----- Original Message -----

From: Patti Anklam

To: ona-prac@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2009 6:27 AM

Subject: [ona-prac] FW: Diagnosing Your Social Network's Health

Here’s another great resource for testing network health. (And if you are a network-builder and not just an analyst, and you haven’t read Net Gains, you really should do so!)

Best,

/patti

From: Greg Berry [mailto:greg@nuanceintelligence.com]
Sent: Thursday, June 04, 2009 5:03 PM
To: patti@byeday.net
Subject: Diagnosing Your Social Network's Health

Hello,

The team that brought you Net Gains: A Handbook for Network Builders Seeking Social Change has developed a new tool for assessing your network’s health.

As we've designed networks and coached network builders, the question always comes up: How can we know how the network is doing? In some ways, the answer is complicated. There are different types of networks and networks evolve through different stages--factors that should be taken into account. But it's also true that some things about networks hold for any network at any stage of life.

We've developed this Network Health Scorecard working with colleagues at Cause Communications, and testing ideas with networks that include Rural People Rural Policy, an initiative of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. With just 22 questions and a 1-5 scoring system, it focuses on key aspects of any network: purpose, performance, operations, and capacity. It's designed for group use--network members answer each question and then discuss their answers--or on your own.

Please read about it, test it out and share your feedback at the website to let us know how it worked for you so we can improve this tool for network builders.

Madeleine Taylor and Peter Plastrik