Learn About IISC
The Interaction Institute for Social Change (IISC) is a nonprofit organization that harnesses the power of collaboration within the social sector to create a just and sustainable world. IISC builds the collaborative and leadership capacity of social change agents through process design and facilitation, consulting, and training, and by modeling the behaviors and transferring the skills and tools of collaboration.
The work of IISC is informed by our theory of social change, mission and values. At our core, we practice and teach facilitative leadership – a model rooted in shared power and decision making, consensus building, collaborative skill, and servant leadership. We continually strive to deepen our capacity to address issues of power, privilege, and oppression related to various dimensions of diversity and design culturally appropriate processes and services that consciously address power dynamics.
IISC was founded in 1993 by Interaction Associates (IA) as an expression of its commitment to social change and as a way of bringing its collaborative methodologies into the social sector. IISC adapted IA’s methodologies and created new and innovative approaches to working with and meeting the needs of social change leaders. Over time, IISC has grown from a staff of two to an organization of twenty staff members and a cadre of affiliates who have worked with thousands of change agents across the globe and social sector.
Our Clients
The Interaction Institute for Social Change has the privilege of working with a diverse array of clients. They include networks and coalitions; nonprofit organizations of all sizes; schools and school systems; public sector agencies; and foundations. Our clients work in all disciplines of the social sector and are located throughout the United States, in Ireland, and beyond. We are particularly committed to building the leadership and collaborative capacity of grassroots leaders to engage, speak out, and participate fully in determining the policies and decisions that affect their lives and their communities.
See a partial list of our clients
Our Guiding Principles
In all of our work, we seek to uphold the following guiding principles:
Congruence between the values and mission of the client organization and those of IISC is an important foundation for a strong working relationship.
Commitment to designing open and educational processes enables clients to achieve broad–based agreement while also building collaborative capacity.
Commitment to maximum appropriate involvement of stakeholders in decision making is essential to effective collaborative processes.
Capacity building and skills transfer are integral to the process.
Our core values enable us to balance a focus on results, process, and relationships.
IISC serves primarily as a process expert, partnering with content experts as needed to serve specific client needs.
Conflict is a natural part of the process and we expect to manage, rather than avoid, conflicts that emerge.
In order to make progress in communities and organizations, we anticipate and embrace the need for change at all levels: individual, group, organizational.
We practice honest, timely and constructive feedback. Giving and receiving feedback is an integral aspect of our work.
Key agreements, critical success factors, and resource allocations are clearly understood and assured by the client organization at the start of an engagement.
In addition, when we work with an organization on strategy design or strategic planning, we also are guided by the following principles.
Commitment by an organization’s leadership to participate fully in the process is essential to success.
As a strategic planning process unfolds, it must identify and facilitate interim successes that demonstrate the value of the process long before the plan is completed.
A complete Strategic Planning process includes Implementation Planning and Follow-up as essential phases.