Collective Impact Fall 2017

What is Collective Impact? “Collective Impact is a framework to tackle deeply entrenched and complex social problems. It is an innovative and structured approach to making collaboration work across government, business, philanthropy, non-profit organizations and citizens to achieve significant and lasting social change.”

Wait… what? In its simplest form, collective impact means that we attain much more and have greater impact when we work collectively on an issue.

Five Key Conditions (Kania & Kramer, 2011) These conditions together produce true alignment and lead to powerful results in successful Collective Impact initiatives (p. 39).

Common Agenda Common agenda requires that all participants have a shared vision for their collaborative work. In fact, there are three steps necessary within this. Insure a common understanding of the problem Agree upon a joint approach to the problem Agree upon actions to be taken

Shared Measurement Shared measurement means that all organizations and agencies are using the same metrics and criteria for assessing success. In addition, this should be fueled by evidence-based research.

Mutually Reinforcing Activities Mutually reinforcing activities are necessary to move toward a common goal. Each organization’s efforts must be part of an overall plan. They don’t all need to be playing the same roles, but those roles need to be clearly stated and coordinated.

Continuous Communication Continuous communication refers to an ongoing regular set of meetings as well as communications between meetings. Essential to this process is building the trust of all participating organizations. Sometimes this takes years.

Backbone Support Backbone support requires an organization separate and distinct from those working directly on the issue that can provide all of the “behind the scenes” support and facilitate the coalition’s work. Skills needed and services provided would include: data collection and reporting, logistics and administration, technology and communications support.

The Four Phases Collaboration for Impact

WARNING! It is important to recognize that Collective Impact initiatives and collaboration is not a linear process. Over time, a successful collaboration will make progress through these four stages, but it is unlikely that the steps and milestones within each phase will follow each other in a plotable and predictable path towards maturity. Rather, within each phase and across the life cycle of the collaboration the work will be cyclical.

Phase 1 – Generate Ideas and Dialog Key questions Is my community‘s history with collaboration positive or negative? How can we use either situation to our advantage? What pressing issue or opportunity has brought us together? Will this idea galvanize leaders across sectors in my community? How does the issue identified by the collaborative fit into the broader context of our community? Are other efforts under way? Are there opportunities for partnership with existing partnerships? In what ways is our work needed and additive to existing work? How can we foster genuine community partnerships to help us understand the issue and create the necessary support for the interventions needed? Meaningfully engaging the community is the focus of Phase 1. Community engagement is critical to the success of a Collective Impact initiative.  Phase 1 of the Collective Impact framework is focused on testing and building the case for change with key stakeholders and the broader community.

Phase 1: The good, the bad, and the ugly Challenging Ugly Engaging the community in conversation Identifying the value proposition, common ground and shared values Having a core group of dedicated people to lead Spending time on relationships and trust by inviting usual and unusual suspects Competing priorities and competing agendas Developing a laundry list of activities but not focusing on the core goal Identifying who needs to be at the table and keeping them there – legitimacy of decision-makers Agreement around the issue and early milestones Dealing with the tension of being the convenor without being the driver Identifying an urgent issue that has community ‘buzz’ Managing community engagement and action Establishing shared leadership from the beginning

Phase 2 – Initiate Action Key questions What core group of people simply has to be at the table to make needle-moving change occur on this issue What do we know about this issue? What data is out there to help us better understand the issue? Is this issue capable of attracting resources both for direct service providers and dedicated collaborative capacity? Is there a trusted, neutral, influential leader – usually an organisation – that is coordinating and facilitating the collaborative? Note: This may be your organisation. How can we foster genuine community partnerships to help us understand the issue and create the necessary support for the interventions needed? Building and communicating the case for change is the focus of Phase 2.

Phase 2: The good, the bad, and the ugly Challenging Ugly Using data to inform work A focus on building engagement Funder works with you Invest in incubation Working across different systems and timelines Building collective capacity The three trolls of collaboration – control, competition and commitment Embedding data and communications in the process Dealing with impatience The three trolls of collaboration – control, competition and commitment

Phase 3 – Organize for Impact Key questions Do we have the right people at the table? Have we thought about what assets and perspectives each brings to the collaborative? What exact change do we plan to see in five years? How will we measure our progress? How will data be tracked and is there a data analyst or other resource available to support the ?collaborative in this regard? What roles are needed to staff the collaborative? What resources are available to do this? Do we have a funder(s) at the table willing to provide resources for the collaborative as it begins to ?implement its plans? What will it take to get funders on board? Based on the assessment results, what are our collaborative strengths and weaknesses? What steps do we need to take to address weaknesses? Developing a common agenda and the infrastructure to achieve it is the focus of Phase 3

Phase 3: The good, the bad, and the ugly Challenging Ugly Having early adopters and champions Process experts and funders at the table Leveraging community assets A backbone with capacity Building and maintaining trust and commitment Managing expectations Agreement on Common Agenda and Shared Measures Decision-making, governance and sustainability The three trolls of collaboration – control, competition and commitment Finding balance Skilled facilitators to help navigate this Phase The three trolls of collaboration – control, competition and commitment Defining communications strategies Governance structure Evaluating resistance Managing multiple stages and phases of work

Phase 4 – Sustain action and IMPACT!

Now that you know a little bit more about Collective Impact and its key features and phases, proceed to the next part and watch the videos!

References Collective Impact (SSIR). (n.d.). Retrieved April 27, 2017, from https://ssir.org/articles/entry/collective_impact Four phases of collective impact. (n.d.). Retrieved April 27, 2017, from http://www.collaborationforimpact.com/the-how-to-guide/the-mindset-and- leadership-needed-2/