INTRODUCTION
Extension Foundation’s Impact Collaborative is a methodology that helps Cooperative Extension projects, programs, and initiatives to be innovative and community engaged efforts that result in measurable and visible local impact. Whether your team is looking to improve an existing program or expand its reach to new audiences, possibly through the use of new technologies, or seeks to establish new services, or spark the creation of new businesses, the Impact Collaborative process, engagements, and activities provide project teams with tools to develop innovative, community-based approaches to problem solving. The following aims to provide context and guidance on community engagement and team building in the Impact Collaborative practice. When identifying a need or challenge and the potential for a new program, initiative, service or project to impact that challenge, Cooperative Extension Service (CES) program planners and project developers may find it useful to ask three questions. They originate with Ron Lippitt, one of the founders and thought leaders for the field of organization development, who intuitively asked them in designing a collaborative change experience (Cady 2007).
What is the purpose?
Who needs to be involved?
What conversations need to take place?
1. The first question is aimed at the WHY? of your project, program, or initiative: Why are you trying to address this challenge? How do you define the problem? People frequently confuse problems and symptoms. So, spend some time clearly defining the problem to be solved - the purpose of the project. 2. Answering the second question will ensure that you have identified all necessary stakeholders: Who needs to be on your team? What process and content expertise do you need? Whose time, talent, treasure, and ties are you needing to connect to and leverage to implement your project? 3. Once you have some clarity of purpose and your core stakeholders, the focus shifts to the nature of the process: how to have productive and meaningful conversations that move the group towards the future it yearns for. This third question seeks to identify what facilitation you may need to provide ongoing communication and assessment as those involved define the problem, design and develop solutions, and coordinate the implementation of those solutions. How are we going to go about solving the problem or achieving our purpose?
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