parents of my son’s small daycare, families just like mine who are struggling with huge daycare payments of their own (on top of mortgages, commuting, etc), donated $6,200 to the fundraiser. The parents of the location that the boy himself attended, not surprisingly, raised even more. And the total of the small network of parents from the 3 centres, donated an incredible $26,000 to help this boy and his parents through a very difficult time.

So why am I writing about this on a CMA blog? Because it proves that the sense of community is alive and well, even with time-stressed young parents in Toronto. As marketers for organizations with a strong cause – we need to leverage this sense of community. We need to think about how to bring communities together (both online and offline), and to hit home in people’s hearts in a powerful way. And we need to teach our children (and ourselves) the power of compassion. I hope that all of the children in these 3 daycares were taught a very valuable lesson – that when someone needs our help, we help. That every person, no matter how small, can make a real difference in someone’s life. My son understands that his dancing made this other little boy happy. His Mom knows that the togetherness of community made a real difference to this boy’s parents. As a person, my faith in the intrinsic goodness of humanity has been restored, and I have developed a strong connection to a family who I will likely never meet thanks to the power of compassion. As a marketer, I have become even more committed to the idea of developing and leveraging community in its truest sense for my cause-marketing clients.

I hope you will take the same lessons.

Tags: Not-for-Profit, Social Media