October 2022 Newsletter: Change is Not a Solo Effort, It’s a Shared Responsibility
We need each other. Solutions to many of our current challenges require marshaling our shared resources. No single organization, no one leader or group of individuals can tackle these problems on their own. Every person in the community can help. The heart of our work at The Harwood Institute is a belief that everyone has intrinsic talents and treasures—and when we effectively bring them together, harnessing the resources of our communities and inviting everyone to the table, we can productively and positively shape our shared civic lives. The key is to pitch an open tent: everyone can join, everyone can contribute, everyone belongs.
Building a New Tool: An Open Tent
We’re innovating with a long-standing partner, the United Way of Southwest Michigan, to test and deliver a new tool for communities to direct their collective resources toward a common purpose. This tool is an entreaty to pitch an open tent.
The idea of the open tent comes from a story in the Bible. The story goes that Abraham’s tent was open on all four sides so that anyone, from any direction, would be welcomed inside—even the stranger.
This story is raised not to make a religious point, but rather to help us reimagine the kind of space we need in our local communities. Communities need to pitch tents that are open on all four sides—intentionally creating spaces that welcome people who are willing to work together on common issues and challenges, and in doing so, generate a culture of shared responsibility.
We’ve worked with the United Way of Southwest Michigan for many years and they repeatedly send community members through our Public Innovator Labs to learn how to turn outward. They’ve seen what it’s like to turn outward and unleash a chain reaction. But they’re at an impasse: how do they step into a new phase of this work? How do they mobilize individuals, groups, and organizations who are taking different actions across their community, and leverage their talents and resources in service of a shared aspiration?
The “open tent” tool is our latest innovation—a tool that will be tested in the community and refined as we engage with a small team of public innovators who will use it, provide feedback, and help us hone in on the best ways to support communities as they build their capacity to create change.
None of us can do this alone: we need to welcome everyone to the table, moving ahead with those who are willing and ready, and leaving the tent open for others to join us when they feel called to step forward.
Rich’s Healing and Hope Tour Visits Southwest Michigan
“[Rich’s message] resonates so completely with where we are today in this work…This is hard work, but he still has excitement. He leaves us with so much hope and vigor about doing the next phase of our work. I can’t thank him and his team enough for being here.”
-Anna Murphy, UWSM President & CEO
The media and politicians keep telling us that Americans are polarized—deeply opposed to each other on public policy and ideology. This is wrong. The truth is divisions in this country are more about social and psychological conditions—fear, anxiety, a lack of empathy and belonging—than about ideological polarization. Following the release of the Civic Virus report, which details these conditions and reminds us we have common aspirations, Rich has been touring the country, sharing a message of healing and hope: it’s not easy, but there is a clear and proven way forward.
Last week, he gathered with public innovators in Southwest Michigan, giving a keynote address that acknowledges where we are as a country and within our communities and that calls us to action. He urged: “When they say we can't move forward from trauma and vulnerability, I say, yes, we can, but only when we move forward together.”
Rich also joined a small group of leaders for an intimate roundtable discussion to explore their challenges and how they and their communities can deepen civic culture, bring people together across fault lines, and catalyze change.
Participants left the events feeling reinvigorated. They told us:
“I am reenergized and hopeful.”
“I am inspired to want to learn more and feel validated.”
“I feel a renewed sense of conviction.”
And they’re ready to step up. As Lorraine Day from Midwest Family shared, “The presentation today is making me think about what I can do as a catalyst in our community. How can I help us really move toward hope and healing?”
In a society that is breaking apart, we must give people safe passage to hope. Together, it is possible.
Cultivating Public Innovators: Clarksville Lab
In 2019, Money magazine named Clarksville, TN, the best place to live in the U.S. With one of the largest military installments in the country, Clarksville has a strong identity and is loved by the people who make it their home. Perhaps this is one of the reasons Clarksville is enjoying unprecedented growth. But growth doesn’t come without challenges—it has outstripped its civic capacities to manage its future and the needs of young people, many of whom are struggling with parents coming in and out of military duty, with trauma, and mental health challenges. Working in partnership with the Boys and Girls Club of Clarksville, Leadership Clarksville, and Women Veterans of America, our challenge is to help the community take action through shared responsibility to ensure there is a strong network of mentors and support for their young people–and that no one is left behind.
In September, we hosted a Getting Started lab to galvanize 25 local leaders, organizational staff, and community residents in Clarksville. Participants learned the turning outward practice, equipping them to build their community’s civic capacity, unleash a chain reaction of positive actions, and shape its future.
With their new knowledge and orientation toward the community, these public innovators will step forward to activate their communities, working together toward a common purpose: to ensure all young people have an equitable ability to fulfill their potential. Youth touch every part of the Clarksville community: educating them is not the sole responsibility of the local public schools, but must be a shared responsibility of the entire community.
Turning Outward Across the Globe
The towns in Australia where Brian Smith, a Harwood coach, along with local community organizations, has led three “Getting Started” labs for community members, organizational staff, and local leaders are, in his words, “tough areas.” “They’re facing really difficult situations,” he said as he described one lab where most of the participants work in a neighborhood center focused on public housing, in an area where “virtually everyone” is unemployed. “There’s generational disadvantages and trauma, a mix of nationalities and languages…Often, hope is pretty shattered.”
The Getting Started labs are intended to help public innovators learn the practice and orientation of turning outward, so they can begin to catalyze a chain reaction of positive actions in their communities. The lab doesn’t prescribe solutions; as Brian said, “it’s a practice. And you’ve got to keep practicing like playing the piano.”
The three labs featured participants who work in a range of community organizations with missions such as disaster recovery or engaging and supporting youth. In fact, Brian shared that the regional youth coordinators in attendance have adapted our community conversations practice to listen to and learn from young people, sometimes as young as primary school age who share their thoughts through pictures.
Community leaders from around the world, like those in Brian’s lab, continue to turn to the Harwood approach because it’s an effective means of catalyzing change. With over 30 years of on-the-ground experience, rigorous research, and constant innovation, we know what it takes, in practical ways, to create change. Because of this, our work has been adopted and adapted by public innovators in all 50 states and over 40 countries around the world, including Australia.
When asked what they stand for, lab participants spoke of their deepest alignments and aspirations: “dignity and respect for all,” “truth-telling,” “education,” “emotional wellbeing,” and “kindness.” In spite of the challenges, they stand for hope.
Harwood Team Update!
We are excited to welcome a new member to the Harwood team: Ashley Asti, our Writer and Content Producer. Ashley believes in the power of stories to connect us to each other and to spark transformation. She’s written a handful of books and hosts a podcast that seeks to bring the unfamiliar closer and to remind us that love demands we move toward justice. Learn more about Ashley.
Rob Barron, a Des Moines native and the Executive Director of Iowa and Minnesota Campus Compact, joins the Harwood Board of Directors. Rob brings a wealth and breadth of experience in civic and community engagement and higher education leadership. He was recently named one of the Midwest’s most influential people of color by Madison 365 and was the first Latino to win elected office in Polk County. Learn more about Rob.