THE 4 STEPS TO BUILDING A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL MOVEMENT
by Kaihan Krippendorff
People who study social movements like the French Revolution, women’s rights, and the Arab Spring, show that successful movements follow a predictable pattern:
1. A community forms around a common goal
2. The community mobilizes resources
3. The community finds solutions (what I call “fourth options”)
4. The movement is accepted by (or actually replaces) the establishment
If you understand this pattern and build your project or career or business with this pattern in mind you have a greater chance of success.
Step 1: A community forms around a common goal
Business planning experts will tell you to create a mission that sounds something like “to create shareholder value by becoming the greatest ice cream scoop maker in the world.” The problem with most mission statements is that they matter only to three stakeholders: shareholders, employees, and customers. As for the rest of the world...who cares? By contrast, great social movements must have broader human appeal. For example, at one point in his life, Pipkin was helping plant trees in Kenya and was asked to plant trees at a school. When he got there he realized the 8th graders digging in the dirt with him were about to end their education because there was no high school in the area. These kids would be thrown out into the world half-educated. Solution? He and a few others brainstormed “to build a model [high] school that has all the things a school needs: safe buildings, durability, and a healthy environment with good air and light,” he explained. For your business/career/project to really take off, ask this question: What mission could you pursue that society would care about? For me, I see the opportunity to build a consulting firm that helps solve big problems by helping people see “fourth options.”
http://www.fastcompany.com/3006283/4-steps-building-successful-social-movement
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Eleanors38, I believe that a great name will reflect a great common goal. You, WillyT, and EEO have all started threads to identify those goals, would you be willing to work with them to collect all the feedback from your three threads, filter out repetitions, and create a comprehensive list of suggestions? PM the list to the hosts so we all have a copy, and then we'll create a new thread where we can all vote on the suggestions.
Are you up for it?
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