"Taking down the fences between sectors has benefited all parties and increased the chance of sustainable results through community ownership and collaboration"
Philanthropy NZ 2009 conference participant

At the heart of Inspiring Communities Networks is a small Exchange team

The Exchange exists to build and spread the "know-how" of place-based, collaborative community-led development, and to provide more leverage than is possible from disparate and unconnected local initiatives, through:

  • Learning from experience
  • Advising
  • Community leadership development
  • Promoting and advocacy
  • Bringing unlikely people together and developing the 'strength of loose ties'

  • Meet the members of The Exchange
The Exchange is the engine room that:
  • Supports a national network of people and places actively involved in practising and learning about community-led development - the Core Learning Cluster
  • Supports the development of regional learning networks of people, initiatives, organisations and places wanting to share experiences, strengthen community-led development ways of working and enhance community resilience
  • Inspires and supports development of local leaders and leadership styles that foster community-led development
  • Develops tools, processes, case studies and identifies lessons learned
  • Communicates about community-led development through the newsletter, website and advisory services
  • Provides focused community-led development expertise in selected communities for specific purposes
  • Builds cross sector understanding and connections over practical community-led development initiatives
  • Connects and learns from developments in New Zealand and internationally, distils and shares information
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