This toolbox was designed to facilitate team, group, student, community, etc. conversations. You can certainly use it alone, but it’s intended to help you collaborate with and learn from others. Use the toolbox in person and/or virtually through links and QR codes. The following four core components can be used independently or interdependently as "scaffolding" for one another.
"Something hit me very hard once, thinking about what one little man could do. Think of the Queen Elizabeth — the whole ship goes by and then comes the rudder. And there’s a tiny thing at the edge of the rudder called a trim tab. It’s a miniature rudder. Just moving the little trim tab builds a low pressure that pulls the rudder around. Takes almost no effort at all. So I said that the little individual can be a trim tab."
BUCKMINSTER FULLER
FUTURIST | DESIGNER
CHANGEMAKING TRIMTABS
These are your strategic principles. They help you set, maintain, and correct your changemaking course.
Buckminster Fuller (see the quote) imaged people as trimtabs. Metaphorically speaking, he believed that, just as a little trim tab can turn a massive ship, a person can change the world. But how? Well, you can’t change the world by trying to change the world. That’s impossible. You change the world by applying simple, proven strategic principles that, just like a trim tab, require little energy but empower big change. These strategies are what I call Changemaking Trimtabs. This toolbox includes 22 Changemaking Trimtabs. You might want to buy the book just for these!
DOWNLOAD THE INVENTORY LIST + EXAMPLES
THE LAW OF THE INSTRUMENT
"If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail."
ABRAHAM MASLOW
PSYCHOLOGIST
CHANGEMAKING TOOLKITS + TOOLS
These empower you and your team/ community to have conversations that put the Changemaking Trimtabs into action.
There are 76 tools curated into 13 toolkits. The tools were inspired by human-centered design methods, systems thinking approaches, Business Model Canvas, real world challenges, and insightful articles/ books, amongst other sources. I designed these for my work with communities, as a team leader, as an educator, as a service learning leader, as a facilitator, as a social innovator, and as a strategic consultant. The tools should meet you when and where you are. Most of them should be valuable if you only have 20 minutes. Depending on the context, you might work with a tool for hours, days, or weeks.
You might want to buy the book just for these!
DOWNLOAD THE INVENTORY LIST + EXAMPLES
"The law of floatation was not discovered by contemplating the sinking of things, but by contemplating the floating of things which floated naturally, and then intelligently asking why they did so."
THOMAS TROWARD
AUTHOR
CHANGEMAKING INNOVATION MINI-CASES
These are 90 short, evergreen, curated videos that show collaborative changemaking in action from around the world.
The changemakers in these videos model what this toolbox is all about. My focus was to curate videos that can be valuable both as stand-alone resources and for scaffolding the Changemaking Trimtabs and Changemaking Tools. There are a variety of ways you can search including by SDG. There's a balance of for-profit and nonprofit changemaking examples. These show changemaking in action in 39 countries. They’re joyful and inspiring.
You might want to buy the book just for these!
DOWNLOAD THE INVENTORY LIST, PLAYLISTS + EXAMPLES
CHANGEMAKER COACH
This includes advice/ Ask Me Anything, basic HOW-TO guidance for changemakers, and recommended resources for changemakers that include helpful websites and books.