Building Backbone Support 101

Backbone support is an essential component of collective impact.  A backbone is an entity that functions independently as a centralized management team for partnership efforts.  Corresponding with a growing interest in collective impact efforts, a growing number of foundations, policymakers, and practitioners endorse multi-sector partnerships and their use of a backbone support organization.  While the idea of using a backbone has gained currency, little attention has been paid to how to establish a backbone.  Instead, much of the prevailing discussion has focused on what a backbone should do after it has been formed.

Under collective impact, backbone organizations cover six key activities:  supporting vision and strategy, supporting aligned activities, establishing shared measurements, building public will, advancing policy, and mobilizing funding. 

This webinar delivers an overview of the backbone in supporting collective impact efforts, how to build backing for it, and its importance in keeping collective impact on track.