Weaver Literacy

Tool: Weaver Literacy

This document gives you basic information about community-led development, community engagement and empowerment models

TOOL

Weaver literacy

Appreciative Inquiry (AI):
Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is a change management approach that focuses on identifying what is working well, analyzing why it is working well and then doing more of it. The basic tenet of AI is that an organization will grow in whichever direction that people in the organization focus their attention.
Tool: Appreciative Inquiry (AI) Guide

Asset Based Community Development (ABCD):
Asset-based community development (ABCD) is a methodology for the sustainable development of communities based on their strengths and potentials.
Tool: Asset Based Community Development

Bump Spaces:
Bump spaces are where people bump into one another, often these are spaces where 'community' happens, they are also referred to as connected spaces.

Co-creation:
Co-creation is an initiative, that brings different parties together (for instance, a company or community and a group of customers), in order to jointly produce a mutually valued outcome.

Community consultation/participation process:
This process is the participation of the community throughout the project lifecycle through strategic communication planning

Community-Led Development: (CLD)
Community-led Development (CLD) is the process of working together to create and achieve locally owned visions and goals. It is a planning and development approach that’s based on a set of core principles that (at a minimum) set vision and priorities by the people who live in that geographic community, put local voices in the lead, build on local strengths (rather than focus on problems), collaborate across sectors, is intentional and adaptable, and works to achieve systemic change rather than short-term projects. CLD is focused on building the capacity of the community as a whole system. This process acknowledges the Community as experts in their own lives.

Complexity theory/thinking/systems: (sometimes referred to as Chaos Theory)
Complexity Theory is the study of complex and chaotic systems and how order, pattern, and structure can arise from them - It's not simple and it's not complicated, it's complex. It provides a way of thinking about the structure of your team, organisation, or community. Where many of the organisational structures we see around us are ‘mechanistic’ in nature, complexity sees organisations as more akin to a living system, one that is dynamic, has space, and allows for organic and spontaneous actions from throughout the organisation.

Consultation to Participation Spectrum:
The IAP2 Federation (International Association for Public Participation) has developed the Spectrum to help groups define the public’s role in any public participation process. The Spectrum show that differing levels of participation are legitimate depending on the goals, time frames, resources and levels of concern in the decision to be made. However, and most importantly, the Spectrum sets out the promise being made to the public at each participation level. The Spectrum is widely used and is quoted in most community engagement manuals.

Holacracy:
Holacracy is a system of flat organizational governance structure (trademarked by HolacracyOne), in which authority and decision-making are distributed throughout a holarchy of self-organising peer-to-peer teams rather than being held in a management hierarchy.

Holding the Space:
The word ‘holding’ has connotations of care, support and preservation rather than grasp, manhandle or hold to tightly. The word ‘space’ implies an expanse, a capacity and a sense of freedom therefore creating a place of potential, a safe place where things can happen and a place where something can expand.

To hold space is to create and maintain a place where things can exist, expand and grow and is based on four actions:

Let go of judgment
Open your heart
Allow another to have whatever experience they're having
Give your complete undivided attention to the situation/other person (to be fully present)

Non-Violent Communication (NVC):
(sometimes referred to as Compassionate Communication or Collaborative Communication)

Nonviolent Communication is a communication process developed by Marshall Rosenberg beginning in the 1960s. Its purpose is to: create human connections that empower compassionate giving and receiving; create governmental and corporate structures that support compassionate giving and receiving. This model is useful in guiding the interactions within teams.

Open Space: (sometimes referred to as Open Space Technology (OST))
Open Space is an approach to purpose-driven leadership, including a way for hosting meetings, conferences, and community summit events. Open Space focuses on a specific and important purpose or task however does so without any formal agenda, beyond the overall purpose or theme. Although specific outcomes can not be predicted, it's always highly productive for whatever issue people want to attend to often with surprising results and fascinating new questions to follow up. This process can be useful when carrying out community engagement and visioning processes.

PERMA:
PERMA is an acronym for a model of well-being put forth by a pioneer in the field of positive psychology, Martin Seligman. According to Seligman, PERMA makes up five important building blocks of well-being and happiness:

Positive emotions – feeling good
Engagement – being completely absorbed in activities
Relationships – being authentically connected to others
Meaning – purposeful existence
Achievement – a sense of accomplishment and success

While predominantly applied to individuals, this model can be effectively applied to communities, providing a structured view of the potential positive impacts of a project.

Permaculture:
Permaculture is a creative design process based on whole-systems thinking informed by ethics, and has twelve design principles. It’s application to community projects supports a holistic view of the impacts of projects, and helps to focus the goals and vision of a project, while reducing negative impacts on a community.

Social Landscape:
(sometimes referred to as social architecture, social ecology, threefold corporate state/threefold social order)

The social landscape model provides a framework to holistically look at the context within which your project or idea sits. The three sub-sections of The Social Landscape Model address issues that continue to shape our collective identities:

Political/Social or ‘Rights Sphere’ is where the government maintains equal opportunities, follow the rules and looks at conflict and social reform as they are reflected in people's daily lives.
Environmental or ‘Economic Sphere’ considers the relationships between meeting humans need from their physical landscapes and animal kingdom while meeting the needs of all beings on the planet.
Cultural Identity or ‘Cultural/Liberty Sphere’ addresses the ongoing issues faced by indigenous and immigrant peoples in our countries and addresses the right to express cultural, artistic, religious or alternative education perspectives.

Tool: Social Landscape Model

Sociocracy:
Sociocracy is a whole systems approach to designing and leading organisations. It is based on principles, methods, and a structure that creates a resilient and coherent system by using transparency, inclusiveness, and accountability to increase harmony, effectiveness, and productivity. It is particularly applied to decision making processes.

Strengths Finder:
The Clifton StrengthsFinder is a Web-based assessment of normal personality from the perspective of Positive Psychology. It provides customised results that name your unique talents, helps identify what you naturally do best and how to succeed by turning your talents into strengths. It can be both useful at an individual level, while also being useful as a tool to build teams.

Teal organisations:
The Teal paradigm (think the colour teal) refers to the next stage in the evolution of human consciousness. When applied to organisations, this paradigm views the organisation as an independent force with its own purpose, and not merely as a vehicle for achieving management's objectives. Teal organisations are characterised by self-organisation and self-management.

World Café: (sometimes referred to as Knowledge Cafe)
A World Café is a structured conversational process for knowledge sharing in which groups of people discuss a topic at several tables, with individuals switching tables periodically and getting introduced to the previous discussion at their new table by a "table host". This process can be useful when carrying out community engagement and visioning processes.