Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
I don’t care how exciting your insights or data might be.
Even the most actionable or groundbreaking ideas can lose their charm when hidden in a 100+ page strategy report. The key to bringing those ideas to life is in cultivating a beginner’s mindset with your team.
Take our recent collaboration with a regional food access organization, for example. To help them envision their bold role in the food justice movement, we built miniature terrariums together. If you are scratching your head, stay with me.
Centering community interactions around playful, movement-, or art-based activities isn’t precious or cute. In fact, it’s a critical step in developing a seriously transformative strategy. As Albert Einstein once said, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Play and experimentation are essential requirements for innovation.
A beginner’s mindset fosters an atmosphere of joy and inspiration, leading to the most remarkable innovations. Research shows that a playful environment can boost creativity by 20% and increase innovative thinking.
Whether it’s building terrariums, painting a group mural, or engaging in a movement session, the goal is to embrace — and harness — a beginner’s mindset. This fresh perspective is what unlocks those game-changing solutions to long-standing problems.
Maintaining curiosity and an open mind in a world that often prioritizes groupthink, routine, bureaucracy, profit, and professionalism is nearly impossible. This is where art and play come in. These experiences help create an environment where everyone feels like a beginner — and that’s where innovative ideas flourish.
When planning your next meeting or focus group, consider your community’s unique needs and limitations, and use them as a springboard for creativity. Choose art- or play-based activities that match, ensuring they serve as vehicles for sharing ideas and stories, not just add-ons.
By embracing a beginner’s mindset and incorporating engaging activities, you’ll attract the right people and spark more meaningful conversations and solutions.
Do you know someone who’s gearing up to gather community insights? Make sure they’ve downloaded our workbook, packed with step-by-step guidance for sparking equitable and empathetic moments of genius in your community. Share our new workbook right here!
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Have I taken a minute to introduce myself?
My name is Kate Downing Khaled, I use she/her pronouns, or even better, just use my name. I am a Muslim American woman, a firstborn daughter, a Canadian, a millennial, and a mother of four.
My family is made up of scientists, academics, educators, and artists, deeply rooted in Saint Paul and Montreal. I am connected to a community of Muslim women, and multicultural leaders who love to build new things.
My purpose in this group is to show you that new futures are not only possible, but they are also inevitable, and they can — and must — be beautiful.
I’m also here to show you the power of a collective introduction – which you just read!
To collaborate successfully, we all need much more context than the standard “name, pronouns, job title” we rattle off again and again.
Instead, start to know your collaborators on a human level by beginning collaborations with a collective introduction.
Here’s the simple template my team uses to kick off new design projects with all sorts of friends and clients:
My name is ______________ (pronouns). My family is _______________. My ancestors were from ________________. I am connected to _______________ (communities) by ____________ (type of relationship). My purpose in this group is to _____________.
How often do you share these foundational truths about yourself at work?
If you work in a corporate setting, I’m guessing the answer might be: “Not ever!” And you’re not alone.
Credentials such as degrees, where we went to school, and our job titles are our go-to introduction strategy for business meetings.
But does knowing that I have a master’s degree in public health really tell you anything about what bold ideas I might bring to the table?
And if I don’t have lived experience in the problem our group is tackling, my degree lacks the specificity that equitable solutions require.
Unlike in white-dominant spaces like corporate America, Indigenous community members have been introducing themselves in relationship to their communities for generations. You can listen to Allana McDougall, an Indigenous Affairs video journalist, introduce herself and share more about this practice in this brief video. She says: “My hope is that when I’m seen, my community is seen too.”
Our origins, our families, and the communities we’re connected to reveal crucial context about who we are and where we can best contribute. They anchor us in our shared humanity.
They’re also the source of wisdom we need for bold transformation. We can ALL tap into these parts of ourselves to build something beautiful, no matter our job title.
Because if we want to come up with beautiful new ideas that change systems, we can’t do things the way we’ve always done. And that includes introductions.
Now, it’s your turn! Use our collective introduction template during your next group collaboration – and let me know how it goes!
P.S. Our new interactive workbook has even more tips for collaborative engagement – send it to a friend who’s looking to gather actionable community insights.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
It felt just like being in a snow globe.
I’m talking about our in-person Imagine Deliver staff retreat, which we hosted in a home near Lake Minnetonka in early January.
During a particularly picturesque snowfall, it was a magical experience to be ensconced in our own little world, dreaming about community-driven design.
But no matter the season or weather in your region, you don’t need a snowfall to host a successful brainstorming session.
Open-ended questions encourage your team to dream big — which is a crucial catalyst to accomplish unprecedented, audacious, and innovative goals.
To build a bold roadmap for the future, invite leadership from all corners of your organization to dream… and watch the momentum build!
An official staff retreat isn’t a make-or-break strategy, but we found this intentional time helpful to set the scene for out-of-the-box thinking.
During that January retreat, we used an activity inspired by World Cafe — it’s a simple, flexible format to bring out individual ideas and turn them into a cohesive message.
Here’s what we focused on:
“What dreaming, scheming, and planning must we do in 2023 to prepare for radical nationwide systems transformation?”
Talk about a big question!
To tackle it, we began by breaking into small groups. We cranked up the music and passed out lots of bright markers and post-it notes.
Everyone on the team was encouraged to either write or draw and illustrate their ideas — there were no method restrictions.
Using tools that were so different the same old rotation of Zoom, Google Docs, and Monday.com built a creative and fun backdrop for us to bring our brightest ideas.
Here’s just a taste of what Imagine Deliver is beginning to implement in 2023, and beyond:
And guess what? All of these ideas began as sparks during our retreat!
It’s March, but the team building and creativity we cultivated within our January snow globe still carry our team forward.
We’re building a movement and you, the person reading this blog post, are an important part of it.
Help community-centered design continue to grow, and share this post with a friend or colleague you love collaborating with!
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
What’s the best way to build a more equitable food system?
To help a regional non-profit answer that question, we turned to the experts.
And by experts, I mean the community members who were already using resources like food distribution sites to feed their families!
That led us to the next question — how were we going to meaningfully connect with busy food bank shoppers?
Take it from this mom of four… grocery shopping with kids in tow is not always the most conducive environment for a detailed one-on-one interview or QR code questionnaire.
Yet, we received insightful feedback from 377 shoppers across 23 sites, because we fully acknowledged what WOULDN’T work for our community.
Constraints don’t have to hold you back from engaging. In fact, they can inspire the best creativity!
To reach our shoppers, we knew our survey tools had to be colorful, eye-catching, and most importantly, EASY for our community members to complete while juggling grocery bags.
We used colorful survey cards with a few statements meant to surface shopper priorities in relation to their values and what they considered to be the most urgent.
To visually depict which option shoppers valued more (for example, availability of organic foods vs getting a low price) we asked our community to circle where they fell on a dotted line.
These cards worked SO well because it didn’t take long for shoppers to contribute, and even those without time to provide written feedback could leave a nuanced response.
Admittedly, this engagement method took more time, more staff resources, and a lot more standing in the cold to flag down shoppers, than it would to simply hang a QR code on the wall.
But I’m willing to bet that the majority of shoppers using those QR codes would be the shoppers with the most time, energy, and resources… aka not the community members with the wisdom we need to create a more equitable food system.
It’s important to consider the day-to-day challenges your community members might face when trying to engage with them.
In this example, the challenges were limited time, potential caretaking duties, and the circumstances that led them to use our food distribution resources in the first place.
Working around these challenges created the potential for truly meaningful connections.
When you know what doesn’t work, you can use this information to build effective strategies for connecting with your community.
Remember, you won’t uncover new insights by engaging in the same way you always have!
If you’re looking to shake up how you engage with your community — to tear up the rule book, as it were — I’m really excited to share a brand new resource from our team.
Our second Get Started Guide is a step-by-step guide to making a tactical plan to engage with your community.
In this guide, you’ll find questions and activities to help you decide where and how to engage, what questions to ask — and how to design those interactions to reflect your community’s unique identities, values, and constraints.
Download the Get Started Guide 2: Engaging Your Community with Equity and Empathy here!
And once you’ve worked through it, send me a note. I’d love to hear what you think.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Take a second to imagine a city street — maybe one in front of your home or office building.
The flashing lights of a three-way traffic light might catch your eye. Maybe there’s a row of protected mailboxes located nearby. And if you’re located in a metropolitan area, maybe you see a street sweeper machine making its way down the block.
Did you know that all those essential facets of city life were invented by Black people?
Black people are the innovators behind inventions that play essential roles in our lives, yet those origins are overlooked, forgotten, or ignored. Unfortunately, this is a pattern we see again and again in city life, local government, philanthropy, and any field you can think of.
That’s the status quo — but we can subvert it.
Make it a practice to remind yourself where real innovation comes from every single day.
Adding intentionality behind these daily reminders is how we can all build the foundation to center Black innovators and other overlooked community members in our strategy design.
When your user is your most important designer, it’s not simply the group that’s the most over-represented in your dataset.
By centering your user, their ideas are acknowledged. Their expertise is lifted and celebrated. They receive meaningful compensation and hopefully wealth as a result.
We have a LONG way to go until the Black innovators in our community are celebrated, not co-opted.
That’s why it’s so important to acknowledge and uplift Black innovation daily in all areas of our life.
It’s not enough to dedicate February to Black History Month! I could go on and on about how it’s the shortest month of the year, to begin with…
The truth is, centering Black innovators has the power to create more prosperity, health, and justice for everyone.
Solutions dreamed up by the people experiencing the deepest disparities have the most significant potential to improve everyone’s life!
A great example of this is our work with the Groundbreak Coalition.
Members of the Coalition represent leaders from 200+ different private and public agencies — banks, philanthropies, nonprofits, entrepreneurs, and local and state government agencies. Many organizations have mission statements that focus on serving Indigenous, Latine, and other specific cultural communities.
Yet, all of these leaders have embraced a shared and singular goal to build enormous Black wealth across Minnesota and beyond.
Because when we work toward systemic justice — especially for Black communities — we all win.
So, on behalf of all of us at Imagine Deliver, I invite you to join us in celebrating Black History and Innovation ALL YEAR LONG! And guess what? You’re invited every year after this one, too.
Here’s a great way to start — write back to uplift one of your favorite examples of Black innovation. Check out this great list to get inspired!
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Would you swap strategies with your closest business competitors?
If you feel a bit uneasy about that proposition, I don’t blame you.
But this exact scenario is what the GroundBreak Coalition, which includes leaders from 200+ different private and public agencies — banks, philanthropies, nonprofits, entrepreneurs, and local & state government agencies — has embraced… for months!
Under the leadership of Tonya Allen at the McKnight Foundation, we’ve been energized to act as GroundBreak Coalition’s strategy partner to enable their singular goal — building enormous Black wealth across Minnesota and beyond.
This effort is about taking big, rapid action in collaboration at its grandest and most audacious scale.
The real secret to effective collaboration is taking stock of your own unique power to make a change and then partnering with others to make something even bigger happen together.
We can all tap into our unique power every day. We all have the unique power to make sure our calendars get cleared, our travel gets coordinated, and we delegate the day-to-day work we might miss while we dream up a bold vision for the future.
You know… all the really sexy parts of collaboration and leadership!
Yet those small, unsexy actions have added up to the 200+ leaders in the GroundBreak Coalition members working together to prioritize Black wealth building in our community.
For eight months, GroundBreak Coalition work groups (composed of more than 200 leaders!) came together in an equity-focused, user-centered design process to collaboratively and creatively craft solutions that will bridge the wealth gap region-wide.
That didn’t happen by accident. All these leaders followed through and showed up. Each of their organizations bought into the value of collaboration before even pulling up to the ‘table’.
When leaders can put aside competition to embrace collaboration (even imperfect collaboration) in pursuit of a shared vision, we can act on our values and accomplish goals so much more quickly than we could alone.
I love how one of the members of the GroundBreak Coalition recently described our vision:
“We all have to put Black wealth building at the forefront of everything that we do. Every sector needs to think about how we’re impacting the Black community, and how everyone can benefit.”
This means setting aside logos, egos, and brands to prioritize the shared collaboration this member described! In fact, one of the coalition co-chairs from a Fortune 100 bank reminds our team frequently about the fact that collectively, we can create a poka-yoke with the power to raise the tide of the entire financial services sector.
Even one of the biggest banks in the United States couldn’t do that alone.
Justice and innovation require a different type of shared commitment. That sometimes means working closely with competitors to create a different type of collaborative — instead of competitive — advantage.
If you’ve been seeking support to build a bold plan with unlikely collaborators, email me. I’d love to hear from you!
Kate Downing Khaled | CEO & Founder
After a brief streak, venture capital has ditched Black startups.
That’s not just my opinion. It’s a word-for-word headline I read in Fast Company.
After raising a record amount of funding over the past tumultuous years, VC funding to Black-led startups has plummeted to lower than any point since the Fall of 2020.
“Diversity” is a buzzword that gets thrown around a lot in venture capital, HR departments, and other places where leaders make decisions about what kind of people to invest in.
And unfortunately, performative “diversity” goals inevitably vaporize the moment the economy faces challenges.
Race itself is not a hiring strategy. Neither is gender.
To retain the best teams, the belief that genius is everywhere must be a core function of your hiring and promoting practices.
Adopting this belief comes in two parts:
1.) Knowing that brilliance and value come from all people, without caveat.
2.) Searching for greatness wherever people are, whoever they may be.
When hiring managers are superficial about demographics *without* believing in the underlying value of all people, it’s only a matter of time, economic stress, and a dramatic shift in work/life values brought on by a global pandemic before things backslide.
But even before the Great Realization of 2020 (read this to learn how and why we’ve adopted that phrase), performative hiring based on race or gender is ultimately playing a zero-sum game with talent.
Nobody wants to stay in a place where they’re tokenized. If the budget for “DEI” is cut during tough times, that’s a demonstration of values more powerful than any words on your “About Us” page.
Workplace leaders who get this ‘right’ tend to also have intersectional identities. But don’t forget that these leaders *do* still hire white people, cisgender men, and other people with privileged identities. Why wouldn’t they?
The difference between authentic and performative HR professionals is the fact that they also understand and relate to the fact that everyone is smart and worth investing in, through ups and downs.
Our modern culture of work was developed to treat humans like units of production or consumption. It doesn’t have to be like that. And we know there are more leaders out there who believe that, too.
In fact, filling open roles with amazing people from all experiences builds strong teams that last.
It’s just a better strategy!
It’s that belief that led us to develop Mailroom, our new HR software that helps large companies fill job opportunities with the best talent from within their organization.
We want to help you give previously-overlooked employees the opportunity to grow, thrive, and experience renewed value in their work — and win big when it comes to building teams that last.
Curious to learn more about Mailroom? Contact us and we’ll give you access to an exclusive first look.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
It was nearing the end of our brainstorming session, and we had filled a whiteboard with questions that the Saint Paul Public Library (SPPL) team wanted to ask their community.
We were headed in the right direction, but I could sense that the questions we had generated didn’t totally embody the bold, equity-centered vision SPPL had for their new strategic plan.
When all of a sudden, Maureen had an epiphany.
“What do you want to borrow that you don’t want to buy?” she asked.
The room was stunned into the best kind of silence. Immediately, we knew that this question could help us unlock the best ways to revamp SPPL’s programming, without limiting the community’s imagination.
And no one but a library leader could have devised such a brilliant question.
The best engagement questions practice abundance.
And today, I’m going to tell you exactly how to create open-ended, future-focused questions that treat community members as geniuses, beyond just their current needs.
What and how you ask your community really matters.
The best kind of questions assumes the genius of the person being asked. Notice that Maureen’s question didn’t include a list of items for community members to pick from, nor did it attempt to qualify or explain what could or could not be loanable.
We also try to write questions to be universally answerable, which means that they can be phrased differently to meet different users where they’re at.
“What do you want to borrow that you don’t want to buy?” is a great example because it uses plain language. A teenager could understand it just as easily as a grandparent.
In fact, we actually planned a whole series of youth roundtable discussions based on this question! Ideally, your questions can generate new engagement opportunities that weren’t even on your radar.
So how do these questions come about? We first start with quantity over quality. In the past, we’ve gathered with client stakeholders and set a timer to challenge everyone to gather 30 questions in 10 minutes. You want your stack of post-it notes to far outnumber the number of minutes you provide!
This kind of freewheeling creativity can feel unusual to folks who spend most of their time working in offices, so I encourage appointing a team member to be a brainstorm facilitator.
This person’s role is to shape and push the brainstorming energy to the nth degree of imagination. That can look like asking clarifying questions, or adding imaginary constraints to the engagement scenarios to find unexpected ideas. For our library story, an example of a constraint would be: What if our questions can’t use the word “book?
Keep in mind — the best questions don’t usually emerge in the second or third round of brainstorming. It’s usually more like the 15th or 20th!
The more engaging and interesting your questions are, the more genius will come to life in your insights, and therefore your strategy.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Streamers and balloons cover every inch of wall space. A DJ makes beats as children giggle underneath a piñata. Across the room, neighbors fill their plates with snacks purchased from local businesses and gather together around circular tables.
That sounds like my type of party — and it was also an essential part of our community engagement to help the West Side Community Organization redesign its central business corridor.
You may have spotted Imagine Deliver in the community, popping up at your neighborhood block party or in front of your local library. However, interacting with crowds and passersby isn’t the only way we discover rich community insights.
Deep engagement with a smaller group of stakeholders creates an environment of trust, intimacy, and creativity. Where community members can more easily imagine what a new future can look like, far beyond what is accessible in quantitative data, survey responses, or “drop-in” interactions.
We do our best to make them feel more like parties rather than formal meetings. These invitation-based parties, charettes, or fireside chats last about 2-3 hours, and delicious, culturally-affirming food is non-negotiable.
We also pick a space with plenty of natural light, fill it with color and music, and bring along our favorite art-based icebreakers. We typically compensate participants more than we would for filling out a quick survey because they invest significantly more time and energy.
This alchemy encourages the most brilliant community genius to come forward. And I suspect it’s for a couple of reasons.
First of all, gatherings like this are multi-generational by nature. That makes it easy to tap into the wisdom of the youth and elders simultaneously.
Secondly, intimate conversations are held around a table — or while painting a shared mural — they bridge the inherent “communication gaps” in even the most thoughtfully designed survey.
Our Associate Strategist, Jenny Tam, recently shared that she often finds herself rewording questions or even going off script to best support the community members she’s interacting with. Off-the-cuff questions can often result in the best answers, but not everyone can adjust on the fly. This kind of flexibility takes a certain level of intelligence that comes naturally to people like Jenny.
Free-flowing conversations open up a space where dreaming can happen outside a predetermined scope of questions. Community members sit down, break bread together, and open up to one another. Across cultures, it’s a setting that helps us lower our barriers and dream together.
So, is hosting an “engagement party” the right decision for your organization?
We recommend this approach for clients who have had the same bold organizational goal for decades but are struggling to find actual receipts demonstrating their impact. You know, think of that organization that’s focused on “eliminating homelessness”…but can’t really tell you how they’ve done that.
These organizations usually have a wealth of quantitative data about their community but can’t connect the dots to show that data has informed their programming or priorities.
These are indicators that an organization might not have built a solid foundation to support its “why.” And there’s no better way to get on track than gathering rich, qualitative data from your community members.
Would you consider throwing an “engagement party” for stakeholders? What kind of elements would you love to see there? A selfie wall? Finger paint? Performances from local musicians? Email me and let me know — I’m always on the lookout for party planning tips.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
When people are released from prison, about 90 percent of prisons expect them to be able to survive the next few days on “gate money.” Gate money is a cash grant that ranges from $10 to $200, depending on the state. (The other 10% of prisons don’t share any resources at all)
How long could you survive on $200? In most states, you’d fill up a gas tank — and nearly a third of that money could be gone.
If I started detailing all of the evils and injustices of the American prison system, this email would go on forever.
Instead, I’ll focus on a prison abolition initiative that’s got me feeling optimistic. In 2020, the Center for Employment Opportunities in New York started distributing direct cash grants to about 10,500 formerly incarcerated people who did not qualify for pandemic relief checks.
Each grantee received an average of $2750 over three months — and the New York Times reported that advocates describe these direct cash grants as the “most straightforward and revolutionary solution.”
I tend to agree. Think about it — for the most “innovative” online consumer services, we can access what we need in two clicks or less.
Our daily user experience for social and government services should also be as streamlined and efficient as possible in order to get people what they need to thrive.
Even though direct cash grants are gaining popularity, many still consider them to be a fringe idea.
That’s because our government systems have historically relied on bureaucratic systems, in-person appointments during work hours, and stacks of paperwork to access even the most basic services.
Making people jump through hoops is the status quo, but it’s incredibly dehumanizing. If a system’s goal is to help as many people as possible access resources, why are we relying on processes that actively limit the number of people who are able to navigate them?
When we work with clients to re-imagine service delivery, we actively seek out ideas from community members that can help us re-imagine these outdated systems with simpler solutions.
That’s because people who have been on the receiving end of our social services are always ahead of our systems in knowing how they could be simpler, better, and easier to access.
People are smart. It doesn’t require an advanced degree to know what you need to thrive. When we embrace this truth, it can lead to some of our most transformative solutions.
That could look like reducing staff costs in order to free up more grant money. Or setting up multiple decentralized locations for people to seek trauma-informed healthcare instead of sinking money into remodeling a central hub that’s miles away from the people who need it most.
Or making sure that people just released from prison have access to the cash they need to access transportation to job interviews, pay for a security deposit, and purchase nourishing food for a few months, not a few days.
Of course, when the words “transformation” and “innovation” get thrown around, things start getting over-complicated, fast. What is it about those words that make us think that complicated equals better?
If you feel like you might be overcomplicating a solution, try asking yourself:
A world where everyone can access the resources they need in two clicks or less isn’t a pipe dream.
It’s a reality that we can co-create if we’re willing to let go of outdated systems and listen to our communities when they tell us what they need.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
I was excited to see the Minnesota Public Radio report on how “Traditional Ecological Knowledge” from Indigenous communities is shaping the culture of Minnesota forestry and natural resource preservation.
…but it also raised some complicated feelings to see a media outlet describe Indigenous knowledge as a “trendy buzzword.”
It’s not a huge surprise, because American media and work culture seem to value “innovation” and novelty above all else.
But I believe there truly is very little in this world that is actually new.
When our systems are seeking out ways of knowing that aren’t based on research and books, or when we’re seeking to learn from elders who hold generational knowledge, we need to have real humility about this practice — give credit where credit is due.
As you’ll read in the MPR article I linked, the scientific community has started referring to Traditional Ecological Knowledge by the acronym “TEK.” But don’t forget that no matter what we call it, indigenous knowledge has always shaped science.
To share another example, the holographic designs we’re planning to wrap on our outreach team’s new Tuk Tuk are meant to attract passersby with its novelty. But we haven’t forgotten that Tuk Tuks are used to bring resources to communities all over the world.
Creating a new acronym for traditional knowledge can also have the unintended effect of “othering” that source of wisdom. I’m a firm believer that people of all cultural backgrounds can tap into trusting our spirituality, getting in touch with our bodies, listening to elders, and being in tune with the Earth.
These “traditional” forms of knowledge have contributed more to our collective understanding of the world than we may think. An engineer could benefit from these activities just as much as an illustrator, just as much as a biologist, and just as much as a chef could.
The problem is, the indigenous roots of this knowledge have been discounted, ignored, and even stolen for generations. Accessing that knowledge while erasing that history is not only disingenuous – it can continue to cause harm.
Here’s what we do to avoid erasing indigenous wisdom:
Cite our sources.
Be as specific as possible.
Ask for permission.
As more and more sectors (hopefully) tap into “Traditional Ecological Knowledge” of their own, I hope these practices of humility become widespread as well.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
One perk of working alongside systems seeking to better serve the new majority is that I learn about new shifts, values, and cultural trends that are inspiring leaders in real-time.
So my ears perked up when my colleague, Malik, told me about something the leader of a national workforce development fund that recently confided in him. That leader shared how his organization is taking a new approach to address inequity by focusing on job quality as a fundamental part of building a thriving workforce.
Job quality wasn’t a new concept, this leader explained to us, but was an issue that activist coalitions like the Food Chain Worker’s Alliance had been advocating for years. What’s new is that for the first time, well-resourced organizations are finally listening.
Too bad this person wasn’t able to see all the connections I was making in my brain. Our team has been tracking how the fight for job quality has gained a flood of attention in mainstream media, thanks to activist organizers like Chris Smalls of the Amazon Labor Union.
This story confirms what my team has always believed — to identify solutions with the best chance of success, look to the ideas that activists are already suggesting.
Activists often get discounted because they are vocal agitators. They use people’s power to push for change, outside of channels that systems deem “acceptable.” Their voices are seen as opposing the interests of systems as a whole, and people assume their ideas are not feasible or affordable.
But I actually feel the exact opposite. Ideas formed outside of old ways of thinking, doing, and being — and in direct collaboration with community members — are usually the most innovative. These ideas have the best chance of success because they were formed in an environment where nothing else was working.
So when systems see activists as key designers, it can be a game changer. When the City of San Francisco looked to community organizations to design the work of addressing the city’s harmful fines and fees practices, $32 million in criminal justice system debts were waived or eliminated.
And this debt forgiveness supported the city’s interests too. Ending driver’s license suspensions for failing to appear in court resulted in a nine percent increase in collections per ticket. (Could those collections have been eliminated as well? Probably, but that’s a conversation for another time.)
Activists are not monolithic, and every system has a unique set of historical, contextual, and regional nuances that all come into play when my team and I consider potential solutions.
Our goal is to identify and lay the groundwork for opportunities that can generate transformative change, with ideas that spring from many different sources.
But listening to activists, who do their work by making a way out of no way, will always help us stretch our ideas for justice, wellness, and prosperity to their fullest potential.
At the top of this email, I shared a new trend in workforce development that has leaped from activist town halls to mainstream policy proposals. Have you observed a similar trend picking up steam in your sector that originated with activists? Email me and let me know.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Question: How do you invite a team of highly-decorated professionals to dance to Lizzo….in a group of people they want to impress?
Answer: Veeeeerrrrry slowly!
We recently kicked off a facilitated retreat for a client with a series of movement exercises led by SHAPESHIFT, a Minneapolis dance collective.
We began by standing quietly and observing the natural smells, sounds, and feelings around us. After some yoga-inspired movement, trust-building exercises, and practicing a simple viral dance, we ended our session blasting Lizzo, with SHAPESHIFT choreographers jumping into the middle of our circle to show off some amazing freestyle dance moves.
These movement exercises created an incredible connective tissue between us for the work that lay ahead. We spent the rest of the day supporting a new team to bring their best genius forward in order to effectively mobilize philanthropic resources.
Building transformative strategy always requires untethered creativity.
And to get creative, we need to tap into a type of wisdom that doesn’t come from a book. Instead, we need to bring our subjective lived experience, our ability to dream, and our own humanity to the strategy table.
Using movement to get clear on the stories we hold in our bodies, along with any biases and baggage we’re bringing into a room, can unlock the potential for new possibilities.
I’ll be honest — I don’t know of any other strategy consulting firm who would elect to begin a facilitation with a movement exercise. Embodying our whole selves is really not promoted in school, or the workplace.
The myth of “objectivity”, which is so prized in professional settings, runs counter to embracing our human connection and what we know to be true in our bodies.
I have a Master’s in Public Health, and I’ve contributed to a LOT of research projects. But I know there’s no such thing as objectivity. We all bring our own lenses and biases to every project we touch.
If we dismiss or ignore that reality, then we’ll repeat the historical patterns of harm that “objective” methods uphold. And that has no place in our work to build strategies that advance justice, wellness, and prosperity for everyone.
At Imagine Deliver, we lean into resisting objectivity. We still employ rigorous and data-based research methods, but we use tools like movement and storytelling to acknowledge the humanity that exists alongside the data.
Movement in particular can help us acknowledge what’s inside ourselves, so we can better connect with others, be cognizant of our own biases, and tap into the superpowers that we all possess.
Just because intentional, artist-led movement isn’t data-driven does not mean that it’s “fluffy” or “woo-woo” work.
Getting in touch with our bodies is essential to clarifying our purpose, understanding our goals, and preparing to work together collectively to build something more beautiful.
And if it happens to include a little Lizzo or Beyoncé? All the better.
If you’ve ever participated in a movement or somatics-based workshop, I’d love to hear more about what that experience was like for you. Connect with us and share!
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
I’d like to officially thank R&B group “Jagged Edge” and their iconic 2001 hit, “Where The Party At” for making a recent work week a LOT more fun with an impromptu dance party with my colleagues Rose, Theon, and Taqee.
It had been a particularly difficult and trying week, and when the song came up on someone’s shuffled playlist, it didn’t take long before we were on our feet and dancing. We even captured it on film!
Even when — especially when — things are hard, finding moments of play are essential to storing up the resources, energy, and inspiration we need to bring forward new futures.
Now that we’ve shifted to a hybrid work environment at Imagine Deliver, moments of play, both spontaneous and planned, are a little easier to come by.
On Mondays, we rotate the responsibility of facilitating our weekly check-in meetings. Over the past few months, we’ve grounded ourselves with poetry readings, writing prompts, and breathing exercises, each led by a different member of our team.
Friday afternoon dance parties don’t happen with the same regularity, but our Monday routine of connection has helped us build a foundation of trust to the point where we’re comfortable getting loose to 90s hits.
As fun as the TikTok videos look, dancing and being silly in front of colleagues can feel like a risk. I try to lean into these moments, especially as a leader, because putting myself out of my comfort zone with a few dance moves helps me practice for when I need to take a risk while working with a client, disagreeing with a collaborator, or while engaging with the community.
And we know how vulnerable it can be to start treating your users like your most important designers, especially if you’ve never done it before. So when our communities and clients are ready to take a risk, we want to be prepared to leap with them every time.
Shifting systems toward justice takes a LOT of effort. It’s heavy, it’s hard, and some days it can be really discouraging.
Intentional moments of play — like absolutely losing it over Theon’s ridiculous dance moves — help me reconnect to the optimism that keeps me moving forward.
We won’t stop the hard work of building towards equity — and we won’t stop dancing, either.
Reach out and let me know how you and your team have been finding moments of play recently. Bonus points if they include 90s music or funny memes.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Would you stay accountable to your community, even if it meant shifting decision-making power, or stepping down from your role?
That might sound extreme, but this actually happened during our strategy development work with Heart of the Beast Theater (HOBT) in South Minneapolis.
After making a powerful promise to act on community insights, we heard an overwhelming amount of feedback that HOBT should take the lead from intersectional BIPOC artists in their neighborhood to decide what was next for their organization.
Heart of the Beast knew that this was the moment to take action — not only to preserve their financial sustainability, but also to rekindle their connections with the South Minneapolis community.
So HOBT made a decision to transfer leadership and brought in a new group of partners to lead their strategy — Free Black Dirt, an artistic partnership formed by Minneapolis-based collaborators Junauda Petrus and Erin Sharkey along with Lisa Marie Brimmer.
But this year, the MayDay festival returned, reimagined as a block party in collaboration with other community organizations.
This is just one example of the power of a public promise, but there are hundreds more.
To create a more effective and less extractive strategy, you must define how your user feedback will be put to use, and honestly share what type of real decision-making power your community actually has along the way.
I won’t lie — this can feel quite scary. For organizations AND the individuals within them.
Committing to a promise means committing to learning in public, and being held accountable. It means that you might mess up, and everyone will know. It means that you’ll have to share power to figure out what to do next.
But ultimately, creating a public promise only stands to benefit the investment you’re making in redesigning your strategy and gathering community solutions.
Extracting community insights, knowledge, wisdom, and ideas without making a commitment in return is how your organization burns bridges and loses trust.
Think about it — if someone asked you for all your best ideas, but then launched a new strategic initiative that had nothing to do with the insights you shared…would you be inclined to go to that launch event? Would you trust that new “community resource?” Would you sign up for that new service?
I know I wouldn’t.
Prioritizing trust and accountability is the right thing to do. And it ALSO leads to community buy-in, which increases your return on investment, and the ultimate effectiveness of your new strategy.
Public promises don’t usually mean that you need to commit to leaving your leadership role. And not every organization should commit to acting on every single idea from their community.
Instead, it’s more important for public promises to be self-aware and actionable. They should be written in plain language, so anyone could read and understand what your organization is planning to do with their feedback, and how they can be involved.
Standing behind beautiful words isn’t what matters to us. Instead, we want to stand behind honest ones.
Crafting a public promise takes introspection, intentionality, and a foundation of self-awareness.
Feeling overwhelmed? That’s exactly why we created the Get Started Gathering Community Insights guide – a step-by-step workbook to help you kick off your strategy development process, including how to craft a public promise. Download it now on our website.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Sometimes the thing we need most makes itself known. I gasped and knew instantly that I had found what we were looking for.
There it was in my Google search, a listing that had been posted only thirteen hours prior.
And two days later, Imagine Deliver bought a Tuk Tuk, because the best way to gather generative, innovative, and powerful community insights is by creating inviting spaces that are just as unique as the ideas we’re seeking.
As an entrepreneur, I make a lot of decisions from my ‘gut’, so this wasn’t new for me, but it definitely made the team do a double-take.
Have you ever felt intuition resonate deep within you? That’s how I felt when I saw the listing posted for this vehicle, which was shipped over from Thailand and then traveled from Georgia to Minnesota to sell Hmong and Thai-style jerky products at local food markets.
And now, it will become one of our signature tools to make every-day spaces come alive with community genius.
On the day I discovered our Tuk Tuk, I hadn’t exactly been writing out the phrase “unique and custom-designed mobile food and entertainment vehicle” in the Google search bar.
But I was keeping my mind open, along with my Operations leader, Rose, for tools that could help us create more frequent, spontaneous and hyper-responsive community experiences.
Public, fun, and creative engagement not only produces the best ideas, but it also recognizes and celebrates the full humanity of the community members we’re trying to reach.
Whether it be through drawing, art, or aerosol painting, we find different opportunities for community members to get artsy and let loose. Our creative collisions might be focused on hearing from people who are most often pushed to the margins, but our community members are so much more than data points– so we make sure to have fun with it!
Art, music, delicious food and fair compensation help our conversations become moments of connection, not extraction.
And a Tuk Tuk offers us endless ways to engage with the level of responsiveness and care that we owe our communities – after all, they are our most important designers.
Popsicles and a sound system!
A local DJ and spray painting pop-up!
Hiring a neighborhood food vendor and slinging meals all night!
A holographic-painted, unicorn-design-inspired vehicle that draws you in with curiosity at the beach, in front of the grocery store, or in a city courtyard!
Yes, we will be re-painting the Tuk-Tuk, and these are just a *few* of some amazing pop-ups that we’re beginning to brainstorm.
I hope you feel inspired to add an element of art and fun the next time you’re trying to gather insights with your community. What will you be trying out? Reach out and send me a note — I’d love to hear from you.
And if you think a Tuk Tuk could help your insights process, send us a note. We can pop-up anywhere, anytime — we’ve got wheels and a deep commitment to the new futures that are taking root in our communities.
See you out there!
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Cesarean sections are on the rise.
New research from the World Health Organization (WHO) found that C-sections, which can be life-saving for people with prolonged or obstructed labor, now account for 1 in 5 births across the globe!
And those parents and children have Ugandan surgeons and Tanzanian and Congolese midwives to thank. While there are current disparities in how C-sections are prescribed today, it’s important to recognize the origins of where this medical advancement came from.
During the mid-1800s, when nearly half of European and US women died in childbirth, and when nearly 100% of European women died if a C-section was performed, healers and midwives in the continent of Africa had perfected a strategy for safe and sterile C-Sections.
The history of C-sections is powerful because it illuminates how the communities who are most ignored by systems built to uphold whiteness and favor men — such as our “modern” medical system — have always been innovators. This is in spite of and because of systemic barriers.
Giving credit where credit is due isn’t just a moral obligation. It’s a deliberate strategy to unearth and revive solutions that patriarchy and racism have distracted us from recognizing.
Here at Imagine Deliver, we tap into pre-capitalist roots and solutions of our systems in a few different ways.
When we’re seeking feedback from community members, we specifically ask questions about their cultural and familial traditions within the system that we’re seeking to transform. We don’t just ask people about their dreams for the future – we want to know how problems have been solved in the past, too.
As part of this work, we prioritize community insights that are shared by elders. Elders hold the majority of life experience, stories, and history within their communities, and they deserve more credit and recognition for the innovation and survival strategies that their life represents.
We also do our own digging into our clients’ knowledge base to identify the original intent of their system and institution.
For example, a recent project with a regional library system led us to discover that libraries have long been sites of radical access and community resistance.
In 1790, Benjamin Franklin donated a collection of books to a Massachusetts town that had named itself “Franklin” in his honor. Residents of the town voted for those donated books to be freely available for town members – creating the nation’s very first public library.
And in more recent history, the American Library Association launched “Banned Books Week” in the early 1980s to push back on the rising culture of censorship that accompanied Ronald Reagn’s presidency and politics.
Understanding this history helped us better interpret the community insights we gather from library users.
Community members reported over and over again that they dreamed of libraries that could be used as safe spaces to organize their communities and advance movements for justice and equity.
The revival of this sentiment feels almost like a historical renewal in today’s world, where justice and belonging is so hard to come by.
Because my team was able to recognize ancestral roots in this present-day community feedback, we could confidently prioritize and raise up this insight in our final strategy recommendations.
Understanding the ancestral roots of today’s medical, government, and philanthropy systems points the way for the types of users and community experts that need to be at the system design table. And it helps us discern actionable solutions that have already been proven successful.
Do you know the original intent of your system and institution? How did your community solve problems before your institution existed? I’d love to understand how your organization accounts for its history in your present-day planning. Contact us today!
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Not many people know this about me, but I once carried a 120-pound, waterlogged canoe on my back for nine miles!
Years ago, I completed the Grand Portage to Lake Superior with a few friends, and let me tell you, hauling that canoe was not easy.
Even though it was tough, I found the strength to keep going because I had trained for this moment. I had gone on several canoe trips before this one, and my friends and I had gone over the terrain in great detail before heading out. I knew that this nine-mile stretch was coming. And more than anything else, I knew that I didn’t want to give up and disappoint my friends, who were counting on my support to collectively finish our journey.
My experience on the Grand Portage leaps to my mind whenever I’m supporting organizations and leaders to share power and increase participatory decision-making in their organization.
Participatory decision-making is a creative process that gives ownership of decisions to a community or a wide group of stakeholders, with the goal of making decisions that everyone can live with.
And it sounds great in theory! But in practice, it can be as difficult as carrying a waterlogged canoe.
If you want to start shifting norms and sharing power in your organization, it requires continuous practice. And just like any skill, you’ll have the best results if you start small, and commit to finishing what you started.
I always recommend a practice-based approach to participatory decision-making, because sharing power is always more scary, painful, and uncomfortable than we realize.
As leaders, we’re trained to carry an enormous amount of personal responsibility for fulfilling the mission and goals of our organization. That sense of responsibility is usually the reason we’re considered to be “leaders,” but it also means that relinquishing control can be extremely difficult.
And, good intentions aren’t enough to truly commit to sharing power. You can’t hear new ideas and then dismiss them as soon as the community leaves the room. Participatory decision making requires an unwavering commitment to actually apply community recommendations – even when no one is there to hold you accountable.
So just like I would never recommend the Grand Portage for your very first canoe trip, I would never recommend dramatically shifting all of your organization’s decision-making to be participatory, all at once.
That sets you up for failure and worse, sets you up to lose the trust of your community if you’re unable to commit to big promises. Think of your community as your fellow canoe trip companions. You can’t leave them behind as you make your way to the next shore.
Instead, start small with a pilot project when it comes to participatory decision making. It’s okay to paddle a small lake before you make your way to Lake Superior!
Start by making a list of all the places where decisions get made in your job or organization, including who makes those decisions. Narrow down that list to the 3 most impactful decisions that you will make this year. Choose the one that seems most feasible to execute with participatory decision-making, and invite the community to help you decide.
When the project is complete, evaluate success by reflecting on your organization’s ability to be flexible and agile throughout the process – not necessarily by evaluating the outcome of the decision itself. Remember, if the process felt challenging, you’re doing it right! Use what you learn to continue to bring participatory decision-making into more areas of your organization.
A great example of how to start small with participatory decision-making is the Giving Project Program run by one of our former clients, Headwaters Foundation for Justice. Each year, Headwaters coordinates a cross-class, multi-racial group of 20 folks that come together to make collective decisions about moving money to Black, Brown, and Indigenous-led organizations that focus on systems change.
Since the Giving Project launched in 2015, Headwaters has expanded this collective approach, and now relies on people from the community to participate in all of its grantmaking programs. Even seven years later, I’m willing to bet that their team is still experimenting, practicing, and learning how to better include the community in their work.
Participatory decision-making is a process…and unlike a canoe trip, there’s no final destination that will let you know you’ve arrived.
But I promise, eventually the journey will feel easier. And most importantly, you won’t be alone. You and your community will be transforming your system, together.
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Imagine sitting down for an informational interview with someone brand-new, only to be peppered with questions about whether your company is hiring and if you could put in a good word for them.
You’d probably feel a little bit taken advantage of, and like the other person only saw you for what you could offer them — not for the whole person you are.
On the other hand, I’m willing to bet that the people who mean the most to your professional life don’t talk about “careers” 100% of the time. You probably know more about each other than just your respective job titles. Maybe this person is someone who opened a door for you before you were aware it was even there.
If you can relate to the difference between these two “networking” scenarios, then you already understand the reciprocity that organizations must demonstrate in order to build true relationships with their communities.
Building these relationships is critical for community-driven strategy that leads to better business, but it’s about so much more than that. As organizations and people, being embedded in our communities builds our shared humanity.
So in order to show up and build community relationships that are truly reciprocal, give first, give often, and give generously.
The word “give” is intentional. Gifts come without strings attached or expectations of reciprocity. You need to give your time, resources, and support to the community without expecting anything in return. In an ideal world, you should be connected to your community long before you ask them for anything.
I’m a big believer that building new relationships always betters my life — as a person, as a professional, and a business owner. I’ve seen this play out time and time again, but not because I’m constantly running internal calculations about how many months/years it takes for someone to refer me to a client, or to share a resource that I really needed.
When a relationship is truly mutual and reciprocal, it benefits both parties’ lives in a spontaneous way that is impossible to guess. We live in an interconnected and interdependent world, and moving from an individualistic to a collective mentality means that everybody wins.
If you’re just getting started with devoting resources to community relationship-building, it can help to think like a community organizer. Ask yourself: How can you benefit, support, or help your community in their current endeavors?
Don’t wait to be asked, and don’t wait for an opportunity that perfectly aligns with your professional goal. Chances are, there are events and projects that your community is already inviting the public to attend and support. Find a way to show up, and don’t expect a thank you or a photo opportunity. And keep showing up again, and again, and again.
Do you have an example of how a new relationship led to an unexpected benefit in your life? Stories about spontaneous connections and reciprocal wins always brighten my day. Shoot us a note!
Kate Downing Khaled | Founder & CEO
Did you know that when the Saint Paul Public Library decided to stop enforcing library fines, they actually found more money in their budget?
After they stopped printing overdue notices, paying for postage and envelopes, and devoting staff time towards library fines, they saved a lot of money.
Leadership decided to re-invest that extra money into their community-led, racial equity strategy, because it was that work that led to abolishing fines in the first place.
I love this story because it so clearly illustrates the “return on investment” of community-led strategies — and the transformative power of acting on your values.
And when it comes to acting on your values, a budget is one of your most influential tools.
But I see too many organizations putting community engagement and insights work as the very smallest line item in their budgets, even as those same organizations claim “community-driven” values.
And that’s a shame, because community insights really can be the gateway for compelling, transformative, and yes, LUCRATIVE strategy — if your budget reflects it.
I understand why it often takes organizations a few tries to adequately scope their budget for community-driven strategy. Prioritizing community insights as the most important driver of your organization is usually a brand-new concept for many systems.
And behind those systems are a network of people, who just like all of us, are reluctant to let go of “what we’ve always done.”
“What we’ve always done” could look like:
Sound a little bit familiar? I see this happening in organizations across all sectors, and you’re not alone!
If you feel like your organizational strategy is stale or stuck, pull up the web page where you list your company’s values. Then open another window with your annual budget.
Ask yourself honestly: Can you see those values reflected in your budget? Are you really putting your money where your mouth is? If not, what can you change?
I know that this process is not always as simple as it sounds. It’s really difficult to balance all of your values. And there’s not a template or formula that you can copy and paste.
But here’s a simple truth to keep in mind.
If you hope to develop a strategy based on equitable and non-extractive community insights, you can’t skimp on your budget. The only thing you’ll develop is another stale strategy, and a lot of wasted effort.
Your community, your organization, and even your bottom line all deserve better than that.
Are you trying to put together a budget for community-driven strategy work, but not sure if you’re on the right track? Contact us to get started.