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Tool 10

How can you share power with community members?

Create a “power map” of your organization's governance and decision-making process to reveal who is overrepresented and who is missing.

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Download a PDF for the Share Power instructions and tips for guidance on structuring community committees, and examples of participatory budgeting.

Tool 10: Share Power

Description

This tool will help you plan for ways to share power—an important step in any effort to redress systems of injustice. When community stakeholders are brought into a decision-making process, an organization is laying the groundwork for more inclusivity and impact. Yet, this is easier said than done. Trust must be built and maintained, and this will likely involve repairing lines of communication that were broken long before your organization arrived. To do this, organizations need to make this process transparent, genuine, and commit to sharing power and resources over the long term. 

Developed by Harvard Graduate School of Design

Follow-Up Questions

Once you have defined guidelines to share power, ask:

  • Do we continually invite and incorporate community feedback? If so, how?

  • Are there formal systems for this collaboration in place that hold our organization accountable?

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