A new City of Campbell River initiative aims to help local business owners wade through a tide of information.
The city’s economic development department is hosting twice-a-week virtual meet-ups with a different theme for every session.
Rose Klukas, the city’s economic development officer, said the goal of the sessions to take some of the resources and information being offered to small businesses and help contextualize it for local use.
“It’s an opportunity for people to connect with each other, and that might be the most valuable thing” she said.
The first session, which was held Wednesday morning, focused on working remotely and featured guest expert Andreas Hagen.
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The second session was scheduled for Thursday evening, from 6 – 7 and focused on supporting employees during “these challenging times.”
The session featured Crystal Henrickson and Annika Reinhardt from Talent Collective, self-described “people whisperers” who are experts in supporting small business needs.
The session topics are being catered to Campbell River-area business needs.
“We want to hear from businesses and then maybe we’ll be able to flesh out our list of topics in the coming weeks, based on what we hear is the need,” said Klukas.
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Session 3, “Health Related Strategies to Flatten COVID-19” is planned for next Weds., April 1 from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m.
The meetings are held on Zoom, an online video communications platform that has risen in popularity over the course of the last few weeks.
Klukas said the meetings will continue weekly (Wednesdays from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. and Thursdays from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m.) for the foreseeable future.
All the meeting information and resources are being posted on the techatchery website, which is the city’s brand for growing the local innovation sector. It was launched just before Christmas.
“We want to support local businesses. We want to shop local,” said Klukas. “We want to hear from businesses and we’ll do our best to support them in any way we can.”
Information about COVID-19 is constantly changing. The Campbell River Mirror recommends visiting our website ( https://www.campbellrivermirror.com/tag/coronavirus/ ) for the most up-to-date information. Other reliable resources are Provincial ( http://covid-19.bccdc.ca/ ), Federal ( https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/diseases/coronavirus-disease-covid-19.html )and Local ( http://campbellriver.ca/ )governments, and local health authorities ( https://www.islandhealth.ca/health-alerts ). Due to the rapidly changing nature of the information, be sure to always check the date and time of your news, and ensure information you’re sharing is up-to-date and accurate to prevent the spread of misinformation.
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