Connecting Food Movements
Multi-day virtual events
90+ participants from 5 countries
2 live artistic performances
Trilingual meeting, conducted in Spanish, Haitian Creole and English
Interactive activities using Padlet and Zoom
These multi-day virtual events brought together diverse partners across Tribal Nations, USA, Mexico, and Haiti. We provided simultaneous interpretation to Haitian Creole and Spanish, and had two beautiful live artistic performances. We used Padlet for participants to self-organize, visually share ideas and discuss themes in small breakouts and designed the agenda with several interactive activities. The event was recorded in 3 languages and shared with the client.
The main challenge was that the events were scheduled in August 2021, immediately following a magnitude 7.2 earthquake in Haiti and several tsunami warnings. We held an emergency meeting with the client to pivot our planning. It was decided that the event would be postponed, and of course there was no charge for these changes, given the circumstances. The client was grateful not only for our ongoing flexibility, but specially for our solidarity and the sensitivity we showed. While we pushed the events weeks after the earthquake, quality internet access continued to be a challenge for some participants.
When we show solidarity and empathy with our client’s challenges, that translates into a lot of trust and loyalty. This trust enabled us to be flexible and open as we adapted to changing circumstances and challenges that arose.
Despite the challenges, the events were a success, with high levels of engagement and client satisfaction. Since then, we have had many follow-up contracts with the same client and a new contract from a participant at the event who witnessed how well we managed the back-end and tech support for a diverse, collaborative event.
© Neolé 2021