“Listeners should expect refreshing and new voices from me. The plan is to put Africa on the map.” - Whitney Ogutu

In the middle of July, we announced that we were searching for a new podcast correspondent to  help us expand the stories we tell. We had an incredible response to the program–117 applications! We decided in the end to bring on not just one, but two correspondents: Marjorie Anderson and Whitney Ogutu.

We’ve been training Marjorie and Whitney over the past few months on our editorial voice, how to do outreach, how to interview, and to edit, and we’re excited to share that they've recorded their interviews. 

In advance of hearing her first episode, today we will introduce you to the cerebral, sincere, kind-hearted Whitney Ogutu who comes to us from Nairobi, Kenya. Whitney leads Community Engagement and Programs at Mettā Nairobi, a community, and innovation hub that supports startups, entrepreneurs and innovators. 

She is an investor in people and their potential, which she traces back to her first memories of local chamas, a Kenyan community format for brainstorming and taking actions on local problems.

Over the next few months, Whitney will be sharing stories of community leaders on the podcast but first we wanted to share hers. 

👋🏻Say hi to Whitney on Twitter: https://twitter.com/WhitneyOgutu

This podcast was created by the team at People & Company. 

🔥Say hi! We would love to get to know you.

We published GET TOGETHER📙, a handbook on community-building. 

And we help organizations like Nike, Porsche, Substack and Surfrider make smart bets with their community-building investments.

Hit subscribe🎙 and head over to our website to learn about the work we do with passionate, community-centered organizations.

Meet Whitney Ogutu 🎙“Get Together” Podcast Correspondent

“Community doesn't require that you have the same opinions. It just requires that you share a passion.” - Marjorie Anderson 

In the middle of July, we announced that we were searching for a new podcast correspondent to  help us expand the stories we tell. We had an incredible response to the program–117 applications! We decided in the end to bring on not just one, but two correspondents: Marjorie Anderson and Whitney Ogutu.

We’ve been training Marjorie and Whitney over the past few months on our editorial voice, how to do outreach, how to interview, and to edit, and we’re excited to share that they've recorded their interviews. 

In advance of hearing her first episode, today we will introduce you to the playful, diligent, sunshine-energied Marjorie Anderson. By day she leads the community at Project Management Institute. In the evenings, she runs her own community and blog, Community by Association. 

Marjorie, in her words, “makes a great dinner party host but a terrible dinner party guest.” While  an introvert, Marjorie is an orchestrator of connection with a gift for bringing people together.

👋🏻Say hi to Marjorie and learn more about Community by Association: https://communitybyassociation.com/

This podcast was created by the team at People & Company. 

🔥Say hi! We would love to get to know you.

We published GET TOGETHER📙, a handbook on community-building. 

And we help organizations like Nike, Porsche, Substack and Surfrider make smart bets with their community-building investments.

Hit subscribe🎙 and head over to our website to learn about the work we do with passionate, community-centered organizations.

Meet Marjorie Anderson 🎙 “Get Together” Podcast Correspondent

Note: we will discuss sexual assault in this episode and advise our listeners to practice discretion in tuning in.

“Everybody's story is valid. The fact that people feel they cannot speak up about their own pain is my motivator.” - Onyango Otieno

At twenty years old, Ongyango Otieno was the victim of sexual assault and found he had no where to turn. In Kenya, as in many other societies, the patriarchal structure turns a blind eye to the sexual experiences of men. Men are socially conditioned to hold in their pain.   

Because of his background as a storyteller, Onyango instead began writing about his experience. In sharing his story on Facebook and Twitter, he found “some kind of liberation.”

Onyango continued exploring African masculinity and advocating for mental health, and eventually put up a post sharing that he was starting a WhatsApp-based mental health support group.

Over 200 people raised their hands to join him there. 

Onyango put these folks into two groups and offered some basic community guidelines that allowed members to define the space the way they wanted. Today they call these groups Nyumbani, which is Swahili for “home.”

We talked with Onyango about structuring a community support group starting with community guidelines and his personal self-care as he leads people to unpack trauma. 

Highlights, inspiration, & key learnings:
-  Sending a signal. Onyango sent a call for men who wanted to join a support group.
-  Watering hole. Gathering on WhatsApp and creating community guidelines.
-  Healing circles. A participatory shared activity where men share stories of sexual assault, often for the first time. 
-  Self-care. Onyango’s practices to check in with his emotions.

👋🏻Say hi to Onyango (onyangohome@gmail.com) and learn more about Nyumbani

✨Say hi to Whitney Ogutu, “Get Together” correspondent: https://twitter.com/WhitneyOgutu 

📄See the full transcript: https://bit.ly/Onyango-Otieno

This podcast was created by the team at People & Company. 

We published GET TOGETHER, a handbook on community-building 📙:  https://amzn.to/2SxKUCO

And we help organizations like Nike, Porsche, Substack and Surfrider make smart bets with their community-building investments. 

Hit subscribe🎙 and head over to our website to learn about the work we do with passionate, community-centered organizations✨: people-and.com

Room for reimagining masculinity 🤝Onyango Otieno, Nyumbani

“Leadership is actually the first few followers, not the crazy person who did something on stage.” - Anna McAfee

In May 2017, Anna McAfee put up a simple post on LinkedIn to see if anyone living in her hometown of Coffs Coast, Australia wanted to get together. She had just returned after years of living abroad and wanted to “get to know the people behind the profiles” in her area. 

Anna included the hashtag #LinkedInLocal. Fifteen people made it out to the first Coffs Coast event, but the online response was what would change Anna’s life. 

Three strangers—Alexandra Galviz in London, Manu Goswami in NYC, and Erik Eklund in Brussels—raised their hand to also host a #LinkedInLocal in their city. No one could predict what happened next.

Host requests started pouring in from around the world. The founding team was soon hosting after-hours trainings six nights a week to help new cities ramp up. For two years, Anna and her co-creators led, mentored and managed the #LinkedInLocal global community. At its height, #LinkedInLocal had more than 1,000 hosts and had rallied over 300,000 humans, in 650+ cities across 92 countries. 

Anna & co. fostered this community without formal support from LinkedIn. She walked a fine line between an unexpected, organic community and the priorities of the platform. In 2019, Anna stepped away and she recently co-authored a book about her experience: How a Hashtag Changed the World.

We talked with her about creating a host community and the friction that can appear when an organic community erupts on a major platform.

Highlights, inspiration, & key learnings:
-  Anna defines personal why. Searching for belonging in her local community, Anna used the tool she knew best--LinkedIn.
Identify the “who” of #LinkedInLocal. The power of a network of hyper local communities.
-  Balancing inclusion and exclusion. #LinkedInLocal’s first core value: diversity.
-  Cultivating your identity. Building an organic community within the guidelines of a major brand. 
-  Support leaders. Anna played the role of connector--making connections within the host communities, helping hosts help themself. 

👋🏻Say hi to Anna and grab a copy of her book: https://au.linkedin.com/in/annamcafee 

✨Thank you to Mia Quagliarello, “Get Together” correspondent, for spotlighting Anna’s story with us: https://twitter.com/miaq

📄See the full transcript: https://bit.ly/Anna-McAfee  

This podcast was created by the team at People & Company. 
We published GET TOGETHER, a handbook on community-building 📙:  https://amzn.to/2SxKUCO

And we help organizations like Nike, Porsche, Substack and Surfrider make smart bets with their community-building investments. 

Hit subscribe🎙 and head over to our website to learn about the work we do with passionate, community-centered organizations✨: people-and.com

How a movement took over LinkedIn 🗺Anna McAfee, #LinkedInLocal

“You don't have to be a celebrity or a mega influencer to take action and host an event. A hundred people or a thousand people don’t have to attend. It can be five people. That impact is still impact. ” - Nicole àBeckett 

Just after the 2016 U.S. election, many people were saying, “I want to do more to get involved but I don’t know how.” Nicole àBeckett and her brother, David, knew there had to be a better way to bring people together for action on issues that matter. 

They started SameSide with a simple idea—to incorporate civic engagement within existing communities. Based in LA, Nicole worked with a local named Phil in March of 2017 to host the first event. 

Phil had a large network of friends and rallied them just after the Women’s March to campaign for Sarah Hernandez, a candidate for Senate in California. Together with SameSide he paired phone banking with a brewery tour. While phone banking was intimidating to some, the brewery tour with friends nudged fifteen of Phil’s buds cross the threshold to activism. 

Through SameSide, this accessible activism model has been employed at scale. SameSide offers hosts the tools to learn and take action on issues. A host's job isn’t to be an expert; it’s to conviene people around something they care about. The Standard Hotel is hosting pool parties advocating for gun safety.  A woman celebrating her birthday wove in efforts to support ending the rape kit backlog in California. 

We talked with Nicole about how she has empowered hosts with tools to gather folks around what they care about to take action.

Highlights, inspiration, & key learnings:
- Origin story. The beginning of integrating civic action with existing experiences and communities.
- Supporting leaders. How Nicole instills confidence and educates hosts on civic issues with issue baked tool kits.
- Ramping up the purposeful and participatory in activities. The tools Nicole offers hosts to make events action focused.
- Leaders roadmap. Nicole utilized email campaigns to plant the seed for folks to take their first action and build up to hosting. 

👋🏻Say hi to Nicole and learn more about SameSide: https://onsameside.com/ 

✨Say hi to Marjorie Anderson, “Get Together” correspondent: https://twitter.com/MarjorieAyyeee 

📄See the full transcript: https://gettogether.fm/episodes/nicole-abeckett/transcript 

This podcast was created by the team at People & Company. 
We published GET TOGETHER, a handbook on community-building 📙:  https://amzn.to/2SxKUCO

And we help organizations like Nike, Porsche, Substack and Surfrider make smart bets with their community-building investments. 

Hit subscribe🎙 and head over to our website to learn about the work we do with passionate, community-centered organizations✨: people-and.com

Supercharging grassroots political action in our communities 📢 Nicole àBeckett, SameSide

A show about ordinary people building extraordinary communities that bridge the gaps between us. Hosted by the co-founders of People & Company and co-authors behind "Get Together: How to build a community with your people," Bailey Richardson, Kevin Huynh and Kai Elmer Sotto, and our friends Mia Quagliarello and Maggie Zhang. Learn more about our community coaching services at peopleand.company or get a copy of our book at gettogetherbook.com 🔥