Building Community Wealth: Role of Cities

I wrote an article about the Role of Anchor Organizations in 2013 after hearing the Democracy Collaboration talk about this.  An anchor organization is a hospital, university, or other institution that is a long-term part of a neighborhood, and often the major employer.

Today I've been listening to a panel discussion titled: Cities Building Community Wealth: A Gathering at the CUNY Law School.  Here's a link to the video.  

When I focus on volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs I'm thinking of them as a form of bridging social capital, that connects people from high poverty, mostly segregated neighborhoods, with people, ideas and resources from beyond the neighborhood. Such programs can have a transformative affect on the lives of young people, if they are available in the neighborhoods where young people live.

To me, anchor institutions should be the lead convener trying to make such organizations available in the areas where they operate.

Since we're in the middle of a Presidential campaign, and inequality, wealth gaps, Black Lives Matter, and so many issues are at stake, the comment made by the Mayor of Madison, Wisconsin is really important.

"We've elected progressive Mayors. They just have been too ineffective in governing."

Nearly 1000 people attended this weeks Mentoring Summit in Washington. I followed the even via live stream and Tweeted using #mentoringsummit2016.  I hope that this results in a growing number of tutor/mentor leaders from around the country, and Chicago, looking at this blog, and then looking for ways to motivate their volunteers and students to spend time looking at my articles, and the links I point to, like today's panel discussion.

There's lots that needs to be learned. 

Innovative use of concept maps to support collective effort

Below is a concept map that I created many years ago to show the commitment many leaders need to take over many years so that more youth born in poverty in one year might be starting jobs and careers out of poverty 20 to 30 years later.  A person/company could demonstrate this commitment by putting a version of this on their web site, with their name/logo in the blue box. 

Yesterday I found an article on the Stanford Social Innovation Review (SSIR) site, under the title of 

The Tactics of Trust

The subhead reads: "Participants in a large, complex collaboration can build a capacity for finding common ground—and it doesn’t have to take years."

I read the article, then I asked,  "What this might cost per year?" and was told that "the most effective networks involving multiple organizations typically require an operating budget of $150,000 to $300,000 per year for maximum impact"

Then I asked if anyone was using concept maps to show their process, and included this timeline showing my work since 1990 as an example. 

I received this comment:

"Wow Daniel.This is a spectacular map. I’ve never seen one like it before and don’t know of anyone doing this. We’ve used in-person graphic facilitation at times, but this is different. Amazing how much you’ve accomplished without funding and only volunteers. Impressive."

Then I posted a link to a page with my library of concept maps, and said, "By sharing this I’m inviting others to use the maps, and create their own versions."

That generated this response:

"Very impressive Daniel. I’ve never seen concept maps like this. I wish you well in your important work." 

I've received similar comments about my uses of GIS maps, which you can see in articles on this blog, and on the Mappingforjustice blog.

However, I've never found a way to turn this into consistent funding at a $150-$300,000 a year level. Since 2011 I've not been able to find more than a few thousand dollars a  year to support my work as Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC

This graphic illustrates what I'm trying to do, and what I've been trying to teach others to do.  This page provides a PayPal button and a mailing address that others could use to send financial support to help me continue to do this work.

However, I'm not posting this with a goal of finding a few small donations. I'm posting it so that someone who has the civic and business reach, and the talent to develop business plans and secure investment funding, will reach out and offer to become a partner in helping me find the funding and do the work, and in sustaining and growing it in future years when I'm no longer around.

When someone says "Very impressive Daniel. I’ve never seen concept maps like this. I wish you well in your important work," ....

...my hope is they will go beyond "wishing me well" to helping me find the resources and partners needed to do this work as well as it needs to be done, and in every urban area in the world.

Career Opportunity for Urban Youth - Data Story Tellers

Since 1994 I've been using maps to tell stories and encourage more people to be involved in helping build and sustain mentor-rich tutor/mentor programs in high poverty neighborhoods.  In many articles on this and other blogs I've suggested that this is a skill that youth living in high poverty neighborhoods could learn, supported by teachers and/or volunteer tutors and mentors.  We know that youth possess  unlimited pools of creative talent. This just has not been focused in this direction.

Last week I saw an article on my @tutormentorteam Twitter feed titled "Data Storytelling: Big Data's Next Frontier", written by James Kerr.  It emphasizes the talent needed to make sense of the big data that is becoming more and more available.   Over the past decade, I've connected to organizations like WEAVE, a new web-based visualization platform, to encourage them to enlist volunteers and youth to use their data visualizations in stories that make sense of the data, and point readers to actions they can take to build solutions to problems indicated by the data. This is an emerging field, thus, it's something  urban youth could enter on the ground floor.

If you're a parent, volunteer tutor or mentor, teacher or policy maker, I encourage you to look at a map of Chicago, or any other major urban area, and envision icons showing up in all the high poverty areas of the map, indicating that part of the mentoring and learning strategy of such programs is to teach youth leadership and communications skills, using data storytelling, to draw attention and resources to support these programs, and to help fill the map with more.

That can happen if more people use blogs, newsletters, web sites, etc. to include maps and other visualizations to educate and motivate others to take roles that lead to such results.

This PDF shows a variety of map stories I've created since 1994.  If you're a business, or philanthropist, I encourage you to become a sponsor of the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC, so I can update our maps, keep the map platform available, and keep this resource free to all who might be inspired by the stories. 

Engaging Volunteer Mentors in Youth Employment Issues

I attended a Youth Employment hearing at the Chicago Urban League yesterday where nearly 20 urban youth testified before a panel of elected officials and a crowd of community organization leaders, showing the importance of jobs and mentoring.  Articles sharing this information are in today's newspapers and many places on social media. Congratulations to the organizers for bringing the media,  political leaders and community organizations together to focus on this issuel.

During the hearing, Teresa Cordoba of the UIC Great Cities Institute shared a report, showing nearly half of urban Black men, age 20-24, are unemployed, and used maps to show the relationship of poverty, unemployment and urban violence.   Kelly Hallberg, from the University of Chicago Crime Lab, shared research showing that youth employment programs have a positive impact on the aspirations of youth and in reducing criminal behavior. She started her testimony with a sign saying:

"Nothing stops a bullet like a job."

Since this is obvious, why are the funds not in place to offer more jobs, Why isn't the business community doing more?


I attended this hearing (that's me sharing event information via my Twitter feed)  because I became a volunteer tutor/mentor in 1973, and because I was part of organized, structured, supportive non-school programs, I've stayed involved, and grown my own commitment to where it is today. See timeline.

I've been saying for nearly 20 years that strategies that support the growth of well-organized non-school tutor/mentor programs are strategies that increase the number of people who become allies..and voters... who are needed to resolve these problems.   Unfortunately, too few leaders have embraced the vision and ideas I've been sharing on this blog and on the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC site.

Below is one of several presentations I've created that expand on this idea.

Mentor Role in Larger Youth Development Strategy by Daniel F. Bassill

If company leaders, faith leaders, college teams and more adopt this ROLE OF LEADERS strategy, and build internal teams to lead the engagement of the entire corporate/organization in this effort, there would be more well organized youth programs, and more volunteers, like myself, deeply involved in trying to reduce these problems.

As I listened to the different youth giving testimony yesterday, I had a vision of a different type of presentation.  What if each youth, when they introduced themselves, said "I'm a registered voter. I  live in xxWard, xx County Board District, xx State Legislative and State Senate district.  I am to cast my vote for someone who brings jobs and non-school learning and mentoring opportunities to my neighborhood."

I've written many articles on uses of maps, such as this one.  Here's a presentation, illustrating what youth could have been offering as part of their testimony, using maps of political districts, to illustrate where help is needed and who should be helping.

Violence in Chicago: Where Will We Be in 10 Years? by Daniel F. Bassill

I'd be happy to meet with leaders of youth serving organizations, schools, universities, faith groups, political campaigns, and business, to show ways I think maps, and map stories, can involve youth in roles that not only educate and motivate adults to do more, but provide skill-building opportunities that translate to well-paying 21st century careers.

Connect with me on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIN, or email tutormentor 2 at earthlink dot net.

Brainstorming. Sharing ideas.

Last night while I was listening to community leaders of a group called BlocksTogether describe their participatory budgeting process, I scratched out a planning cycle, that would engage youth as leaders, researchers and communicators. I posted it from my camera to Facebook. Then today, I used my cMap application to create a better version.

Here's how I shared the original sketch of this idea on Facebook:

This is planning process sketch I drew tonight while listening to a community group from West Humboldt Park in Chicago. I will write more about this on my blog.
Posted by Daniel F. Bassill on Thursday, January 21, 2016

Below is the same idea, converted to a concept map, using cMap tools.  Here's the link to the concept map

Building the Learning Network - Example

In the past few articles I've mentioned Terry Elliott, and shown how we've connected via cMOOCs held the past few years.  Below are three videos, illustrating how that connection is growing.

In preparation for today's Hangout, Terry created this article on his blog, focusing on this article from my blog and this article on Simon Ensor's blog. It included the two videos below:

Daniel Bassill



Simon Ensor



What I admire about Terry and a few others who I've met via cMOOCs and similar on-line forums is that he takes the time to dig into information put online by myself and others, then takes even more time to create screencasts and similar work that shows his understanding of what he's looking at and encourages others to spend their own time looking at the information.

Today's Hangout with Daniel, Simon and Terry



I hope you'll take some time to view these, and share them on your own blogs and web sites. Terry created a Vialog where you can offer your own comments and join the conversation. 

I home many others will create their own guided tours through this information and will share links to your articles in the comment section below, and on Twitter, Facebook, Linked in and other spaces.

Use of Cartoons to Draw Attention and Communicate Ideas

Kevin Hodgson, a middle school teacher in Western Massachusetts, who I met via the Making Learning Connected cMOOC,  has been creating cartoons and using them to tell stories for the past few weeks.  He's sharing them on this Tumblr site.

As I looked at these this morning I was reminded of an animated cartoon done by an intern from South Korea, via IIT in Chicago, during his work with Tutor/Mentor Connection in Chicago. 





This animation is timely because as part of National Mentoring Month, many athletes and celebrities are part of videos that show the importance of mentoring, and to encourage others to become involved. My goal is to motivate more athletes, teams and sponsors to focus on building great tutor/mentor programs in multiple locations throughout big cities, and on the actions that help such programs become great, and stay great, over a period of years.

I've suggested to Kevin and others that students from schools across the country could be learning to communicate ideas and strategies, just as interns have been doing with me since 2006.  Here's more videos by past interns. 

The strategy ideas interns have been visualizing focus on this, and help draw the attention of a growing number of people who could adopt, and duplicate, these ideas as part of their own leadership.

I'm looking for volunteers and sponsors to help update the web sites where I share these, and to update the videos themselves. More than that, I'm also looking for web sites where others are collecting and hosting videos created with the same focus of  helping youth living in high poverty, as my videos have.  

Connect with me if you'd like to discuss involvement. 

Note: the contact information at the end of this video has changed since the video was created. I'm no longer part of the Cabrini Connections program and now lead the Tutor/Mentor Connection as part of Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC. 

Annotation. A New Learning and Collaboration Tool

How many times have you read a book, or an article, and used your yellow high-lighter to mark up important passages, or used sticky notes to post comments? Or even written notes in the margins? I'm sure many of us have done this to support our learning and prepare for tests.

A few weeks ago Terry Elliott, who I met through the Making Learning Connected cMOOC (#CLMOOC) introduced me to on-line annotation, and a tool called diigo.com

Today I spent an hour listening to Terry and a few others talk about another annotation tool, called hypothes.is. Below is the video of Google Hangout is below.



As a result of listening to the Hangout, I followed a path of learning, to several other web sites:

First I went to the Vialogue page where participants were holding a live chat while the Hangout was taking place.

That pointed me to Joe Dillon's "learn, teach, repeat" blog article.  Joe was the moderator of the Hangout.

In addition, the Vialogue pointed me to this article on a blog titled "Keven's Meandering Mind" which I've been following for several months.

Kevin's article encouraged readers (and me) to read this New York Times article about annotation, which provides many strategies for applying this process in classroom learning, and real world collaboration and problem solving.

The Hangout took place the day prior to the 2016 State of the Union Address, and it's goal was to encourage people to participate in a group annotation of the SOTU speach, using Hypothes.is.  Many did, and here's the link.

Terry, Kevin, Joe and the other Hangout participants, as well as the people I've met in the Making Learning Connected cMOOC, are all educators. I understand how they see this as a powerful tool for motivating students to dig deeper and engaged with what they are reading, line by line, and word by word.

I've participated in a few MOOCS like the #CLMOOC since 2013, and sadly, very few educators from Chicago and other big cities seem to be participating.

However, my focus is expanding the network of adults who help kids succeed in school and in life, beyond the adults the meet in a classroom, or their immediate family.  Thus, while I see very few educators in these on-line learning communities, I see even fewer people who are leaders, volunteers, donors and/or board members with the various tutoring and/or mentoring programs operating in Chicago and other cities.

I wrote an article about Hospitals as anchor organizations a few weeks ago and showed how Terry was annotating articles I've written.

@tutormentorteam Just did a quick annotation of your article: https://t.co/dCWqIEDESI

— Terry Elliott (@telliowkuwp) December 14, 2015

Using hypothes.is and diigo.com to do annotation is one way to learn and collaborate.  In another article by Terry Elliott I found this screencast, in which he was highlighting information on a blog article by Bryan Alexander which is a mega-list of different podcasting platforms.  What a fantastic way to share what one person is reading and learning with thousands of others.

My goal in sharing these articles, and this information, is that others will take time to read my articles and share them with others.  Imagine if a volunteer, or a student, from every non-school tutoring, mentoring and after school club in Chicago, or other cities, were reading this article, annotating it, digging into the links I point to, and sharing all of this with others at his/her location.

Perhaps hundreds of volunteers would begin to draw students into newspapers, blog articles, text books, etc. to support their own habits of deeper learning, collaboration and idea sharing., Imagine if those students began to take those habits into their schools and classrooms, demonstrating their greater learning to teachers and peers, and sharing the tools they were using to learning, and pointing to this blog, and the sites I point to, as their reference material.

Imagine how many lives we might transform. 

Note: One of the reasons I wrote this article was to create a single reference point for me to include in this section of the Tutor/Mentor Web library. Since first writing this I have added links to new sites focusing on annotation,  using the comments box of this article. Feel free to add links that you're aware of using the comments, or using an annotation platform.

7-9-2018 update: Here's a guide to using Hypothes.is posted by New York City Hive network. click here

Network Building - Mapping Event Participation

The first time someone from IUPUI came to a Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference was in 2000 or 2001. After that someone came each year and by 2004 we were talking about ways to help IUPUI duplicate the Tutor/Mentor Connection in Indianapolis, in exchange for a small annual consulting fee.  That did not happen, but one outcome was that the tech department at IUPUI re-built the www.tutormentorconnection.org web site, which has been first created by one of my volunteers in 1998.  IUPUI hosted that site until 2014 and it's been hosted by a friend from IUPUI since then.

Thus, we've been connected for nearly 16 years.

In January 2014 a team of students in an information visualization MOOC hosted by Indiana University took a look at the Excel attendance records of each of the conferences that I've hosted since 1994.  Their final report is in this blog article, along with a map of participation that they created. 

A couple of months ago my friend from IUPUI asked to look at this same information, in his own efforts to build his skills at using another mapping platform, called Tableau.  He and I have been working on this since then, and he sent me this link a few days ago, showing the map you see below.

I embedded the map on one of my web sites.  By looking at this, you can see that the Tutor/Mentor Conference that I've hosted since 1994 has drawn people from all over the country.  You can zoom into the map down to the Chicago zip code level, and see the number of participants from each Chicago zip code. You can also look at participation in individual conferences. Between 1997 and 2002 we were drawing 200 to 300 to each conference. That tailed off to 100-150 by 2010, then has been 70-90 since then. The decline parallels the financial challenges since 2001 of small non profits, the rise of the internet, making it easier to find ideas and connect with others on-line, and the rise of other intermediaries in Chicago who are also inviting people working with youth to come to their events and their training sessions. 

If you look at the goals of the Tutor/Mentor Conference, you'll see that its

part of an ongoing strategy aimed at building connections between the people leading tutor/mentor programs, the people who are volunteers, and the people who provide the money so that high quality tutor/mentor programs can reach more K-12 youth in high poverty neighborhoods in Chicago and other cities.

The conferences was not only intended to draw people from tutor/mentor programs together to share ideas and build relationships, but to build public awareness that would draw more consistent support from people in business, philanthropy, media, faith groups politics and other sectors to the conference and into support of tutor/mentor programs in different parts of the city.

I've been trying to map participation for several years to show who has been attending (tutor/mentor programs people) and who has not been attending (everyone else who needs to be involved!).  The categories on the top map, are the same as the categories on the second map, shown above. This is the November 1998 conference.  The orange icons are tutor/mentor programs. The other icons code for different sectors. You can see the interactive map, and several others, here. 

I've never had much money and little political or philanthropic support for the Tutor/Mentor Connection and the conferences and I've much less today than even before. The lack of consistent participation from business, faith groups, philanthropy, political leaders, etc. reflect that lack of support.

However, since the mid 2000s I've encouraged others who have much greater clout and financial muscle than I have to map participation in their own events, showing year to year participation, and using the map and on-line communities like Google+, to connect participants with each other, and keep them connected, and growing in their involvement, from year-to-year.

Hopefully, their maps would show more of the people who are not coming to my conferences, coming to their events. Hopefully we can find a way to connect those people to the vast on-line library of ideas I've created, as well as to the list of Chicago area non-school tutor/mentor programs that I've been hosting since 1994.

I don't need everyone coming to the conference I host. My goal is that a growing number of people adopt the commitment shown in this strategy map.

The conferences are part of a network-building strategy, which I've described in many articles on this blog.  In the presentation below I show how every one of us has the potential to be a "network builder" who responds to negative news with actions that draw more people together, into a movement of people who provide time, talent and dollars in many places and for many years.

Network Building - Unleash Your Personal Power to Make Good Things Happen by Daniel F. Bassill

While many can take the role of network-building, I hope that some also begin to map participation in their networks to show growth over a period of years and to identify gaps where participation is missing.  Building and sharing network maps publicly, and connecting communities via cMOOCs and other on-line communities, can encourage idea sharing across networks, and within networks, that stimulates involvement, innovation and leads to constant improvement in what the network, and its members, do to solve the problems they focus on.

While we're celebrating National Mentoring Month, and using images of minority youth, and stories of overcoming poverty, let's remember that there are thousands of such youth living in Chicago and every big city, and it will take many years for kids in first grade today to be starting their first job and building their careers when they are in their mid twenties.

I hope you'll read other articles I've written on this blog since 2005, and look at more of the ideas shared on the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC web site.

If you'd like to use the conference data to create your own maps, or to create network analysis visualizations, or if you'd like to apply your talents in communications, web design, etc. to help build and maintain the platforms I describe on this page, I'd love to have your help. 

I have my PowerBall ticket in hand, and if I'm lucky enough to win, I'll plow that money back into the work I've been doing for the past 30 years.  If I'm one of the millions who don't see any of the winning numbers of their ticket, I hope articles like this will inspire one or more philanthropists or investors to support what I've been doing.

National Mentoring Month - Time for Reflection

During the month of January local and national organizations will celebrate mentoring in media and events held throughout the country.  Visit the National Mentoring Month web site to learn about national events. Visit the Illinois Mentoring Partnership web site to learn about events taking place in the Chicago area.

While all of the attention is focused on mentoring, I think it's a good time to dig deeper, to  understand the different types of mentoring strategies that exists, and the different youth and adults who are the intended beneficiaries of mentoring. Furthermore, let's once again look at roles volunteers can take beyond being a mentor, or without being a mentor.

Let's look at this graphic first:

All youth and adults would benefit from mentors helping them journey through life. However, much research shows that youth living in high poverty, segregated, and/or isolated, areas need more help to move from first grade toward their adult lives.  Here's a concept map that illustrates this differently. People living in more affluent areas have more resources to help them overcome challenges.  This page on the YEARUP web site illustrates this "opportunity divide" effectively.

Through the Tutor/Mentor Connection, started in 1993, and through the Tutor/Mentor Institute, LLC, started in 2011, I focus on youth living in high poverty areas of big cities like Chicago, where a wide range of mentoring, tutoring and learning supports are needed, in the lives of thousands of young people.   Ideally, such programs should reach youth early and stay connected for many years, if the end result is a life out of poverty with a network of people to help achieve that goal.

The above graphic illustrates this long term commitment.  It shows kids I connected with when they were in middle school, who I'm still connected with nearly 20 years later. Several have college degrees, including advanced degrees. These are just a few of the teens who were part of the tutor/mentor programs I led between 1975 and 2011.

While some children might join a tutor/mentor program when in elementary school others might not have access to this type of support until much older. Many mentoring formats focus on youth age  16-24 who have been involved in the juvenile justice system, or have dropped out of high school before graduation.  Such program require many different types of support to help a young person get his/her life back on track. 

Other mentoring formats, such as school based mentoring, are not structured for long-term connectivity. Many forms of involvement are "motivational speakers" or short duration classes. These are all part of a mix of needed services, but without at least one organization in a child's life offering a long-term support system, are the others enough to overcome the challenges poverty places in front of kids and families?

Regardless of when a tutor/mentor program first connects with a youth, the responsibility should be that the program, or other partners, provide a continuum of age appropriate learning, mentoring, experiences and work and skill-building opportunities that result in youth having the skills, education, network and opportunities needed to find work and build careers beyond the grasps of poverty.  Here's a concept map that illustrates this differently, showing that at each age groups youth need a variety of supports. Few tutor/mentor programs can provide all of these. 

Above is another set of graphics to stimulate your thinking. The middle one includes a map showing high poverty neighborhoods in Chicago.   It also compares operating a tutor/mentor program, or being a teacher, to Thomas Edison. Each child is different, and constantly changing. Thus, leaders, volunteers, parents and educators must be constantly learning ..and experimenting, in order to offer the greatest benefit. 

The question we should be asking ourselves, if our focus is on youth living in poverty, is "How can we fill all high poverty neighborhoods with organized, age specific programs, that can build and sustain long-term connections with children as the grow to become adults?    How do we pay for it? Where do we attract and retain talented leaders? How do we keep volunteers involved for multiple years?  

These are just a few of many questions to be asked an answered...in many places. For instance, of all of the organizations that offer mentoring, which focus on children living in high poverty poverty areas? Which have long-term strategies? Do cities have  maps showing what neighborhoods are being reached with existing programs? Do they use that information to expand the number of kids reach every year?

Furthermore, who's providing the money and talent to collect, organize, analyze and share this information on a continuous basis?  

So what role do volunteers, and people who don't  have the time to meet directly, and regularly, with youth, take to make this happen?  Here's one presentation titled "Mentor Role in a Larger Strategy".  I hope you'll look at it.

Mentor Role in Larger Youth Development Strategy by Daniel F. Bassill

The questions I've posted here just scratch the surface of the questions that might be asked.  Visit this section of the Tutor/Mentor Web library and read the research articles. Visit this section and read the blog articles.

During this month, and throughout the year, I invite volunteers, program leaders, media, donors and policy makers to dig into this and other articles I've posted since 2005 on this blog, and in my library on Scribd.com.  Do a Google search for "tutor mentor", then look at the images. You'll find dozens more intended to stimulate your thinking.

Build a deeper  understanding of what types of  programs serve the different needs of youth from different age groups and different social/economic backgrounds. Talk about proactive roles business, volunteers and donors can take to help strong, long-lasting tutor/mentor programs reach youth in more places. Create a "learning organization' where many are involved in this effort.

Every child is special. Every child deserves a support system that offers hope and opportunity. Some have this when they are born. Others won't have this unless many adults who don't live in poverty make a consistent, heroic, on-going effort to make such supports available. 

If you're writing similar articles on your own blog, or host on-line forums where people are discussing these questions, use the comment box to share a link to your web sites or forums. I hope there are many leading this discussion.

Help me continue to write and share articles like this. Visit my FUND T/MI page and add your support. 

Using Better Data to Support Innovative Problem Solving

I read this article, from the Stanford Social Innovation Review (SSIR) today, titled,"Bridging Communities and Government Through Data".   It shows how better data can point people and resources to places where complex problems require investment and on-going effort to create solutions.   This would be part of Step 1, from this 4-part strategy (see presentation)  that I've been sharing , and applying through my own efforts, since 1993.

The SSIR articles calls for government funding of the data gathering part of this process. I think that's part of the solution, but before we get consistent, on-going funding for everything that I include in this strategy map, we need to influence many people in the private sector to do much more than they do now.

The visualization below is one that illustrates a need to influence what resource providers do in order to also influence how government and social benefit organizations do.  Without building a flow of resources, to support innovation, learning, and stronger organizations in more places, the efforts to document and measure outcomes will be too few, and to limited. 

How to Influence Change: Use of Visualizations by Daniel F. Bassill

I don't know if you've set a New Year's Resolution yet, of if you ever do. However, unless more people share the ideas I write about, or that SSIR posts on their web site, too few people will be involved in doing the "influence" work needed to get more people involved, more resources involved, and better on-going distribution of talent, dollars, ideas and other needed resources into all of the high poverty areas which are the root of many of the problems we see written about in the daily media.

I've written more than 1000 blog articles since 2005 and I have hosted ideas like this on web sites since 1998. I included these ideas in printed newsletters before the Internet became my tool for sharing ideas.

Leaders in every sector, in every city, need to be writing blogs with the same information I'm sharing, and for the same purpose.

Among the data we need to be collecting would be data that recognizes, on an industry-by-industry, or faith group-by-faith group basis, who is actually taking this role.

In this presentation I show the potential of using the information we collect to inspire and influence constant, year-to-year improvement in what we're all doing to solve complex problems.

While I think this role can be adopted in many types of organization, I continue to seek partners, funders, investors who will help me continue my own efforts.  Click here and make a 2016 contribution to support my work. I'm not a 501-c-3, so I cannot offer a tax deduction.

I can offer to continue to share these ideas, at no cost, to you and other users if you'll help me.