Values of Our Community Building Teams
/We build understanding and encourage independent action, empowerment and and ownership among community members. We are careful to not create dependency on our team.
We’re for what works for both now and the future. We don’t pick sides.
Institutions and communities need each other. Institutions can provide important services, but they will always have their limits. Communities can provide care, possibility and innovation beyond any institutional limits. Institutions and communities are not competing entities, just interdependent and co-existing.
All who care are welcome. We don’t pick winners and we can’t predict who will be successful innovators. We provide an open network and welcoming front door to anyone who is interested in constructively participating in our community. Membership in the caring community is voluntary. No application or admission fee required.
Encourage Transparency. Our work is to create an open network for all caring community members. Transparency of relationships, resources and opportunities are key to engaging and welcoming all people into the fold.
Work in Partnerships. To create an infrastructure of relationships and resources to get more things done, produce all events, programs, and special features with a set of partners who actively care about the issue at hand.
Build Capacity and Capabilities. Our intention is to create more vibrancy in the community – not to own it. To that end, we work to support, promote and encourage community members to learn and take on productions of events, projects and programs of ours or their own.
We embrace a density of resources and encourage collaboration over competition. Replicated efforts in different areas of the community can add up to a stronger network and more knowledge in the community of what works and what doesn’t.
We bring a fresh perspective and ways of doing business. We look for models, formats, ideas and ways of operating that inspire sense of new possibilities. Highly valuing and prioritizing design, hospitality and regular travel to other vibrant communities is key to keeping our methods fresh.
We’re people first: personal, genuine, human, authentic and fallible.
There is a clear distinction between community building, community organizing and networking. Teams will have the burden of explaining that distinction, especially in politically sensitive systems.
Market and non-market forces can work together to their mutual benefit.
Community building is non-partisan. Teams focus solely on allowing the system to attain optimum performance. Just like a good teacher, the teams don’t push their system toward any one future, but support them in making whatever future they choose the best it can be.
It’s possible to build consensus while maintaining differences. Teams will strive to move their systems toward these points of consensus.