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World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD), on 10 September, is organized by the International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP). The World Health Organization (WHO) has been co-sponsor of the day. The purpose of this day is to raise awareness around the globe that suicide can be prevented.

According to WHO, “in past years, over 300 activities in around 70 countries were reported to IASP, including educational and commemorative events, press briefings and conferences, as well as Facebook and Twitter coverage. Over 800,000 people die by suicide every year. Furthermore, for each suicide, there are more than 20 suicide attempts.

Suicides and suicide attempts have a ripple effect that impacts on families, friends, colleagues, communities and societies. Suicides are preventable. Much can be done to prevent suicide at individual, community and national levels.”

What does the day mean to me though….

I now know the facts but I didn’t know them before the day of 11th November 2013.

That was the day my best friend, identical twin sister, Elizabeth, decided it was time for her to leave this earth.

The first walk on Suicide Prevention Day that I went to was in Melbourne as the Mornington Peninsula did not have one yet. I remember the overwhelming feeling of driving an hour by myself and walking into this large park called Birrarung Marr that was filled with so many people. I was in awe by the number of people here and I didn’t know where to turn first but I remember people asking if I had put my loved ones name down to be called out. I quickly ran to put her name and age down. This was extremely important to me. Then I collected a purple ribbon, her favourite colour and put her name on it with a small note from me. I waited patiently with watery eyes as they started to call the names out. The tears flowed as I heard all of the names and ages, some so young and some so much older. They finally called her name out, Elizabeth Phillips aged 38. The tears kept flowing. There was no one there to hug or console me. It was just me remembering my twin sister and my best friend. This was a walk I was doing on my own and only with my sister.

I started attending the Frankston Support After Suicide Group thereafter and have been lucky enough to have found some very special people that have been extremely supportive over these past years. When the first Suicide Prevention Day Walk came to Mornington, I was happy there was a walk much closer to home. I met up at this walk with some of my support group and it was then that I realised I wasn’t so alone. The people that attend are all in my shoes… they have dealt with suicide in some way or another. We were all here to support each other, grieve and remember our lost loved ones, and most importantly give hope that we can keep going in life. I felt like I now had a support group and we all are helping one another. I wasn’t just grieving alone.

In 2019, I became a volunteer at Chasing Change. I wanted to make a difference and try to help others in any way possible. I felt so grateful to also volunteer at the Suicide Prevention

Day Walk this year. It was so empowering on a different level, being involved and feeling like I was making a difference. This year I knew more personal family & friends also attending.

I didn’t have time to prepare for my grief as I had so much else to prepare for. But as I walked up to the podium to read out a poem and some of the names and ages of our lost loves ones, I was physically trembling all over… from head to toe. These were names of loves ones that all of these people in this overwhelming crowd had lost, just like my twin Elizabeth. The moment when you read that persons name out loud it.. just felt so real and I had to fight to hold back the tears. The lump in my throat was so massive and the pain in my heart was so heavy… I just kept thinking… WHY?

Why did all of our loves ones think their time was up when it was just too soon?

Why did they need to leave us and feel there was no way that things could possibly get better…

I can’t tell you how many hugs and conversations were had after the walk.

I grieved for my sister dearly but I also grieved for all of our loved ones lost by suicide.

As we approach the 2020 walk, this year the theme is “WORKING TOGETHER TO PREVENT SUICIDE” again. It was felt appropriate to keep the same theme this year due to the ongoing world pandemic, we need to work together more than ever.

We can’t hold a walk this year on the Mornington Peninsula but we are coming together “online” to support one another in the best way that we can.

World Suicide Prevention Day now means to me….

• A day to remember my best friend and twin sis who I cry every day for. I will do a walk on my own & have a chat with her to remind her how much she is loved and missed. I will tie a ribbon as I have always done on my Queen Elizabeth rose bush that I planted for her and I will write that special message that I do each & every year.
• It is also a chance for me to reach out to my support group and all the new friends I have now made that are part of this suicide bereavement. We never asked to be in this group but here we are and we need to support one another.
• And finally it’s a day where we want to give HOPE.

This is a day to provide awareness to the community as well as support.

We want to connect people in every way possible so people know they are not alone….and if just one life is saved, then it has all been worth it.

Written by Rebecca Tyler

This blog is an opportunity to recap and reflect on another successful Suicide Prevention Walk. We wanted to take the time to give a brief overview of how the event went, what it included, what went well and what we learnt from this event.

2019 saw the Chasing Change Suicide Prevention Walk become the largest event we have run. The walk, which was run in September to align with the national suicide prevention week attracted over 1400 community members to come together to support each other in reflection and grief. The latest instalment of our annual event saw an increase in size of attendance, but also in what we could offer to the community. We had more entertainment, more food and coffee offerings and more presence from other local members which showcased the great collaborative effort from everyone involved.

For those who have not attended one of our annual walks, the event consists of both formal and informal proceedings. The event has been held in Mornington Park for the first three years and begins with an informal yet vibrant atmosphere of coffee, food, local stalls of support services and entertainment. This continues for the first part of the morning before more formal proceedings commence. At approximately 10am, the crowd is gathered as speeches are made by various community members. At this latest event we had Chasing Change members speak of their own personal loss to suicide, as well as other community members give speeches on various topics surrounding suicide, grief, loss, and the celebration of life. We then had a period of silence in which the names of loved ones who had been lost were read aloud. Immediately after this the walk was led by Chasing Change member Kate, in which a gentle walking lap of the park is made before participants are encouraged to tie a ribbon with the name of their lost loved one, around a memorial-like fence.

Our motivation and justification of why we run this specific event was clearer than ever after the 2019 event. We run this event because we see a real need in the community to give people the opportunity to come together and support each other at a local event, supported by other local members and groups.

What went well

The 2019 walk was a success on many fronts. It was our biggest attendance yet, and we were able to collaborate with more people and groups within the local community. There were two new things we implemented that stood out.

Firstly, the increase in collaboration with other community initiatives was a welcome and exciting development. We were lucky enough to have some great entertainment and the presence of a local business offering personalised candles. It was great to see our event grow and have the opportunity to collaborate with more like-minded people.

Secondly, the inclusion of a period of silence and the reading of lost loved one’s names provided a moving and reflective mood to the formalities. We received much anecdotal feedback that this was a welcome addition and really added to the feelings of support and grief that people experienced during the event. It was very validating to hear this feedback as we were uncertain how it would be received by the attendees.

What we learnt

As with any event it is important to recognise areas for growth and opportunity moving forward. The increased collaboration proved a successful strategy, something which we were pleased to learn. This provides evidence to us that this is a direction to pursue moving forward. We have always wanted the event to be bigger and better with more people involved and we learnt this year that getting the right people involved will only help connect with a larger and more diverse array of people.

We also learnt that logistics may hamper the growth of the event at the current location. We have had feedback over the years to expand the length of the walk, which we were excited by. But after looking into the specifics of doing so, we learnt that it would hamper the accessibility for attendees based on the physical layout of where we would have to extend the walk to. We took from this the possibility that the Mornington venue may have a limited capacity and if we wish to expand the walk, it may have to involve moving locations or alternatively having several simultaneous locations.

Conclusion:

All in all, the 2019 Suicide Prevention Walk was a success. We had larger attendance than ever before, as well as great anecdotal feedback about various additions we made to both the formal and informal sections of the event. We also learnt a lot about the potential growth of the event, recognising that collaboration with more like-minded local groups is an exciting opportunity to explore, whilst also acknowledging that logistically, we may need to reconsider location options if the size of the event is to continue to grow. But importantly, we are all still very motivated to deliver a meaningful event in 2020 – in whatever means that may be!

The business world is competitive, cut-throat, and ever evolving. Companies are consistently on the lookout for ways to get an edge on their competitors and stand out from the crowd. Often, businesses do this through cutting costs or expensive marketing campaigns. A strategy that is rarely utilised is to explore the benefits of partnering and supporting local community initiatives that are in place to solve social issues. This concept is built off the modern business strategy called ‘shared value’. Shared value is essentially the commitment to solve social issues in a profitable manner. The strategy itself can be quite difficult to implement for small to medium businesses, so instead, a shortcut to gain some of the same benefits the strategy possesses is to partner your for profit business with a not-for-profit business who are trying to solve these issues, and work with them to support them in their goals. This blog will give an explanation on three major benefits that can be gained from supporting not-for-profit organisations in a genuine, value driven manner.

 Firstly, and perhaps most obviously, is that by partnering with not-for-profit organisations your business and brand increases its customer loyalty. As a business, your customers are everything. Without them, you essentially have no business. The more loyal these customers are to your brand means that they continue to return to your business, time and time again, increasing your hold over the market. The reason partnering with not-for-profit organisations has this effect is relatively simple. People like to support businesses that support them and their communities. These same people are more likely to feel a sense of loyalty to your business when they know the money they spend is in some way working towards making their society a better place. It is the reason many of the best organisations make a strong emphasis on setting targets that go past just the profit margin. By doing this, you are making a long term investment into caring about your customers, and when companies care about their customers, customers care about companies.

Secondly, partnering with not-for-profits is a good indication to the world of the values you hold as a business. This helps grow your brand equity, which is an indication of how much value your brand holds within the market. Having stronger brand equity means that your brand is perceived as being of higher value, meaning that customers are happy to pay more or give greater commitment to your brand. This also allows your business to have greater marketability. Advertising that you have created a genuine relationship of support with a not-for-profit allows for engaging and beneficial content to be marketed to potential customers. This marketability helps grow your business and engage with more committed customers and therefore works in a cyclical nature of continuously improving your brand equity.

These benefits also lead to a greater resilience for your brand against external business threats. With the global landscape of business always changing, and external, uncontrollable threats such as the GFC and COVID-19 pandemic, it is as vital as ever to ensure your business is set up with withstand these risks. Partnering with a not-for-profit organisation and creating relationships which strengthen your brand equity and customer loyalty go a long way in helping businesses survive external threats. If you position your business to be in support of other organisations that are integral to solving social issues, then customers will be quick to reward you with their business in both the good times and the rough times.

Changes are occurring in the wider business landscape, and customers are now expecting more from businesses. Businesses that deliver a wider value offering to their customers and the communities their customers are a part of are positioning themselves to take their brand to the next level. The idea of shared value is born out of providing value for businesses, whilst solving social issues. It doesn’t have to be a trade-off, it should in fact be an advantageous strategy for all involved. Partnering with a not-for-profit is no longer a simple donation. Creating genuine and long lasting relationships with these organisations will go a long way to helping improve your business and providing value to the not-for-profit you choose to support.