OVERVIEW This is a tool for assessing the health of your network, and exploring actions to take to develop or strengthen it. This tool is intended for use by individuals working within or through social change networks. Instructions:
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Begin by identifying your network as either: 1. BOUNDED: a network with clear boundaries. The participants are known. 1. UNBOUNDED: a network with fuzzy boundaries. The participants are not all known. Rate your network (high, medium, low) against attributes within eight areas of network health Step back and jot down notes on your network’s performance in each area of health. Note whether or not this is a priority area for strengthening. Depending on where your network is at in its lifecycle, different attributes may be at different levels of priority Elicit multiple perspectives on your network’s health. Ask leaders from across your network to take the diagnostic. Compare and aggregate results Next, link your priority areas with actions for strengthening networks. The actions are by no means prescriptive and do not correlate directly to the attributes within each area of network health. They are meant to spur your thinking about the range of specific steps you might take to strengthen your network
Sources: This tool was created with inputs from multiple sources – most significantly research done by Monitor Institute for Packard Foundation grantees in 2008-09, and the work of the following network experts: Beth Kanter, June Holley, Marty Kearns, Pete Plastrik and Madeleine Taylor, Clay Shirky, and Jane Wei-Skillern. Created by the Monitor Institute, www.monitorinstitute.com Please direct queries about this tool to Diana_Scearce@monitor.com This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.