Breakthrough Community Change: A Guide to Creating Common Agendas That Change Everything

by Paul Born

Discover a powerful methodology for bringing communities together to uncover hidden assets and transform deep-rooted challenges.

Veteran community organizer Paul Born's work has contributed to lowering cancer rates in Maine, improving mental health for young people in Florida, and reducing poverty rates in Canada by 20 percent. In this much-needed new book, he shares stories of how he was able to catalyze local communities and guide them to make significant progress on seemingly intractable community problems.

Born has found that the secret to success is to organize and unite around a common agenda. This is not a list of topics, like a meeting agenda, nor a strategic plan. He offers a process for bringing leaders from businesses, human service organizations, and governments together with people who have a lived experience of a specific community problem. A common agenda is a statement of shared aspirations, a map of the assets in the community, and a road map for how to work together to make those aspirations a reality.

Part I of this book describes how to identify your community's readiness for change; form leadership, action, and strategy teams; create a common agenda; and establish plans for community engagement. Part II presents the approaches and skill sets needed to do the work described in part I.

Remarkably, enormous systemic problems such as climate change, poverty, disease, racism, housing, and many more issues can be best addressed at the local level. Communities can develop solutions tailored to their unique circumstances and can collaborate at a magnitude that can result in a truly transformative impact. This book shows how to make change happen.

Audible Audio

Published February 24, 2023

Reviews

[Kharah · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wanted to read this because it was part of a library program and sounded interesting - who wouldn't want the secret to breakthrough community change? I'm not sure who this book was written for, but probably not the average citizen. There are some assumptions built in - like that your community is already cohesive, that you're well-networked (i.e., know some CEOs), that there's a band of people with energy and time to do the work. A lot of high level advice without a lot of practical guidance. Sometimes felt like a long ad for the Tamarack Institute.

[Colleen Bytheway · Rating 5 out of 5]

Paul Born is the eternal optimist and his book, Breakthrough Community Change is an invaluable resource for anyone who hopes to be part of any community-level improvement, and system and population-level changes for the better, for any issue.

Paul provides detailed information on several community change models, including helpful details on how to apply Collective Impact, which he describes as "the most advanced form of collaborative action currently available."

The valuable message in Paul's latest book is that there is really no right or wrong way to do community change. It is helpful to have some tools in your toolbox, but the most important thing, is to just begin. If you truly want to make a difference, just start! This book can help give readers the confidence, that they really don't need the right job, the right title, or permission to make a difference. Just start. Have conversations, meet others, most importantly, those most affected by the issue you want to address.

Thank you Paul, for your generous of spirit, and for caring about the human condition. You are a such a wonderful inspiration to me, and so many others.

[Paul Born · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is written for community leaders and for those who are actively collaborating to change their community for the better. It has two parts. The first describes the primary methodology. The second six secondary community Development` models.