Wanda HennigLeverage. Ubuntu. Sustainability. Transitions.

You’re the marketing director of a nonprofit — or perhaps the director if it’s a smaller organization. You know you need to add social media to your tool kit. Where to begin? Any good swim coach starts with a plan. You need one too. To ensure success, consider these five key points before you dive in.
By Wanda Hennig
1) Make sure the pool has water in it. In other words, have a handle on what you’re getting into.
This involves, on the one hand, learning about the tools. On the other, …

Story and photos by Wanda Hennig
First published in Sunday Life Magazine, South Africa
“I ENVY you. That’s just the sort of holiday I need. Somewhere to relax, space out and unwind.”

The comment comes from a colleague. We’re in the newsroom of the Sunday paper we’re both working on

Story and photos by Wanda Hennig
First published in the Sunday Tribune, South Africa
The Ufafa district, near Ixopo in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, is home to around 23,000 people. Families reside in a sprawling muddle of family compounds that stagger up hills and tumble into valleys, forming a jumbled patchwork of mud, thatch, concrete block and tin. The dwellings have no electricity. Water for drinking, washing, cooking and bathing is hand-pumped from underground wells and carried in plastic bucket and barrels. The area could have been forgotten. But — was it serendipity, karma or …

Story by Wanda Hennig
First published in Black Diamond Living magazine
It started with a routine morning scan of East Bay newspapers — part of the standard daily work drill for Devi Lanphere, CEO of the Antioch Chamber of Commerce in east Contra Costa County. This time the piece that caught her eye might not, at first glance, have seemed work-related. It announced an extreme makeover contest. Read more …

Do you Twitter, Facebook and have a bunch of people following your daily blog? If not and you feel you should — or need — to know how, go speak to Anca Mosoiu in her 14th Street technology hotspot and salon in Oakland. She’s committed to leveling the playing field, teaching social networking and essential web skills to da people.

What’s fabulously fresh, scrumptiously seasonal, lusciously local and satisfyingly sustainable?
By Wanda Hennig
First published in Alameda Magazine, November 2008
It’s 9:30 a.m. on a Saturday morning at Alameda’s Ploughshares Nursery, and Vera Ciammetti and Steve Rich are setting up an outdoor table. They fill a basket with long crispy loaves, fresh from the Feel Good Bakery oven. They slice the succulent heirloom tomatoes picked up from Dan’s Produce. They daub this impressionist’s palette of variegated shades of orange, yellow, red and green with leaves of fresh basil. They sprinkle sea salt …

It’s late at night and you’re in bed. The body to your left, pushing gentle zzzzs, radiates a comfortable warmth. The radio to your right plays softly. Your mental meanderings are suddenly jolted into focus by Rod Stewart’s voice. It’s golden oldie time and he’s warbling on about passion. “I need passion. You need passion. We need passion. Can’t live without passion.”

First you heard the ululations and the shrill whistle blasts. Then you saw the flags. A big one swirling above the heads of the multinational throng crowding the cavernous lobby area of the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, USA. And many smaller flags waving and dancing with their bearers.

Several in the party, which numbered around 35 at a quick count, were uniformed — if a collection of crazy head-consuming jester hats adorned with South African flag emblems and bells qualify as a uniform. A core group, it seemed, was there, to make noise. The less raucous were … Read more