After two successful events for backbone leaders in the last year, we are excited to announce the 2014 edition of Champions for Change: Leading a Backbone Organization for Collective Impact, to be held in San Francisco (February 11 – 13) and Vancouver, BC (April 1 – 3). This event will be hosted by the Collective Impact Forum, a new initiative of FSG and the Aspen Institute Forum for Community Solutions, in partnership with the Tamarack Institute.
We have designed this workshop for individuals providing backbone support to collective impact initiatives. These leaders – dedicated to guiding a cross-sector group of stakeholders towards a common goal – play a critical role in collective impact, and we look forward to an opportunity to gather this community together in person to share learning and experiences as peers.
Through this workshop, we look forward to providing professional development and peer learning opportunities to backbone leaders, and also generating new insights on the work of backbone organizations for the field. Agenda topics include:
- Clarifying the roles and leadership characteristics of the backbone organization
- Developing and learning from shared measurement
- Engaging the community in your initiative
- Evaluating collective impact
- Sustaining funding for collective impact over the long term
Previous workshop attendees valued the chance to meet and learn from other practitioners:
- “It was the first time I’ve ever been surrounded by people living in a collective impact world, and I look forward to meeting with them again!”
- “This workshop brought my peers together and gave us an extended opportunity to 1) get acquainted on a pretty deep level quickly, which then helped us to 2) share worries, successes, tips, and failures quite readily.”
- “I have had meaningful discussions with [other backbone organizations]; however, the type of information provided in this conference gave me another level of tools to share with partners and colleagues.”
Check out this video and these resources from last year’s workshop, and feel free to share this information with other backbone leaders that might be excited to join us!
Register for Champions for Change>
Are you excited about the Collective Impact Forum? Sign up to be notified when the Collective Impact Forum online community and resource center launch in early 2014.
