Potenciar Comunidades

Potenciar Comunidades is a methodological platform to design and implement collaborative strategies of social investment, territorial development and collective impact. It is designed and managed by Fundación Los Grobo since 2004.

It proposes to go through a process of collective construction in which the involved actors imagine, debate and design development alternatives that are transformative, innovative, sustainable and meaningful for the territories.

Through the creation of spaces for participatory planning, the actors involved are encouraged: local organizations from the public, private and social sectors and Social Investors to connect, dialogue, design and manage community impact initiatives jointly. As a result of this process, more confidence and social capital, better quality of life and more opportunities, economic growth with social inclusion, high levels of innovation and cooperation, low levels of social conflict, governability and sustainability are generated in the territories.

The methodology of Potenciar Comunidades is flexible and integrative, and consists of 4 stages:

Stage 1 – Preparatory: The place where you are going to work is selected and a promoter group of local people and organizations is formed, defining together the rules of the game that will guide the development process of the territory. This body of work includes the active participation of social investors, be they public, private or social.

Stage 2 – Diagnosis: Through a participatory analysis, the main characteristics, problems and challenges of the territory in economic, social, environmental, political and institutional matters are identified and described.

Stage 3 – Design: Based on the diagnosis, a development agenda is defined, containing topics identified as priorities, and strategies and projects to address them. The purpose of this stage is to make the participatory planning space become a space for collective action.

Stage 4 – Action: The objective of this stage is to implement the ideas conceived in previous stages, and for the participants to go through a specific associated management experience. For this, Empower Communities provides financing, support and technical assistance. Strengthens the capacities of local actors and provides them with tools to transform them into agents of development.

Potenciar Comunidades works so that there are solid and motivated groups of organizations, with greater resources and experience; projects that improve the quality of life, provide opportunities, expand their reach and incorporate more and more people; social investors prepared to positively transform the territories where they are present, obtaining more and better results; conscious citizens, caring and responsible, willing to dialogue and open to change, able to build together a better future for themselves and their communities.

The proposal has been carried out in more than 230 communities in Argentina and Latin America, articulating with 60 investment partners and strategic allies, with a reach of more than 500 local organizations, training more than 2,500 leaders and community leaders. With a history measured in more than 60 projects implemented and more than 500,000 people benefited.