The Collective Impact Forum, an initiative of FSG and the Aspen Institute Forum for Community Solutions, and the Tamarack Institute, recently hosted our first three-day workshop of 2014 for collective impact backbone leaders. The event took place in San Francisco, with over 250 backbone leaders across the country and world. And, while Champions for Change in 2013 was tailored to mature collective impact initiatives, this year's workshop was open to all initiatives, regardless of where they were in the collective impact process.
This year’s participants hailed from as close as the San Francisco Bay Area, and as far away as Nigeria and Sweden. Issues addressed ranged from reducing obesity to climate change adaptation, from supporting sustainable fisheries across South and Central America, to fostering better understanding between Muslim and non-Muslim neighbors in the United States. Over three days, participants discussed topics ranging from forming steering committees, to increasing resources to community engagement – with incredible learnings coming out of each and every session.
The event was also a chance to preview the forthcoming Collective Impact Forum website, which will be launched this March. The Collective Impact Forum is a resource for practitioners and funders who are using the collective impact approach to achieve large-scale systems change. Please check the FSG website for future updates.
This post kicks off a blog series in which we will be sharing learning and reflections from the workshop over the next few weeks. Our first blog will be posted later this week, around lessons learned from the collective impact practitioner’s panel. We encourage you to check back soon to learn more about the incredible discussions we were able to have this year at the Champions for Change workshop!
