The following journal entries were either written by Cathy McCabe or were generated by AI trained on all the team communication over the project's duration. Any AI generated posts are clearly marked with a disclaimer.
The freelance experience
Introduction Everyone who worked on Belong in Plymouth did so in a part-time capacity. For some, it was part of a salaried role, but more than half of the ‘core team’ were self-employed. Part-time ho...
What do we mean by 'the system'?
While working on the Belong in Plymouth programme, we often found ourselves talking about ‘the system’ when we were discussing how things currently work and how we might effect change in our city. But...
Defining the 'vision' for Belong in Plymouth
In February 2022, the core team of Belong in Plymouth came together to create a Theory of Change for our work. This proved to be challenging due to the emergent nature of the work and the trickiness o...
Psychological safety and trust
Background In the winter of 2023-24, in my role as Learning Partner for the project, I interviewed 11 of the 18 ‘core team’ members of Belong in Plymouth. A common theme was psychological safety and ...
Navigating uncertainty and emergence
Uncertainty and emergence have characterized all aspects of the Belong in Plymouth journey. From the time we wrote our successful funding bid, things were kept pretty open. The core team wanted to all...
Making Sense of Belonging: From Insight to Action through Community Research
“There is massive value in the way that that has brought people into what it means to research and gather information and data…even if they've just touched on it…you can take some story of like, Marga...
The Importance of Intersectionality in Research
In late September 2022, a vibrant email conversation took off across the Belong in Plymouth network. The topic? Intersectionality—and how to embed it into every part of our community research. Jade W...
Launching a Community Research Group: Importance and Impact
In September 2022, Belong in Plymouth took a big step forward in its community research efforts by creating a dedicated group for those leading conversations across the city. Karen Pilkington kicked ...