Creating, supporting and managing collective impact initiatives requires a separate organization/entity with staff and a specific set of skills to serve as the “backbone” for the entire initiative and to coordinate partner organizations and agencies.
In keeping with a collective impact framework, a backbone staff team of three was recruited in 2015 to support the collective impact work of WPRC.
Jill’s work focuses on bringing people from different backgrounds and sectors together around complex social challenges to create meaningful change. She has worked with diverse groups across the country on issues ranging from urban homelessness to rural resiliency, has designed and taught post-secondary courses on social innovation and systems change, and has presented on these topics internationally.
She is committed to working with people to co-create the change they imagine for themselves and their communities.
Jill holds an MBA from the University of Calgary and she is currently working towards a Doctor of Social Sciences at Royal Roads University exploring the complex, real-world challenges facing our communities and ways to address these through participatory processes.
Kahla is passionate about helping people and communities and hopes to facilitate creative solutions that positively impact quality of life.
Kahla holds a Master of City Planning from the University of Manitoba, which she completed in 2020. Throughout her graduate studies, Kahla focused on issues around food insecurity, inequitable access to housing, Indigenous planning, and community development. Her major research project looked at Indigenous food sovereignty and how this is being addressed and implemented into First Nations comprehensive community plans.
Prior to starting with the United Way, Kahla worked with End Homelessness Winnipeg on developing a Housing Supply Baseline. This experience gave her the opportunity to reach out and get to know local organizations providing social housing and community services to people who are experiencing, or at risk of experiencing homelessness.
