Giving Compass' Take:

• New Power refers to collective power that can be channeled for a common good. This book is a guide to help organizations understand how to harness this power.

• Are organizations you are familiar with already harnessing new power? What gaps exist in this theory? How can they be bridged? 

• Learn how to harness collaboration to create opportunity.

New Power: How Power Works in Our Hyperconnected World - and How to Make It Work for You by Henry Timms and Jeremy Heimans is a guide about how to navigate and thrive in a connected world that has been increasingly been influenced and increasingly defined by two different forces, old and new power.  Here is how Timms and Heimans define these terms:

  • Old power is held by a few, once gained is jealously guarded, and the powerful have a substantial store of it to spend.  It is closed, inaccessible, and leader-driven. It downloads and it captures.
  • New power is made by many.  It is open, participatory, and peer-driven. It uploads and it distributes. It surges.  The goal is not to hoard it but to channel it.

The books answers many questions that are useful to nonprofits in their quest to spread and harness social good.  Here’s a sampling of just a few:

  • How do you create ideas that the crowd embraces, makes stronger, and spreads?
  • How can your organization internalize new power values like radical transparency or constant feedback to achieve success?
  • How can your organization inspire an enduring and loyal following in an era of transient affiliations?
  • How can your organization harness the best of both new and old power?
  • How do you blend? How do you decide which one is best for a particular situation?

Read the full article on New Power by Beth Kanter