B’More Invested
Managing Co-Creation & Liberatory Philanthropy
Managing Co-Creation & Liberatory Philanthropy
About Our Client
B'More Invested is an exciting joint initiative between OSI-Baltimore and Baltimore's Promise. With this launch, B'More Invested has distributed $1.5 million in grants to 11 Black-led grassroots organizations exploring alternative community-based approaches that promote healthy, safe, and thriving neighborhoods.
The VPI Firm submitted an RFP and was selected from a competitive pool of highly qualified applicants to assist B'More Invested with its Project and Community Management initiatives.
The Brief
Supporting Meaningful Joint Ventures & Collaborations
The leadership team behind B'More Invested knew that they would need to expand their capacity in order to manage day-to-day coordination between multiple stakeholder groups (internally and externally), streamline cross-organizational communications between the two leading organizations and external-facing stakeholders, and build/manage relationships with the grantees.
With so many moving parts--not to mention this whole process being rooted in co-creation with multiple stakeholder groups-- the challenge was to optimize and streamline communication, gather real-time feedback and make sense of that data efficiently, and then provide recommendations for how/when to pivot and when to persevere.
Our Role
Project & Community Manager
Strategic Thought Partner & Facilitator
Grounding our approach
Communication & Feedback Loop Optimization! During the discovery process, it was evident that B'More Invested's management team had a lot on their plates, as this initiative was not the only program they were overseeing.
Through a series of quick iterations, building in multiple and varied feedback mechanisms and creating clear scheduling expectations, VPI facilitated the process of streamlining communication and reinvigorating the process of collaboration. We identified and addressed several barriers that prevented B'More Invested from advancing within the complexities of a co-creative and collaborative process with a wide range of stakeholders.
While implementing effective community and equity-centric solutions, VPI is currently working with B’More Invested to optimize the process as the initiative advances to incorporate real-time capacity building and learning & evaluation models.
Impact & Outcomes of Our Time with Market Center:
VPI Firm replaced 4 to 6 individual emails with one central account.
Leveraged the B’More Invested brand guide to create streamlined emails, newsletter, agenda, & powerpoint templates to improve cohesion in communications
Developed a plan for the community of practice’s goals and outcomes
Developed grantees’ 360-degree profiles to support capacity building and the awareness of learning & evaluation work group leaders and the management team about the nuances in experiences/requests from each grantee.