By Dane Waters

Community media has shown to be a powerful tool to help build communities, as it enables communities to talk, listen and then develop strategies to take action to build healthier communities. This is why we are so passionate about training communities to use community media in their own community. An important reminder though is that the underlying foundations of any community development strategy is built on relationships and trust.

I was reminded of this recently, when a community service asked me to attend a workshop and assist with producing community media product to support a mental health project. While it had been a particularly busy time with many deadlines, I committed as we always try to say yes, and the task should have only taken 20-30 minutes. On arrival all training participants were hesitant and did not want to be involved, so instead I became involved in the workshop and spent time building relationships with those there. As the afternoon progressed all the participants felt it was a worthy project and then participated in developing community media messages to help the community with mental health. Even though it then took 2.5 hours, it was definitely worth it.

Giving time is key to building relationships which is foundational to community development.