There’s a legendary story in international development circles about a campaign to get mosquito nets to millions of people in countries being ravaged by malaria, a disease that kills more than 600,000 people a year. Mosquito nets are a proven strategy to prevent this deadly disease. A lot of effort and resources went into the research and then into designing a way to distribute nets to hard-to-reach communities. Millions of nets were distributed, a seemingly huge success. Until researchers visited some of the communities to follow up.

As congregations and social impact organizations, we often sell ourselves short by describing our impact only in terms of easily quantifiable metrics, such as the number of people we reach or events we host. We should take pride in those numbers, but then we should ask, “so, what?” It’s great that people show up, but what does that actually mean? A congregation's value to the community isn’t measured by worship attendance, and a social impact organization's value isn’t just how many people its services reach. We create real value for our communities, and learning to articulate why our work matters helps grow support. 

Both the corporate and social impact sectors use a methodology called human-centered design to create solutions that meet real human needs. In this methodology, the "how might we" question creates the launch pad for innovation. This question defines what we are trying to solve for, helping scope the problem for which we are designing a solution.

Focusing on impact sometimes makes people in the faith sector uncomfortable, but when building an organization, initiative, program, or enterprise with the goal of social change, social impact is the reason for its existence. There's a temptation to say, "It's not all about impact… we build relationships, and relationships matter." That’s true, and we can ask why do those relationships matter? That's the impact. We also might say, "It's important to be in solidarity with people, to show up even when it doesn't make a difference." Indeed, solidarity matters, and it has an impact. Here's a simple exercise to try - create an impact hypothesis.

Often in our endeavors, whether personal or professional, transformative change eludes us because we address only the surface symptoms of a problem. Despite our efforts, the underlying issue remains unresolved. This can lead to frustration, burnout, or acceptance of the status quo. The 5 Whys technique will help.