"connect and affect"

What's YOUR community?

Through the lens of Catalyst, we say "community" referring to a group of people connected through a common interest. So broadly speaking, we could refer to the:

What would it look like?

Catalyzing a new community in the network is not about you organizing your community. Rather, it's about you catalyzing your community to take ownership of a common vision and then empowering them to actively participate in shaping and making their community. So from the start, your role as the catalyst is to facilitate what will become a member-driven community. Each community will look different depending on your own local culture but here's the basic and generic overview:

Phase 1: Assemble the Established Leaders

As the catalyst, first you'll reach out to the key networkers, group/organization leaders and officers, and influential individuals within your identified community. These are the established leaders of your community. Connect with them individually first, tell them about Catalyst, and take a pulse to see how open they are to collaborating with others in their community. Cast vision for what could be done collaboratively. Then assemble these established leaders together to meet each other (or reconnect). As the catalyst that invited them together, facilitate a session where they all begin to articulate a common broad vision statement that they can each own personally. We'll teach you how to facilitate this kind of session.

Once they've developed this collaborative vision statement that they all helped to create, identify a calendar date to assemble the broader community together. So this would mean everyone invites everyone! The purpose of this assembly is to cast the collaborative vision with the people and then empower the people towards taking an action-oriented grassroots approach to the things they care about. Each established leader should tell "their people" about the collaborative vision and invite all the people they know in the community to this assembly.

Phase 2: Assemble the Broader Community

At the assembly of the broader community, display the collaborative vision statement for people to see and have each person (as they arrive) write down three things that they'd like to see happen in their community. Of course, have people sign in with their email address so that you can begin a system of communication with everyone. Then encourage people to meet each other. As this happens, begin to tally the responses. You'll begin to see that people had similar ideas. Identify the top 3 responses.

Gather and welcome everyone together as a group and tell them about Catalyst and the vision to develop member-driven communities. Talk about the collaborative vision statement developed by the established leaders in their community. Cast vision and brainstorm to help paint a picture for everyone what the vision could look like. Have people answer the question - what would this vision look like in our community? This is part of the ownership process for the community members.

Then announce the 3 top responses of what they all as a community said they would like to see happen in their community. Assign each response to 3 designated Think Tank areas and have everyone go to the area that most interested them. Add a 4th area for anyone interested in helping out behind the scenes. This 4th group will become your volunteer Operations Team to assist you with logistical planning in the future. Have the established leaders spread out into various Think Tanks but ask them not to volunteer as a facilitator.

Now in each Think Tank, have them identify a facilitator among them who can keep everyone on task, note those present in the group, and have them brainstorm ideas for how they can make things happen. At the close of the meeting, assemble everyone together again and have each facilitator share highlights of their brainstorming. Emphasize with everyone that this is about ongoing collaboration and that you'll email everyone to update everyone on next steps and future meetings.

Phase 3: Equip and Empower the Emerging Leaders

Touch bases with each of the facilitators and see if they'd like to serve as an Action Team Facilitator for the group that participated in his or her Think Tank. Have a meeting with all of the facilitators and explain that they all function as a peer group to support one another as they each serve their community. This Facilitators Peer Group are the emerging leaders of your community. Begin to teach, equip, and empower the facilitators with some tools on how to work with their Action Team - to develop a mission statement, to develop a strategic plan with them, and to work towards implementation of the Action Team's ideas. We can help you equip them. Have each facilitator identify a meeting date for their Action Team.

Meet with your volunteer Operations Team to see how people would like to volunteer. Start to organize the team. Some operational areas may include graphic design, web site and social media, flyering, event set up/clean up, book keeping, etc. The Catalyst Operations Team will assist you in the development of your community's volunteer Operations Team (including setting you up with a bank account).

Phase 4: Launch Action Teams

Communicate with the broader community to remind them of the vision and to tell them about the formation of the Action Teams so that they can continue brainstorming and collaborating. Announce the dates for each Action Team meeting. Some may be interested in participating in more than one Action Team. If it's ready, announce the new web site and any social media groups or pages that they should join to stay connected.

Phase 5: Maintain Ongoing Connections

Each Action Team can determine for themselves their own schedule of how frequent they'd like to meet each month. As they begin implementing their strategies, they should be developing a project time line anyway.

Reassemble the broader community quarterly to provide a context for everyone to reconnect or to invite new people. This assembly should be a time for each Action Team to update the rest of the community as to their progress while also inviting further participation in Action Teams.This is also an opportunity to add one or two new Think Tanks that could potentially develop into new Action Teams.

Determine whether or not your community needs a monthly social, mixer, or connection event to help facilitate introductions and relationships within the broader community. This would be more informal than the quarterly assembly meeting.

Meet with the Facilitators Peer Group monthly so that they can continue to receive support from you and each other and to organize the community cohesively. Regularly connect with the established leaders of the community to maintain relationship too. You could even eventually bring the two groups together so that both the estabished and the emerging leaders of your community can keep an accurate and current pulse of your community. Also regularly connect with your Area Catalyst and the other community catalysts in your Catalysts Peer Group so that you can continue to receive support and to organize the network of communities more cohesively.

The point in all of this is that you are not alone! This is just an overview but we can work with you to fill in the blanks to support you as you work to catalyze your community. Contact us at info@gocatalyst.org to get started!

The Value of a Network

As you help catalyze your community, you can connect to the broader Catalyst network of communities. Each individual community adds value to the entire network because as the network grows, our collective pool of resources grows! Tap into . . . .

The key is that we are relationally connected. Catalyst helps develop the relational infrastructure, but it's UP TO YOU to navigate the relational networks to tap in to the growing pool of resources that are among us. With a relational network, you have a place to start!

Here's the basics:

By being connected with the Catalyst network of communities, your community:

• functions as a program of Catalyst Community and therefore can raise funds for yourselves using our Tax ID number and 501(c)(3) non-profit status. So your donors can have their contributions tax-deductible. This also allows you to open up your own non-profit bank account.
  
  
• should have an identified "catalyst" (maybe you!) that is sponsored by an "Area Catalyst" that supports and coaches you. You now become a part of a peer group of other catalysts like you where you can see what others have done, share best practices, ask questions, etc.
  
  
• besides your community's broad collective vision, it should also have a catalytic affect upon the community that builds relationships, establishes partnerships, encourages contribution, and inspires growth within the community and its members.
  
  
• should not have particular political goals such as the endorsement of political campaigns for a candidate or ballot initiative. But it may support social movements if the members desire. The key here is the distinction between being a political activist vs. being a relational catalyst.
  
  
• receives operational support to help you become self-sustaining. The mutual benefit is that your community contributes 10% of all deposits and funds received to the Catalyst operations budget so that we can continue to provide overall organizational support throughout the network.

We'll help you get started by connecting you with an Area Catalyst. Send an email to info@gocatalyst.org and tell us about yourself and the community you're passionate about and we'll connect with you!