Yvonne Powley
Executive Officer
The Tamarack Collective Impact Summit, Vancouver BC Sept 28 – October 2, 2015
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Whakatauki Ehara taku toa, he taki tahi, he toa taki tini My success should not be bestowed onto me alone, as it was not individual success but success of a collective (Delivered at the conference by Te Ropu Poa, General Manager, Te Hau Ora O Ngāpuhi)
Carving at Musqueam Community Centre, Vancouver
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Table of Contents
1) Introduction and Acknowledgement...........................................................3
2) Definition Of Collective Impact................................................................3
3) NZ & Australian Delegates at the Summit (Photo)..........................................4
4) The Collective Impact Summit 2015..........................................................4
5) History – Collective Impact.....................................................................4
6) The Collective Impact Approach..............................................................4
7) Summary Overview of Key Learning’s........................................................6
8) Learning Lab Dialogues (Photo)...............................................................7
9) Daily Highlights from Tamarack...............................................................8
10) Yvonne Powley’s Personal Daily Highlights.................................................23
11) Conclusion .....................................................................................33
12) References.....................................................................................34
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Introduction
The following summary report is both my personal account of 5 days of experience of the Tamarack Summit as well as Tamarack’s own documented highlights. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of my time and have returned inspired by the many success stories I heard.
Acknowledgement: A special thank you to the Lottery Minister’s Discretionary Fund for the opportunity to attend the 2015 Tamarack Conference. Thank you also to the ANCAD Board and staff who encouraged and supported me to attend. The learnings were many and I am sure will provide inspiration to my work for some time to come. I hope this report with my conference daily highlights will provide inspiration from the many I received while attending the conference. Also a big thank you to the Tamarack staff who convened an excellent international event with over 250 attendees from around the world.
Definition of Collective Impact
Collective Impact (CI) is a framework to tackle deeply entrenched and complex social problems. It is an innovative and structural approach to making collaboration work across government, business, philanthropy, non-‐profit organisations and citizens to achieve significant and lasting social change.
The New Zealand and Australian delegates at the Summit
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Over 250 delegates from around the world, attended the 2015 Collective Impact Summit in Vancouver, a five day opportunity to learn about the effectiveness of implementing a Collective Impact approach. I was inspired by many internationally renowned thought leaders, hearing innovative ideas and projects from around the world and I am now a firm believer that Collective Impact offers New Zealand communities a path forward for working with large scale social change. History -‐ Collective Impact In 2011, John Kania and Mark Kramer of FSG Social Impact consultants published a paper providing a new way forward for communities. Collective impact, a framework for community and systems change, is built on three pre-‐conditions and five core conditions. The three preconditions are: 1) Making sure there are strong champions for this work; 2) Ensuring there is a sense of real urgency for change; and 3) Having resources to support the planning to do this work. A fundamental principle of the collective impact approach is that complex problems require a different way of working, as well as the intense enagement of a wide variety of influential partners who leverage their collective resources to drive outcomes. The Collective Impact Approach A collective impact approach requires that communities commit to engaging with all five conditions in the framework:
1) Building a common agenda, 2) Engaging in shared measurement, 3) Supporting the collaborative work through mutually reinforcing activities, 4) Keeping partners and the community engaged through continuous communications, and 5) Ensuring that the collective effort is supported by a backbone infrastructure. 1
The Tamarack Institute has been actively engaged in the evolving nature of collective impact efforts across Canada, the United States and internationally for the last 5 years. The success stories told at the conference and evidence produced showed that this collaborative way of working is achieving some excellent outcomes internationally. Liz Weaver lists six essential elements to collective impact:
1) Practice system leadership: System leaders have the capacity to both see and understand the complex problem from micro and macro perspectives. They bring a relentless focus to the health of the whole.
2) Embrace a framework: While each community or collaborative effort is unique, a framework provides a container for testing and proto-‐typing system changes.
1 Liz Weaver, Transformational Change is Possible 2015
The Collective Impact Summit 2015
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3) Assess Community Readiness: Change happens when all sectors of the community believe in the need for the change to occur and embrace their individual and collective contributions to this change.
4) Focus on data and measurement: Two of the most challenging elements of transformational change is maintaining the persistent focus on using data to inform the problem and identifying and tracking measures that lead to outcomes.
5) Communicate and Engage: Often seen as a peripheral element in community change efforts, a focus on communication and deep engagement is foundational.
6) Ask, What’s Next: Be curious about the future and embed continuous learning and reflection into the work.2
The readiness and enthusiasm to work collectively seems to be high in Canada. It has been less easy in the States as they are more drawn to the success of the individual, which is ingrained into the culture. It will be interesting to see how it can work in NZ as we are so used to a competitive, organisational model, although I can see it working far more easily for Maori. The rest of us will have to believe that the whole can deliver better than the sum of the parts.
2 Liz Weaver, Transformational Change is Possible 2015
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Summary overview of key personal learnings:
• Substantially greater progress could be made in alleviating many of our most serious and complex social problems if community organisations, central government, local government, businesses, philanthropists and the public (people with ‘lived experience’) were brought together around a common agenda to create collective impact. No one group on it’s own can solve large-‐scale problems.
• Collective Impact is a messy process. You don’t know what the outcome might be. Outcomes can be quite unexpected. Collective impact requires a big shift in thinking, a culture change.
• Collective impact efforts often take a long time to execute. It does not happen overnight. Large-‐scale change can takes years to accomplish.
• This requires a mindset shift among funders and grant makers to allocate funding to backbone support and to have the patience to allow the process to work and solutions to emerge. This is quite different from the current one-‐year grant cycle. Collective Impact must be resourced.
• Collective Impact is not a rigid model and can look different in different contexts. • The readiness and enthusiasm to work together is really important. • Developing shared measurement that everyone agrees on can be the most challenging part of
Collective Impact. Shared measurement is quite different to evaluation. The famous saying, “what gets measured gets managed” is important in Collective Impact.
• Keeping things as simple as possible without disguising the complexity of what’s happening on the ground is key.
• Structure is the key to collective impact and is more structured and rigorous than typical collaboration. The backbone function is really important for coordination, but as part of that backbone infrastructure you have shared cross sector governance as well as multiple working groups focusing on different parts of the problem. Collective Impact models do not rely on one single leader.
• It is important that government does not impose collective impact models or measurements. Each community context is different and one size does not fit all.
• Collective Impact is not the answer for every community. • Working with an emerging collective process can be very frustrating for those who like to follow
clear guidelines. • It is important to include people with “lived experience” at the table. • Progress is not always clear but is always iterative • The backbone organization/infrastructure serve six essential functions: Providing overall
strategic direction, facilitating dialogue between partners, managing data collection and analysis, handling communications, coordinating community outreach, and mobilizing funding. However, these functions can be accomplished through a variety of different structures.
• Collective Impact works differently from traditional service delivery approaches, the processes and results of collective impact are emergent rather than predetermined, the necessary resources and innovations often already exist but have not yet been recognized, learning is continuous, and adoption happens simultaneously among many organisations.
• It is perilous for funders to champion Collective Impact without understanding and investing in the backbone infrastructure.
• Collective Impact initiatives require up to five years to fully develop and begin showing concrete results (Liz Weaver)
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• When executed effectively Collective Impact can lead to progressive and substantial community impact at scale. With a common agenda driving collective action, shared measurement to assure progress is being achieved, mutually reinforcing activities that ensure alignment and contribute to the goals, continuous communications, and a backbone infrastructure that coordinates and supports the collective efforts.
• Building a common language is important, highlighting knowledge, skills and resources in the collective, affirming what each other knows and brings to the table which will regenerate a sense of energy, mission and purpose. Our communities have abundant capacity that we often overlook.
Learning Lab dialogues
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Day 1: Highlights (from Tamarack) Our Focus: Possible -‐ Making the Improbable Inevitable STACEY D. STEWART, US-‐PRESIDENT, UNITED WAY WORLDWIDE Case Example – (2006) Milwaukee Teen Pregnancy Initiative: improve teen pregnancy over 10 years
• Need to change the norms of the community; guerilla marketing (e.g. images of pregnant boys) • Teens designed and promoted initiative • Involved diverse stakeholders: schools, community-‐based organizations, universities, United
Way, health departments, parents, pharmacies, etc. • Results: teen birth reduced by 56% by 2015 across diverse groups
Engage community members including those most affected by the issue and provide the opportunity to provide their expertise and knowledge
• Benefits: allows for an authentic representation of the community’s perspective, fosters ownership by the community, builds trusts, allows the partnership to identify additional members/collaborators and allows the partnership to continuously learn and improve
Role of business community
• Rarely collaborate with each other; as a result, services are duplicated and creates a chaotic system
• Roles include: strategy, building public will and support, management expertise, advocacy, building support from leaders, funding, data gathering and analysis, etc.
Engage community funders
• Program Investing vs. Ecosystem Investing: transactional relationship to transformational approach; seek answers first to seek understanding first; invest in isolation to invest in respecting first; narrow and predictable impact to scaled and unpredictable impact; individual ownership to collective ownership; immediate return to sustained return
Align all potential assets in the community
• Deploy business leaders • Align funders • Mobilize community residents • Break through system siloes to address root cause
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Lessons Learned
• Funders want accountability and expect a direct line of site of the impact • Funder mistake: collaboration as an outcome rather than a tool to achieve change • Need to build different competencies in our leaders • For-‐profit business philosophies drive particular decisions that may not be beneficial • Analyse partnerships: what advantages does it bring? It is ok to say No • You can start small
LEARNING WALL HIGHLIGHTS Questions We Are Bringing • Creating sustainability; How do we build momentum and engagement? • How do you move from collaboration to collective impact? • How do we ensure that the voices of the most marginalized and vulnerable are heard? • How do we engage others? The unusual suspects? • How do you manage power differentials? • Where do we even start? • How do you create urgency for change? • What does success look like? • How do local efforts turn into systems change? • How do I apply the principles of collective impact to my work? • How do we best share the idea of collective impact with others? • When do you use collective impact and when do you not? Possibilities for Collective Impact • Allows for diverse stakeholders • Provides shared language/shared narrative • Changes the language we use • Getting to tough conversations with competing interests • Provides structure within an iterative process • Isolated interventions do not have impact SOCIAL MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS Ahila P @ahilap – Possible: when the improbable can become the Inevitable #CISummit @Tamarack_Inst Alison Robertson @robertsonalison – Collaboration is not an outcome. It is one tool to use to achieve outcomes @uwmcknight #CISummit Matt Ashdown @ashdown_matt – @SDSLivesUnited #cisummit A 75% solution to the right problem is better than a 100% solution to the wrong problem. Caitlin @ruined4ordinary – It is possible (even inevitable) that we can shape (not simply endure) our future. #cisummit Olive Grove @OG_Consult – “Answers have helped but it is the questions that have made the difference” -‐ @paulborn #CISummit @Tamarack_Inst Colleen Cote @CTAPinSK Talking now abt targeting the #unusual suspects to engage in ur work – broaden partnerships that address #rootcauses #CISummit
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Paul Born, President and Co-founder of Tamarack
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Day 2 Highlights Our Focus: Shared Measurement in Col lect ive Impact FAY HANLEYBROWN, MANAGING DIRECTOR, FSG & MARK CABAJ, HERE2THERE What is shared measurement? • Five conditions of collective impact: shared measurement is the most difficult, but critical • Shared measurement is identifying common metrics for tracking progress toward a common agenda across organizations • Shared measurement is different from but complementary to evaluation o Evaluation refers to a range of activities that involve the planned, purposeful and systematic collection of information about the activities, characteristics and outcomes of a CI initiative while shared measurement systems use a common set of indicators to monitor an initiative’s performance and track its progress towards goals Why do we develop shared measures? • Purposes: clarity of focus, tracking progress toward a shared goal, enabling coordination and collaboration, improved data quality, continuous learning and course correction and catalyzing action • There are many different users of shared measures • Challenges: difficulty in coming to agreement on common outcomes and indicators, concerns about relative performance/comparative measurement across providers, limited capacity (time and skill) for measurement and data analysis within participating organizations, alignment among funders to ask for the common measures as part of their reporting requirements and time and cost of developing and maintaining a system both for human capital and technology When do we develop shared measures? • Shared measures are typically developed once the common agenda has been defined • Can start with creating shared measures if there is clarity to help inform the common agenda How do we develop shared measures? • Design>Develop>Deploy • Shared measurement is an iterative process • Steps: define common agenda, set criteria, establish governance and build working groups, conduct due diligence -‐ leverage what is already being measured, limit metrics (10-‐15), include all stakeholders • Technology is secondary
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Key Takeaways: don’t wait, invest, be inclusive, shared measurement alone is not sufficient. LEARNING WALL HIGHLIGHTS Common Agenda • Isn’t collective impact just well-‐coordinated collaboration? • How to balance the need for research and community input with the need to focus your efforts on specific action Shared Measurement • Evolution of trust allows us to fail safely • Strategic measurement and evaluation, over time, may require flexibility and shifts • Pay attention to the keystone outcomes, not all outcomes are created equal • Trust and healthy relationships are pre-‐requisites for determining a measurement strategy • Measurement and evaluation helps to promote mutual accountability in a shared way • When indicators are skewed toward interventions, how do you shift it to a broader population-‐health focus? Mutual ly Reinforcing Activ it ies • How do you implement collaborative engagement with stakeholders when you have competing interests? Continuous Communicat ion • We need an elevator pitch for CI and better ways to simply and clearly communicate the what, why and how of this work or specific initiatives • How can you identify and realize small wins that can build people’s understanding and buy-‐in of this approach? Backbone Organizat ion • How to start a sustainable backbone organization from the ground up? • What if more than one organization sees themselves as the back bone Social Media Highlights Maureen Kehler @MaureenKehler – Don’t underestimate the power of genuine conversations. #CISummit Gemma Dunn @EVOGemma – How many times must we put a bandaid on our complex issues before we look at alternative solutions #cisummit @EdmCVO Noah Aiken-‐Klar @NoahAikenKlar – If you don’t ‘count’ (and learn), how can you be accountable? #cisummit @Tamarack_Inst @FayHanleybrown Brianna Spicer @brianna2shoes – biggest barrier to large scale social change? @FayHanleybrown and @FSGtweets say it’s isolated impact #cisummit #collective impact Trilby Smith @TrilbySmith – Thoughts on shared measurement: We need to shift from attribution to contribution both in data and in our thinking #cisummit
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Above: Liz Weaver, Vice President Tamarack Below: Mark Cabaj, Associate of Tamarack
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Day 3 Highlights
Our Focus: Scaling Change: Getting to Possible AL ETMANSKI, PLAN & SOCIAL INNOVATION GENERATION • Collective impact is a difficult endeavour; territory of ambiguity and uncertainty • How do we move from improbable to inevitable? o Cultural dimensions of change are a tough challenge; habits and beliefs remain rock solid • Lasting impact is more than coming up with a new method, supporters, funding, technology, hard work, etc. • Innovative solutions are fragile; long term durability depends on the environment it rests upon • Each innovator needs to be a 1) wise traveler and 2) a peace maker • Example: Registered Disability Savings Plan o Rethink disability
• What will happen to our children when we die? • Social isolation and poverty are major factors • “This makes sense, why has this not been done before?”
• 3 types of social innovators:
• disruptive innovators (passionate amateurs) • bridging innovators (excel at spotting big ideas; translate and interpret the value of the disruptive
approach and link to receptive innovators) • receptive innovators (navigators; implementing and scaling ideas)
• Become a peacemaker
• Confront the stadium of your ego, let go of the idea that your idea is the best one • It will take a long time for behaviour to catch up to your aspirations • Collective impact is peacemaking: within yourself and with your allies, adversaries and strangers
• WHO is as important as the HOW • Fall in love with the issue
• Tap into what others deeply care about; we are more likely not to give up • We don’t have to make up solutions to our problems, we need to remember them • “We built a spirit canoe and in a spirit canoe there is always room for one more.” LEARNING WALL HIGHLIGHTS • Self-‐care and connection is vitally important • If it wasn’t for the disruptive innovators, we would always do things the way we always have • Patterns show up when you start thinking as a system • Create heretical propositions
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• If we are returning to the traditional/historical way of connecting and building community is it innovative? • What is your peace-‐making journey? The internal journey can be protected and supported by friends • Principle: collective impact must ensure and protect authenticity from beginning and throughout • We need to be cautious about labelling social innovation as “new programs”. It needs to be about doing things differently • Every yes has its no • Thinking like a movement precedes acting like a movement • “Change happens at the speed of trust” • Strengthen capacity for social innovation through adaptive partnerships • Patterns of social innovation are not linear • Giving up control is challenging, but necessary • Create an environment that supports and cultivates failure • Social innovation requires us to bring lived experience to the table • Our job is to outperform our past • Bringing your heart into the journey • Being ready for the notion of action is different than having everything figured out before moving forward • If you over-‐professionalize the process you run the risk of jeopardizing innovation and ultimate success • Acting out of love SOCIAL MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS Vickie Cammack @vickiecammack – Our effectiveness improves when we fall in love with the issue. @aletmanski #CISummit Noah Aiken-‐Klar @NoahAikenKlar – “In a spirit canoe, there’s always room for one more.” @aletmanski #cisummit @Tamarack_Inst Amy Shipley @shipleyamye – “What inside us do we need to mute in order to speak clearly” #CISummit Mark Holmgren @mjholmgren – Deep collaboration is a process of peacemaking, often among allies…Al Etmanski #cisummit Lisa Joy Trick @lisajoytrick – “If necessity is the mother of invention, then love is the other parent”.
Sylvia Cheuy – Director of Tamarack’s Deepening Community Learning Community
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Above: Stacey Stewart US President of United Way; Below: Liz Weaver, Stacey Stewart and Local United Way Manager
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Day 4 Highlights
Our Focus: Scaling the Practice of Possible KAREN PITTMAN, CO-‐CEO, FORUM FOR YOUTH INVESTMENT Pittman’s Story • What plays a part in the trajectory of youth that seem to come from similar circumstances?
• We should be changing the odds NOT beating the odds Children’s Defence Fund
• Problem free isn’t fully prepared • Individuals could have multiple risks or could have assets; current paradigm ignores individuals as a
whole persons rather than the one problem you are working on • Need to build core supports & opportunities
• Only 4 out of 10 people are doing well when doing well is defined across areas of: physically and emotionally healthy and safe; socially and civically connected; and academically and vocationally productive • Ready by 21 Theory of Change
• If every young person has strong relationships and were being provided meaningful opportunities we can change the odds for children and youth
• A big picture approach to action planning & community change • Need to be able to zoom in and zoom out; pull back to the big picture before making decisions and
you will find gaps Collective Seeing and Learning Topeka Safe Streets
• Contributions consistent across neighbourhoods that took initiative • What did success lead to? Community confidence boosted, community evaluation model
introduced and community leaders aligned • Identify big core issues and find the overlapping similarities between smaller coalitions Exploring and Understanding Context • The practice dilemma: the official (required practices deemed as necessary) doesn’t explicitly name developmental (informal practices that support the development of youth’s sense of agency); results in system and setting traps and readiness gaps Partnering For Impact • Example: how do you show simultaneously that when youth are supported they in turn are ready/able to support their communities; readiness should be a right for young people • Help youth build the sense of agency they need to not only navigate systems and places that do them harm but change them.
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LEARNING WALL HIGHLIGHTS Possibilities • Progress is not always clear, but always iterative • We build individual agencies’ goals into a common agenda tapestry • Press...Pause…Press on – Patricia Katz • To push for change, you need community readiness • You can lead a horse to water…don’t worry if he doesn’t drink right away • Bird’s eye view to worm’s eye view • How to link up isolated collective impact efforts to effect change beyond one community? • We’re talking about evolution not revolution. It takes time • Better to create a movement that’s for something rather than against • Authentic collective impact requires a full systemic paradigm shift Engagement • Have to be both patient and opportunistic and cultivate this in yourself and your network • In this process – how do we ensure that through changes of leadership, staff, residents, etc. that we hold onto what was achieved and continue the conversation? • Meaningful engagement= meaningful outcomes • Equity of participation allows trust to blossom • How do we keep the community focused on the process of collective impact? • Change requires: poets, warriors and engineers • How do we incorporate the personal dimension into the collective impact model? • Storytelling is important • Eventually everything connects – Charles Eames SOCIAL MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS Olive Grove @OG_Consult – “In #collectiveimpact, you have to do the work of defining values and principles of how you will work together.” -‐ @weaverworks #CISummit Tom Klaus @nonprofitgo – Engage people because they have a presence that matters in and to the community – Karen Pittman #CISummit Lee Che Long @LeeCheLong – “We need to CHANGE the odds, not “beat” the odds @KarenPittman #CISummit Gemma Dunn @2ECVOGemma – We need safe spaces for all providers to come together, to enable us to partner for impact #cisummit #endpovertyyeg Mark Gifford @contactgifford – Demanding equity and demonstrating readiness in order to improve community conditions for young people @KarenPittman #cisummit Penny Bradley @Penny_Bradley – It is ok if the process is messy, in fact maybe it is a critical component? #cisummit @anhbc @AlexHouseBC
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Above: Mark Cabaj with Fay HanleyBrown, Managaing Director at FSG; Below: Al Etmanski, internationally bestselling author and Canada’s thought leader on Social innovation.
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Day 5 Highlights Our Focus: Finding Possible in Collective Impact 3.0 THE LEARNING JOURNEY EXPLORED -‐ MARK CABAJ, HERE2THERE • “Today, our very survival depends on our ability to stay awake, to adjust to new ideas, to remain vigilant and to face the challenge of change”-‐ Martin Luther King Jr. • Collective Impact – a framework to tackle deeply entrenched and complex social problems
• Maybe incomplete: equity? Authentic engagement? • Not the only way to make change; still need good programs and social innovation • Cumulative impact rather than collective impact
• Co-‐develop robust practices, co-‐build capacity and co-‐create the ecology that is required • Little efforts, big results • We are all change makers REFLECTION ON COLLECTIVE IMPACT SUMMIT 2015 -‐ PANEL DISCUSSION Reflections • Integration of both ends of the conversation; being a sceptic and lover of collective impact • Honour the expertise of the generalist; don’t need to over professionalize or be the expert • Transformational: hand, heart and head • Gained the tools needed to move forward • Where is the story? Where are the voices that are most impacted? • Issues of equity are at the forefront • Collective naming, collective seeing and collective knowing What will you say to your colleagues? • Helping communities understand their own efficacy; power of relationships • Experimenting, are we clear about what we want to look at? • Explore the existing networks and how that creates possibilities • Where are we in the system? Who do we need to talk to in order to leverage resources to move things forward? • Content experts vs. context experts What is possible for you now? • Being open for a little bit longer • Sky is the limit; hope; believing and having faith • It is possible to be actual • I’m not only the implementer, I can also be an innovator and designer. TREES & LEAVES – POSTER HIGHLIGHTS
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Possibilities • Convene, convene, convene • Principle over practice • Reflection is a powerful tool • Look at changing the funding models • Let go of your ego…we don’t have to like all of our partners • Focus on embedding process into human-‐centred design • Live in a land of possibility • Invest in learning • Common Denominator • Improving not proving • Contribution not attribution • Consider differences in social construction • Be deliberate in how we communicate What can we do now? • Trust your own experience • Be open to listen to other voices • Remember that everyone cares about something • Commit to ensuring those impacted are at the table • Take a day to synthesize what you learned • Join the Tamarack CCI Community • Community coalition map • Spread key concepts • Concrete tools for operationalizing the idea • Keep learning lab active • Look for ways to align different initiatives • Develop participant database • Ask more questions SOCIAL MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS Olive Grove @OG_Consult – If you can’t talk candidly about equity then you are not ready to talk about #collectiveimpact #CISummit Sylvia Cheuy @SylviaCheuy -‐ #cisummit – Karen Pittman Collective knowing collective seeing & collective naming a foundation to collective impact @SylviaCheuy @weaverworks Louise Merlihan @louisekearney – Remember the expertise of the generalist, says @elaynegreeley sharing learnings from #cisummit LAVC @LAVetsCollab – “Society is in the midst of a great self-‐correction & collective, cumulative impact can aid that change.” Last reflection at the #CISummit Noah Aiken-‐Klar @NoahAikenKlar – 5 days, 270 delegates, countless ideas, one future together. #cisummit #frompossibetoinevitable Penny Bradley @Penny_Bradley – Work with youth must consider both equity and readiness – not one or the other. @karenpittman #cisummit
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Mark Holmgren – Muscician & CEO of Bissell Centre, Edmonton
Meharoona Ghani - Spoken Word Artist
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Above: Tamarack’s Learning Wall, Below, Karen Pitman, Sociologist, Leader in Youth Development and Director President’s Crime Prevention Council, Forum for Youth Investment
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(These daily highlights were sent back to NZ from personal reflections of each day)
• Shared measurement is the most difficult of the five conditions of Collective Impact • Must include people with lived experience in your steering group • The Backbone cannot be self-‐appointed • Good to have government, funders and business as part of your collective impact process • Expectation of donors has increased considerably….want outcomes…should not demand
collaboration as part of a grant (Collective Impact is just a tool) • The best attribute of a backbone organisation is political savviness. • Engagement of people with a will to change is the most important factor. Service and money is not
enough. It is the engagement that is important • Funders want to fund a solution, not a programme • How do you reconcile the need for structure but allow for emergence (lots of discussion around this) • Collective Impact is messy. One does not know what the outcome might be. Can get unexpected
outcomes. • Must have better alignment across service provision • A big mistake is to prescribe things from a national level • Multiple pathways to get poverty reduction • Each Collective Impact context is different so cannot prescribe anything. Need to adapt around
context. • Tamarack outlined some backbone budgets and it seems that a backbone organsiations needs
$150,000 minimum for backbone role, they showed what a budget should include. • Tamarack is the backbone organisation for backbones organisations. Convening role, policy work. • One rule Tamarack had with the backbone organisations it worked with was the groups had to be
multi-‐sectoral • Forget the service provider lens (which is “how can I help you?”, connecting people more important
as well assisting people to understand their assets so they can share these…. • Backbones send out regularly (even once a week) an outcome mapping tool! (It is a very good idea to
have a third party evaluator).
Yvonne Powley’s Personal Daily Highlights
Day One Highlights
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Musqueam Carving at the Centre
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• Appreciative enquiry really good tool for Collective Impact. • Biggest barrier to large scale social change is isolated impact • Collective Impact is a movement • Having a common language is really helpful • Collective Impact is very new, only 5 years, but patterns are emerging across the world • Shared measurement is a critical part of the success of Collective Impact • However shared measurement is the most challenging • With Collective Impact you track the progress of all partners • Can be very scary for organisations because they worry they won’t measure up to their peers • Shared measurement is NOT evaluation. Different but complimentary • Shared measures must be common across all organisations • Should find only 10 to 15 key measures • Need to get alignment around funders! • Must not be a funder driven process • Collective Impact requires a big shift in thinking, a culture change • Important to balance stakeholders who want different data, need to come to agreement on
shared measures • One mistake is to jump into shared measurement before shared agenda! • Shared measurements are typically developed once the common agenda has been defined • Distinction between outcomes and targets • Tamarack have created a good criteria for indicators • Measures can be collected weekly, monthly, quarterly and annually • This whole process is iterative, measures can change depending on what you find out along the
way • Technology is secondary! • Shared measurement should lead to learning and course/programme correction/improvement • Must ensure that the shared measurement system does not become rigid and is able to adapt
over time • Don’t worry if you haven’t devised all your measures (FSG took one whole year to develop a
measurement for ‘parent engagement’) • Contribution versus attribution • In Edmonton they have developed an app for shared measurement around community safety • Need agreement on a measurement tool across agencies • SOAR a strengths-‐based approach to planning – a useful tool different to SWOT analysis
(Strengths, Opportunities, Aspirations, Results) • Three preconditions of Collective Impact are 1) Urgency of the issue, 2) adequate resources, and
3) influential leaders. • Theory of change elements……… • The most powerful theories of change are visual
Day Two Highlights Day Two Highlights
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• Evolution of trust allows us to fail safely • Strategic measurement and evaluation, over time, may require flexibility and shifts • Pay attention to the keystone outcomes, not all outcomes are created equal • Trust and healthy relationships are pre-‐ requisites for determining a measurement strategy • Measurement and evaluation helps to promote mutual accountability in a shared way • When indicators are skewed toward interventions, how do you shift it to a broader population
focus? • Things are simple, complicated or complex • Dimensions of certainty, understand our issue, understand causes and understand
solutions/outcomes • High agreement or low agreement • Develop common ground, compromise or compete • Wicked complex problems are hard to frame – very uncertain and cannot predict outcomes.
With a ‘simple’ problem find the ‘best practice’ model • Who has the most influence, moderate influence and least influence on an outcome • Convening is the most important role of backbone • Most problems with measurement are not to do with the data gathering but to do with sense
making. (Mark used a fabulous exercise around micro-‐enterprise for women in Bangladesh and this being introduced to women in New York)
• Biggest challenge in evaluation or measurement is getting fast feed back loops (no point looking at the data 6 months down the track after it has been collected).
• Matrix of 5 types of use for evaluation • Human Centred design versus Design thinking • Three design tools – User Profile/ Scope of work/ Prototype •
Social Innovation • Create a ‘circle of belonging’ around each child • Every child matters • Registered Disability Savings Plan (Canadian initiative) • Our effectiveness improves when we fall in love with the issue • Set the table for allies and adversaries! • Stones are polished by friction • Every time a CI project goes sideways is because of personalities and ego. • Not to be right, not to have all the answers but to discover them
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Above: School of Salmon Carving and Below: Musqueam Painting at the Musqueam Community Centre
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• When nothing is sure everything is possible • Lasting community change is possible, together we are the solution • One problem at a time isn’t the right approach
Measurements for children & youth
1) Physically and emotionally healthy & safe
2) Socially and civically connected
3) Academically & vocationally productive
4) Strong and positive relationships
• They found that youth with supportive relationships as they enter high school are 5 times more likely to leave high school ready than those with weak relationships
• Key milestone report (every time you make key decisions you put in a key milestone report – helpful tool – shouldn’t be more than 3 pages
Adaptive Leadership Principles
• Convene stakeholders • Focus attention on issue • Cultivate a high aspiration • Use framing as a tool • Build a good enough vision • Chunk and link work • Go for multiple actions • Court and mediate conflict • Maintain productive distress • Acknowledge multiple accountabilities
Collaborative Governance Models
• Staffing • Government Mandate • Geographic mandate • Geographic proximity • Community involvement & ownership • Power relations • Availability of process guides • Organisational values • Member motivation
Day Four Highlights
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• Member selection • Member skills • Accountability and transparency
Principles for Working Together
• Transparency • Data sharing • Respect • Inclusion • Mutual accountability • Humour & Fun
Musqueam Painting - Salmon
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Totem Pole, Stanley Park, Vancouver
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The difference between the possible and impossible depends on a person’s determination
• Progress is not always clear but always iterative • We need to get rid of the notion of a ‘white coat evaluator’! • Power of building space of community • Collective impact is moving change in scale Little efforts, big results!
We all benefit from stories of the success of things.
The rest was reflections of the week.
Tour and Dinner Celebration at the Musqueam Indian Band
Day Five Highlights
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Mark Cabaj – Expert on Evaluation
Conclusion
In the last five years of Collective Impact development much has been learned and is now documented internationally. Both Tamarack and FSG in America are leading experts and have many useful online resources. I think that Collective Impact is going to continue to gain worldwide popularity as a framework that can make a significant difference to communities. My scepticism of it driving too much of a top down approach has been allayed as it appears you can work with a strength-‐based, bottom up approach. Each context is different and depends on what individuals bring to it. I also went with the question about the role of government and that Collective Impact may not easily work in NZ without whole of government support. Tamarack appears to have gained Government and State support across Canada. It may be challenging to get the same support here in NZ. Time will tell. I thoroughly enjoyed the Summit and a huge thanks again to the individuals that supported and enabled my visit, especially the Minister of the Department of Internal Affairs, Peter Dunne who approved the funding.
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Websites
Tamarack: www.tamarackcommunity.ca
FSG: www.fsg.org References:
Born, Paul, Community Conversations, Mobilising the Ideas, Skills, and Passion of Community Organisations, Governments, Businesses, and People, 2012, BPS Books
Etmanski, Al, IMPACT, Six Patterns to Spread Your Social Innovation,2015, Orwell Cove Publishing, Canada
Hanley brown,F, Kania,J,& Kramer, M, Chanelling change. Making collective impact work. Stanford Social Innovation Review, 2012
Kania,J, & Kramer, M, Collective Impact, Stanford Social Innovation Review 2014
Kania, J, & Kramer, M, Embracing Emergence: How Collective Impact Addresses Complexity, Stanford Social Innovation Review 2014
Turner,S, Merchant,K, Kania,J, & Martin, E Understanding the value of Backbone Organisations In Collective Impact Stanford Social innovation Review 2014
Tamarack Institute, ENGAGE! A connected Force For Community Change, 2015, Tamarck Institue
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