Do you need a makeover?

Do you need a makeover? One of the newsletters I receive came out and said, I needed a makeover, so this is it. The newsletter went on to explain all the new bells and whistles that the author hoped would make the information more interesting and interactive.

COVID has brought about many changes and I think many makeovers, some were planned but I suspect some were just thrust upon the person or organization and done because to survive the makeover needed to be done.

One of the organizations I work on and am very proud of is the COSCO Health and Wellness Institute, (SeniorsHelpingSeniors.ca). The organization has been operating for 10 years and I have been active with them for five years. For those of you who do not know, we give in-person workshops on a variety of health and wellness issues for seniors. Since we started in 2007, (we became a registered charity in 2010) we have given workshops to over 50,000 seniors in BC. We started with two or three workshops and now have 44 workshops. COVID hit us hard, and the leadership team has struggled to find a path forward, we decided to go online. Our makeover started back in April and we started training our presenters (all volunteers) on how to give workshops on ZOOM. We revised 23 of our 44 workshops so they could be delivered online. We also revised our speaker notes for our presenters, our website, our sign-up procedures, our handouts as well as how we present.

A great deal of time, energy, and angst went into the makeover between April and August. We went to the 99 senior user groups we had been working with, at the beginning of August, and we wondered if they would buy into the new format. We had 25 requests for workshops in September and we have had over 44 workshop requests for October. We only have 18 of our presenters willing and trained to present online so that is about our maximum at this time.

Our makeover worked, now that we are online, we can present anywhere in the world if there are 10 or more seniors willing to connect to us in ZOOM and there is an organization willing to host us. We are in a brave new world and it is extremely exciting. To find out more about our online workshops go to our Webpage: COSCO Health and Wellness Institute, (SeniorsHelpingSeniors.ca).