Our Journey
Reflections, ideas, and thoughts
What we’re taking from 2021, what we’re leaving behind
2021 was a big year for the Collective Impact Agency (CIA). We grew from one permanent member of staff to a team of five, we took on a...
Lightening the Burden of Fear
At some point in our lives, we all face fear. It is the feeling that makes us want to run, to hide, to stop, to not try, to give up…
VCSE orgs - let’s start Going Green Together!
VCSE organisations have a unique opportunity to tackle the climate crisis and contribute to systemic change.
Healthy Systems: Strong Relationships, Strong Foundations
When I look at the world, I generally see it in two ways (usually at the same time). On the one hand, whilst I don't like to admit my...
Deprogramming Dexter
Or 'from weirdo to professional and back again' In school I was seen as ‘Stu the weirdo’. Long hair, earrings, flamboyant clothes...
Why I'm excited to join the CIA
I’m coming to work with the Collective Impact Agency (CIA) next month, and I can’t wait, but it’s an unusual excitement. Usually, when...
Tackling Male Entitlement, One Conversation At A Time
It was half 10 on a Wednesday night when I picked up my phone, crying, to message my friends. The news had just broken about...
The Trouble With Having Values
Hands up, who works for, or has worked for, an organisation that has organisational values? Like mission statements and vision...
Sanctuary for the Troublemakers
I joined the Collective Impact Agency (CIA) back in April of this year. As I look back over my first quarter here I’d love to share some...
How Organisations Can Learn To Learn
Recently, I delivered a talk called ‘The roles of learning and emotions in systems change’...
Crossing Out The Accessibility Tick-Box
Accessibility is a word we’re all familiar with, that is regularly used and regularly misunderstood. It is often a last-minute addition...
How "Lived Experience" fails lived experience
I find myself feeling quite uncomfortable about the way many of the discussions about ‘lived experience’ are playing out these days…
People @ The Heart
You can either structure support systems around people or around professional concerns. Any system not structured around the people it is intended to serve is inevitably going to clash with and exacerbate people’s needs. Our current system is structured around professional concerns…
What Connects Us Makes Us Stronger
Last year, like many people, when lockdown hit I found myself switching from an office of 60-ish people to an office of one.
The thing that anchored me in my working hours was my manager. Every Monday we would use our catch-up time to just be human beings, she gave me space to just be…
Why SMART is actually stupid
I once worked for an organization that had a pretty stringent objective setting process. It was understood that objectives may change as the year progressed. allowed, your manager could recommend you for a bonus. Sounds sensible, right?
The trouble I always found was that life simply didn’t work that way…
We’re all getting recruitment wrong, but what can we do about it?
We all know what it feels like to be applying for jobs. Writing a job application can take hours, a 3 or 4 stage application process can take up a full day’s worth of hours and can last for weeks. Applying for work is exhausting - it’s demotivating, relentless and thankless right up until the point at which you eventually (hopefully) succeed…
The exciting possible futures of Gateshead Mutual Aid
We’ve been big proponents of the Mutual Aid groups and the work they’ve done across the country to support local communities through the pandemic. Last week, we helped host a meeting of Mutual Aid volunteers across Gateshead in which we invited people to share their ideas about what they’d like the groups to do next to help strengthen local communities.
Is it a flaw to feel?
Are some personalities better than others? Two summers ago, my colleagues and I were comparing the results and implications of our Lumina Spark personality tests. We were trying to understand how we could work more productively as a team in light of our differences….
A word on decentralisation
There’s been a lot of talk from a lot of people (myself included) about how the disruption caused by COVID-19 present us with a window of opportunity…
Dear Mutual Aid groups...
We’ve seen local residents helping each other with shopping, with prescriptions, with staying safe and connected during these strangest of times…