Tools & Resources

This resource describes the theory and objectives of reflection workshops, and provides a step-by-step guide to conducting them, based on three stages of evaluative thinking: What happened? So what? Now what?

This resource situates collective impact in relation to similar approaches, notes similarities and differences, and makes recommendations for enhancing collaborative community practice.

This resource uses a basic matrix to distinguish between simple, complicated, political, complex, and chaotic issues and challenges, and the types of intervention most appropriate to each.

This resource explores what the spread of social innovations looks like in contexts that go beyond organisational growth, such as replication and dissemination. 

This resource contains a process for working with stakeholders to determine their desired level of involvement in an initiative.

This resource describes the ABLe Change Framework for systems change, and provides a package of simple rules, processed and tools for applying the approach. 

This resource describes Australia’s unique leadership culture and shows how leaders working in this context can support the change they want to see in the world.

This resource describes the core capabilities of system leaders and describes the means by which they may be acquired.

This resource identifies different levels of thinking and intervention regarding systems, emphasising that most of what occurs, particularly root causes, sit below the surface.

This resource is a video that explains pivoting as changing strategy, not changing your vision, much like changing your route if you encounter an obstacle while driving.

This resource describes six conditions of systems change: policies; practices; resource flows; relationships and connections; power dynamics; and mental models.

This resource helps individuals think systemically about social change, explore what is happening below the surface on issues they care about, and determine how they and their organizations can pursue large-scale change in a disciplined and holistic manner.

There are many more tools and approaches that can be used to engage with and learn about your community, have a look through the following websites for inspiration: 100 Conversations, appreciative inquiry, there are also a number of arts-based methods that can be useful…

More tools for evaluating complexity can be found here. 

This resource will help your group to identify and prioritise influential champions who could be engaged in the collaborative effort and lend their support to moving the effort forward.