As the start of each year arrives, many of us make commitments that focus on improving ourselves in a variety of ways, whether it’s health, career or family. But how many of us really think about how we can impact our communities in a more thoughtful way?
Toward the end of 2019, I had the opportunity to attend a full day meeting in Albuquerque on Building a Public Environmental Health Network. The room reflected diverse populations, including various professions, geographies, and socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds, all a reflection of New Mexico. The workshop featured some excellent, motivating speakers on the potential health impacts of our environmental actions. However, the best part of the day was connecting with the attendees during lunch and at breakout sessions in the afternoon.
For me, there were two major takeaways from the day. First, we still too often think in silos when we approach issues. We often think that some types of people or organizations have all the answers, and we don’t open the door wide enough to entertain multiple perspectives. When we combine diverse stakeholders, with different areas of professional expertise and perspectives, everyone benefits.
Second, when you get a diverse group of people into a room with passion for change and ask them to generate ideas, the ideas can be limitless and transformative. The group that I facilitated at the workshop filled multiple pages with strategies that could be used to make strong policy connections between public health and the environment, all with the goal of improving the physical and mental health of New Mexicans.
My passion in starting AMM Consulting is just that – to help connect people and organizations and to help them be heard. I want to use my years of experience, skills and passion in strategic planning, project management, public policy work, and communications and stakeholder outreach to help people and organizations make a real impact. I am excited about the prospects of people who want to achieve great things and will commit to the real work and connections it takes to get good results.
Good plans no longer come from top-down, hierarchical processes. They come from community connection and real dialogue. Think what we could achieve in our communities if we brought together various parties to discuss issues, provide perspectives and develop plans that reflect all our values and move us forward.
How will you commit to this way of moving forward in 2019? I look forward to working with all of you to help develop this path.
Amy