Reflections on The Big Map

Author: Belinda Young

In mid-November, I attended The Big Map, a resilience exercise run by Disaster Relief Australia. I’m sharing these reflections not as a review of the workshop, but because it highlighted something much bigger - the ongoing gap in how communities are included in disaster planning, and a missed opportunity that many of us have experienced before. Before I continue, I want to stress that this wasn’t a negative experience by any means, but a reminder of how important it is to involve communities in shaping the conversation from the start.

The exercise itself was impressive: a giant floor-sized map of the Yarra Ranges and the surrounding suburbs, laid out in a way that made our connections, vulnerabilities and shared responsibilities visible. But standing on that map also stirred up deeper questions:

If our communities, council and emergency services are this interconnected, why are our conversations about disaster resilience still so siloed? What can we do about it?

That was the first question, more than the workshop format, that prompted me to write this.

For most of the day, participants were encouraged to step into a scenario and consider how communities might respond during and after a major bushfire. We also listened as representatives from well-structured, hierarchical, emergency-focused organisations walked us through their operational responses. Their clarity, coordination and defined processes were impressive—and absolutely essential in a crisis.

But when I was asked how communities respond, I offered the honest, unpolished truth:
“We’ll likely do what we want or need to do.”

Wow, that silenced the room.

Making Sense of Our Mars-and-Venus Approach to Emergencies

I believe that this situation can feel a bit like a modern-day Mars and Venus: two worlds with different structures and rhythms, both trying to make sense of the same challenge from entirely different cultural planets. Agencies arrive with incident action plans and radio channels; communities arrive with group chats and someone’s cousin who “heard something from a mate.”

When I dropped that bombshell of a statement, I didn’t say it because communities are stubborn, and not because they distrust services, but because, like the Mars and Venus analogy, community structures and emergency service organisations operate in fundamentally different ways.

Emergency agencies depend on command-and-control systems, predefined procedures, formal communication channels, strict safety protocols and centralised decision-making—structures that exist for good reason and save lives.

Communities, however, work entirely differently. They move through informal networks built over years, through relationships rather than hierarchies, and through instinctive trust pathways shaped by everyday interactions. Information spreads through word of mouth, local chats and online groups; decisions are influenced by personal obligations, family needs and the immediate realities in front of people. Community decision-making is decentralised. Yes, it can be messy and chaotic, but always grounded in lived experience. These two systems aren’t opposed, but they do behave very differently under pressure.

Once we recognise that communities operate through relationships, trust and informal networks, another issue comes into focus. These networks don’t disappear in a crisis—if anything, they become even more important. Which leads naturally to the next, often overlooked question:

How do organisations build those habits and create trust organically?

These two systems aren't opposed, but they do behave very differently under pressure. Once we recognise that communities operate through relationships, trust and informal networks, another issue comes into focus: how do organisations build those habits and create trust organically?

The truth is, trust can’t be switched on during a crisis. It has to be earned steadily, in the same everyday spaces where community life already happens.

Organisations create habit and trust when they stop appearing only in emergencies and start becoming part of the normal rhythm of community life. That means being visible outside disaster seasons, showing up where people naturally gather, and participating in conversations that aren’t solely about risk or response. When agencies post in community groups between emergencies—sharing small updates, answering questions, joining local discussions without judgement—it normalises their presence. It turns them from “the people who appear when things go wrong” into familiar names and voices people recognise.

Trust grows organically when organisations speak human-to-human rather than role-to-public, when their information is honest, timely and consistent, and when they listen as much as they broadcast. It builds when they acknowledge what they don’t know as openly as what they do. And it deepens when community members see the same faces and hear the same tone over time, rather than only in the high-pressure moments.

Most importantly, trust becomes habit-forming when agencies partner with the networks people already use—schools, kinders, neighbourhood houses, sports clubs, local groups, and yes, online communities. When an organisation shares information through the channels community members are already habitually using, it teaches people to look for them there. Over time, this becomes familiar. Expected. Natural.

Agencies don’t need to manufacture trust; they need to embed themselves into the existing ecosystem of everyday life.

That’s how trust becomes organic and that’s how habits are formed long before a disaster ever begins.

An Often Overlooked Question

If relationships and routines shape how people behave in an emergency, then we need to look more closely at what becomes of the very groups that hold those relationships together.

What happens to the network of community groups during a disaster?

We talk endlessly about community resilience, but almost never about the resilience of the groups themselves. If we know communities lean hardest on familiar groups in an emergency, then here’s the uncomfortable question: What happens when those groups are displaced, overwhelmed or offline?

• Do they relocate?

• If so, where? And, how do they keep operating?

• How can agencies support this, instead of assuming the work simply stops or continues in the same location with the same people at the helm?

I’ve yet to see a multi-agency and community workshop genuinely grapple with these questions and it’s a conversation we urgently need. These groups don’t sit outside the disaster, they are affected by it, displaced by it, overwhelmed by it. Yet, they’re still expected to act as steady sources of support, information and reassurance, often long after the agencies have left. If their leaders are evacuated, if their meeting places are inaccessible, or if admins of online communities are impacted, under pressure or offline, the entire flow of trusted information can collapse exactly when it’s needed most.

Understanding the vulnerabilities, mobility, and needs of community groups is essential because they are not just passive stakeholders, but the first line of connection for families, neighbours and whole townships. If we want stronger, safer, more coordinated emergency response, we must ensure the networks people habitually turn to are themselves supported, included and able to function when disaster strikes.

Online Communities - Always Behind You… Whether You Like It or Not

There’s a great Japanese idiom, kingyo-no-fun—which literally means “goldfish poop.” It describes something (or someone) that just can’t help but follow you around, no matter how hard you try to swim away. That’s kind of what online community groups are to emergency organisations. They’re the goldfish poop of the disaster world. Agencies push forward with their plans, strategies and official comms… and there we are, bobbing along right behind them. Not exactly glamorous, definitely not tidy, but absolutely impossible to ignore.

The funny thing is, emergency services often act like if they just don’t look at us, we won’t be there. But there we are, sharing updates, answering questions, calming nerves, and spreading information faster than any official channel ever could. You don’t have to like goldfish poop… but pretending it’s not there doesn’t stop it from trailing faithfully behind. In this case, it might even save you a whole lot of trouble if you gave it a bit of attention.

Online groups like Mums of the Hills hold thousands of residents who instinctively look to each other for updates, reassurance, explanations and advice. That makes these groups both incredibly valuable, vulnerable and risky.

• Without support, admins can become overwhelmed.

• Without training, misinformation can spread quickly.

• Without connection to agencies, communities can act on incomplete or inaccurate plans.

I’ve been actively advocating for a forum—a structured space—where admins from community groups can work alongside emergency services to talk openly about these challenges. Admins need guidance on how to manage an online group before, during and after a disaster. This isn’t because they want to become responders, hell no, but because communities are already treating them like one.

This isn’t a criticism of any agency. It’s an acknowledgement of where people actually go for information under stress. It’s a recognition that community groups are not just “nice-to-have” additions to a resilience plan, but essential infrastructure that can share information quickly and consolidate updates from multiple sources—something many agencies legally can’t do. They can also calm fears, correct rumours, and encourage people to make safer decisions.

But only if they’re brought into the process early, and supported consistently.

The Big Map workshop made our connections impossible to miss, but the conversations that followed revealed something just as striking: how differently we all operate once the pressure’s on. It’s a bit Mars and Venus out there—emergency agencies arriving with structure, hierarchy and colour-coded plans, while communities move through group chats, gut feelings and whoever “heard something from a mate.” Meanwhile, in the middle of it all, online community groups trail along behind every official update like loyal kingyo-no-fun—the goldfish poop no agency can outrun—translating, interpreting and occasionally causing chaos.

Our hope for future workshops is to discuss the topics that almost no one stops to ask. What happens to community groups themselves and their networks when disaster hits? These are the networks people turn to without thinking and central to the whole community response, yet often treated like they live on another planet entirely.

Importantly, let’s explore not only what communities can offer agencies, but what agencies can offer the neighbourhood friendships, school-gate networks and online groups that carry the emotional, social and informational load every single day. We might orbit differently, but we’re part of the same solar system.

We know that resilience isn’t built by Mars alone, or Venus alone, or the heroic goldfish swimming ahead. It’s built by all of us—agencies, organisations, neighbourhoods and very determined online groups—learning to move together long before the next emergency arrives.

We’ll keep pushing for those conversations and reminding everyone that community connection isn’t a nice extra. It’s the backbone… the heartbeat… and yes, sometimes the goldfish poop that refuses to let you swim off without it.