Today was the best bir­th­day ever!  My 53rd bir­th­day wish was to raise money for the Sha­ring Foun­da­tion to send 53 Cam­bo­dian Young­sters to school by cove­ring the cost of their uni­forms ( per child).  We cru­shed that goal and rai­sed ‚540 because of your gene­ro­sity in dona­ting and cal­ling atten­tion to the bir­th­day wish. That means 454 young­sters will be able to attend school in Cam­bo­dia and hope­fully, fine, a route out of poverty.

But there was some­thing else at play for me this year, my fourth, cele­bra­ting my bir­th­day with social media and a net­wor­ked fun­drai­sing cam­paign for the Sha­ring Foun­da­tion …

Bora Vuth, a young man from Cam­bo­dia who is atten­ding col­lege here in US, put his fin­ger on it as he joi­ned 136 other peo­ple on Face­book who dona­ted to the Sha­ring Foun­da­tion. Kami Watson Huyse calls this a shared accom­plish­ment. It makes you feel good to give and cele­brate and be part of a net­work of peo­ple doing the same.  Like the chil­dren in the orpha­nage mana­ged by the Sha­ring Foun­da­tion who cele­brate their bir­th­day on the same day once a year,  it felt like eve­ryone was having a bir­th­day today!   

One of things I’ve lear­ned about social media and doing fun­drai­sing for cau­ses is that you will be sur­pri­sed!   And lit­tle did I know that Amy Sam­ple Ward and Sta­cey Monk were plan­ning one hell of a sur­prise party!   In a goo­gle docu­ment, some how they put the word out and 66 peo­ple signed up to blog and tweet about the bir­th­day wish pro­pel­ling its suc­cess!   But they also asked to share how I’ve impac­ted their work, and by poin­ting that out has been crea­ted a very mea­ning­ful bir­th­day gift.

Rea­ding the bir­th­day gree­tings and blog posts, made me thing about net­work wea­ving and how much Chri­stine Egger and I have lear­ned from June Hol­ley recen­tly.   I’ve had the honor to work many peo­ple who are using social media for social change or fun­drai­sing, sup­port their work, cheer them on, and learn from them.  So, being able do some real time net­work wea­ving while the bir­th­day cam­paign was unfol­ding was highly satsifying.

I met Spen­cer Brod­sky last Decem­ber when he was doing a fun­drai­ser cam­paign for his pro­ject in Rwanda. He hel­ped me with rea­ching my influen­cers on Twit­ter.  And con­nec­ted with Mark Hor­vath. I noti­ced dozens of these con­nec­tions and faci­li­ta­ted a few.   It’s like we’re all wor­king toge­ther, infor­mally, in a net­wor­ked way to sup­port one another’s work.

In rea­ding all the blog posts, it is remin­ding me that rela­tion­ships are not tran­sac­tions and deve­lo­ped over time through a series of oppor­tu­ni­ties to work toge­ther.  For exam­ple,  in rea­ding Alli­son Fine’s post, the coau­thor with me of our for­th­co­ming book, The Net­wor­ked Non­pro­fit, I rea­li­zed that we’ve known each other through out blogs since 2006.   There are other col­lea­gues that I’ve met through social media and pro­ba­bly wouldn’t have known or wor­ked toge­ther if it had not been for this new con­nec­ted, for exam­ple Nick Booth and Steve Brid­ger.

When Amy posted that Tweet, I was on my way to be a guest instruc­tor at a Stan­ford Busi­ness School Class, the Power of Social Tech­no­logy taught by Jen­ni­fer Aaker.  I got to teach two back to back ses­sions of the class and it was exhi­la­ra­ting.  When I pee­ked at my Twit­ter stream and saw the happy bir­th­day tweets, Face­book wall posts, and blogs, I nearly fell off my chair!

Well, I’m rol­ling up my slee­ves as Jor­dan V would say and as Sean Power sug­gests will be wri­ting a post to share insights about what I’ve lear­ned from today’s action lear­ning expe­ri­ment about real time trac­king, ana­ly­tics, metrics, and reflec­tion.  I’ll also share some insights about instruc­tion.   But it is late, and time for bed!

For now, enjoy Amy Sam­ple Ward’s reflec­tion on cro­wd­sour­cing a sur­prise party!

Thank you!