Download Asset Mapping - Leicester Ageing Together

Leicester Ageing Together
Assets and strengths based working write up and notes
2nd and 9th February 2015
Fulfilling
Lives:
Ageing
Better
Ageing Better
Contents
Introduction and goals
Goals
Actions
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3
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Assets and strength based working briefing
From deficits to assets
Improving well-being
Defining characteristics of asset-based approaches
Challenges for asset based working
Asset/strength based working and Ageing Better
projects
1. Asset mapping
2. Asset based community development (ABCD)
3. Appreciative inquiry (AI)
4. Participatory appraisal
5. Co-production
6. Timebanking
7. Social prescribing
8. Peer support
9. Outcomes-based commissioning
10. Supporting healthy behaviours
11. Asset-based service redesign
12. Displaying and analysing asset mapping
References and source documents
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Introduction and goals
Introduction and goals
This report provides a short write up of the support team run workshops and a resource
providing a more detailed introduction to the approaches introduced in the workshop.
Goals
The group agreed that the partnership wishes to become more asset based in its approach.
The ten point scale below shows an assessment of the current position and where the
partnership aims to be in a year or so.
Session 1: 2nd February (agreed by consensus)
Entirely
deficit
model
based
Now
Goal


Entirely
asset
model
based
Session 2: 9th February (numbers show individual votes with average shown as symbols)
Entirely
deficit
model
based
Now
Goal
Now
Goal

4
3
Entirely
asset
model
based

1
2
3
4
3
2
Actions
The group agreed the following actions at the end of the workshop.
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Introduction and goals
ACTION
Priority

1
Model values around asset-based approaches across the
partnership and implement around life of the programme
High
Now
2
Recruit mappers
High
Now
3
Decide data schema – define the type of assets and data to be
collected
High
Now
4
Share experience with other partnerships
High
Now
5
Review information sources – identify where to find info on
assets
High
Now
6
Identify what each organization can offer – opportunity to
share good practice
High
Now
7
Willingness to share assets for common purpose
High
Now
8
Sharing volunteers – who want to do more
High
Now
9
Research mapping practice – review resources around mapping
Med
Now
10
Identify asset based activities – review activities to help define
‘what is an asset for us’
Med
Now
11
Team workspace – set up online workspace for the mapping
team
Med
Now
12
Express workshops – run short sessions to collect information
High
This
year
13
Create a base map – use initial research to sketch out an asset
and network map
High
This
year
14
Evaluate progress
High
This
year
15
Briefing on mapping – show people why mapping is important
and how they might help
High
This
year
16
Build networks – use the mapping process to build connectors
High
This
year
17
Make it rewarding – build some fun and activities useful to
mappers into the process
Med
This
year
18
Use maps to plan activity
High
Later
19
Develop mapping into action activity
High
Later
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Assets and strength based working briefing
Assets and strength based working briefing
This section provides an introduction to assets and strength bases approaches that could
strengthen Ageing Better partnerships. It draws very heavily on a number of sources that
provide more detailed information, guidance and examples. These are listed as references at
the back of the document and all are recommended reading.
From deficits to assets
Public and third sector human service agencies traditionally focus on individual, family,
neighbourhood, and community needs. In general these needs are expressed as deficits or
problems – such as unemployment, isolation, or unhealthy lifestyle. Many argue that this
negative emphasis communicates a sense of failure and helplessness and reinforces low
expectations. It tends to create dependency and actively discourages individuals and
communities from moving towards the positive outcomes the service or project aims to
achieve. Conversely, assets and strengths based approaches are held to:
 communicate a sense of hope
 establish expectations for success within an individual's capacities
 promote empowerment and independence
 set in motion forces for improvement
In fact, most of our care and support resource has always been found in families and
communities and not the state, whose care budget is around a tenth the value of unpaid
family care. So adult services, instead of trying to fit people into service ‘boxes’, should align
their interventions with people’s ‘real’ relationships and avoid at all costs undermining them.
So, despite the best efforts of many caring and dedicated professionals, people’s first
experience of social care can feel disempowering:
Eligibility assessments ask, ‘Are you vulnerable and needy enough for us to talk to you?’
Upfront means tests ask, ‘Are you poor enough for us to offer you something?’
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Complex planning and resource allocation systems suggest, ‘Our experts have decided upon
your category. You’ll need a professional guide to negotiate our care pathway.’
Even if a person can prove their high level of need, their low level of income and a lack of
family care, they may find themselves receiving maintenance-only support and needing to
demonstrate their continued dependence to remain eligible.
A ‘strengths-based’ (or ‘asset-based’) approach rejects the exclusive focus upon need, looking
first for potential, skills, relationships and community resources. To embed a strengths-based
approach, we need the route towards support to start with a conversation with someone
whose job is to inform, empower and connect people, with services as the last not first resort.
Britain is an aging society, with healthier lifestyles and medical advances meaning that our
older population will continue to grow. Many older people have lived their lives proud of their
independence, and they value the control they have over their life choices. For these people it
can be a frightening as well as a deeply disempowering experience to find themselves subject
to decisions made by others. Some older and disabled people are told which day centre they
will attend, who will come into their home to care for them, when and what they will eat,
when they can socialise, sleep, bathe or even go to the toilet. In a time of austerity, with cuts
to basic local services, it remains vital to meet the wider challenge of ensuring that people
using care services preserve their power over what happens to them.
The asset approach values the capacity, skills, knowledge, connections and potential in a
community. In an asset approach, the glass is half-full rather than half-empty. The more
familiar ‘deficit’ approach focuses on the problems, needs and deficiencies in a community. It
designs services to fill the gaps and fix the problems. As a result, a community can feel
disempowered and dependent; people can become passive recipients of expensive services
rather than active agents in their own and their families’ lives. Fundamentally, the shift from
using a deficit-based approach to an asset-based one requires a change in attitudes and
values.
Improving well-being
Asset based thinking links strongly to developments in thinking about wellbeing. Work by the
IDeA and the Young Foundation demonstrates that community and neighbourhood
empowerment can improve the well-being of individuals and communities in three ways:
1. control: by giving people greater opportunities to influence decisions, through participative
and direct democracy rather than formal consultation exercises
2. contact: by facilitating social networks and regular contact with neighbours
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3. confidence: by enabling people to have confidence in their capacity to control their own
circumstances.
But this research also shows that building well-being and improving social capital are rarely
articulated as explicit outcomes of neighbourhood working or service design.
The five ways to well-being
New Economics Foundation was commissioned by the Foresight Team to review the evidence
about how individuals can improve well-being. They came up with the ‘five ways’:
 connect: with the people around you
 be active: keep moving
 take notice: environmental and emotional awareness
 keep learning: try something new at any age
 give: help others and build reciprocity and trust.
Defining characteristics of asset-based approaches
Sometimes these approaches can be seen as non different to accepted practice – it can
therefore be helpful to contrast asset and strength based approaches with more usual
need/deficit model. The table below shows some of these contrasts.
Deficit approaches
Asset & strengths approaches
Start with community deficiencies/needs Start with the assets in the community
Respond to problems
Identify opportunities and strengths
Provide services to users
Invest in people as citizens
Emphasise the role of agencies
Emphasise the role of civil society
Focus on individuals
Focus on communities/neighborhoods
See people as clients & consumers
See people as citizens and co-producers
Treat people as passive and done-to
Help people take control of their lives
‘Fix people”
Support people to develop potential
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Implement programmes as the answer
See people as the answer
Challenges for asset based working
Shifting attitudes
Professionals and decision makers have to be willing to share power; instead of doing things
for people they have to help a community to do things for itself. The Task Group on Social
Inclusion and Mobility for the Marmot Review reported that one of the consistent barriers to
effective community involvement is frustration and resistance from communities. This is
because of past experiences of professionals misusing their power to control the types of
issues that they could discuss, which excluded some communities and stereotyped others.
They concluded that the practice of empowerment “with its explicit value base of recognising
lay experiential expertise [their emphasis] and changing power relationships will – if done well
and this is key – deliver health benefits at individual and community (interest and place)
level”.
Complementing, not replacing, good service delivery
The asset approach does not replace investment in improving services or tackling the
structural causes of health inequality. While it may help reduce demands on services in the
long term and bring about more effective services, it is not a no-cost or a money-saving
option. The aim is to achieve a better balance between service delivery and community
building. Practitioners and decision-makers need to bear in mind:
 Many communities will need an initial investment in community development and to
strengthen and support local networks and associations.
 Moving to an asset approach implies significant transformation of services and ways of
working – it will take time and money to train staff in this new way of working.
 It will take time to build up local confidence and a sense of empowerment.
 Communities must still be involved in improving access to and design of services, and
play their part in making choices and improving health knowledge. But using an assets
approach can bring more effective involvement in the process.
 Good information about risk, needs and priorities remains important, but this should be
complemented with information about assets and opportunities.
Asset working does not ignore needs. It emphasises psychosocial needs. And it distinguishes
between those needs that can best be met by family and friends, those best met through co-
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operation between services and communities, and those that can only be delivered through
services.
BUT community assets can only have a mitigating effect on the structural and social
determinants of ill-health and inequality – poor housing, low wages, lack of jobs.
Asset/strength based working and Ageing Better projects
The previous section explained what an asset approach is and why it is a powerful tool. This
section explores how it can be applied to the Ageing Better programme and local partners.
Asset based approaches value the capacity, skills and knowledge and connections in
individuals and communities. They focus on the positive capacity of individuals and
communities rather than solely on their needs, deficits and problems. These assets can act as
the foundation from which to build a positive future. As a ‘test and learn’ programme,
Ageing Better is well suited as a vehicle to introduce this type of thinking across partners.
The following pages summarise some practical ways of implementing asset based thinking. :
1. Asset mapping
2. Asset Based Community Development (ABCD)
3. Appreciative Enquiry
4. Participatory Appraisal
5. Co-production
6. Timebanking
7. Social prescribing
8. Peer support
9. Outcomes-based commissioning
10.Supporting healthy behaviours
11.Asset-based service redesign
12.Catalogues, maps and networks
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1. Asset mapping
What is it?
Participants make a map or inventory of the resources, skills and talents of individuals,
associations and organisations. They discover and collate the links between the different
parts of the community and the agencies. They use this knowledge to revitalise relationships
and mutual support, rebuild communities and neighbourhoods, and rediscover collective
power.
Principle
Every community has a tremendous supply of assets and resources that can be used to build
the community and solve problems.
Practice
Creating a map or an inventory is more than just gathering data and information. It is a
development and empowerment tool. The process of discovering the hidden and potential
assets in a community creates new relationships and new possibilities.
Asset mapping categorises assets – actual and potential – in six ‘levels’:
1. The assets of individuals: these are their skills, knowledge, networks, time, interests and
passions.
2. The assets of associations: this is not just the formal community organisations or voluntary
groups. It includes all the informal networks and ways that people come together:
3. The assets of organisations: this is not just the services that organisations deliver locally, but
also the other assets they control, for example, parks, community centres, and faith buildings.
In fact, it covers anything that could be put to the use of a community to improve its wellbeing. It includes staff and their influence and expertise, which they can use to support new
ideas.
4. The physical assets of an area: what green space, unused land, buildings, streets, markets,
transport are in the area?
5. The economic assets of an area: economic activity is at the heart of rebuilding a
community. What skills and talents are not being used in the local economy?
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6. The cultural assets of an area: everyday life is full of art and culture. This involves mapping
the talents for music, drama, art and the opportunities for everyone to express themselves
creatively
Learn more
Kretzmann & McKnight “Building Communities from the inside out: a path towards finding
and mobilising a community’s assets” ABCD Institute 1993. This publication is often referred
to as the Green book
The Ageing Better support team can provide support in developing asset mapping.
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2. Asset based community development (ABCD)
What is it?
ABCD is a process of community building that “starts with the process of locating the assets,
skills and capacities of residents, citizens associations and local institutions”. (Kretzman &
McKnight 1993 Introduction)
The purpose is to build up community groups and voluntary organisations and their informal
associations and networks, their collaborative relationships, their shared knowledge and their
social power (sometimes called social capital and civil society). These are the key to selfdirected and sustainable change. By building pride in achievements and a realisation of what
they have to contribute, communities create confidence in their ability to be producers not
recipients of development. They gain the confidence to engage in collaborative relationships
with agencies.
Practice
The ABCD Institute (www.abcdinstitute.org) suggests the key stages are:
 mapping or making an inventory of the capacities and assets in the area
 building relationships and connections between residents, and between residents and
agencies, to change values and attitudes
 mobilising residents to become self-organising and active by sharing knowledge and
resources and identifying common interests
 convening a core group of residents to identify, from the asset mapping and mobilising
activities, the key theme or issue that will inspire people to get organised and to create a
vision and a plan
 levering in outside resources only to do those things that the residents cannot do for
themselves; they need to be in a position of strength in dealing with outside agencies.
The theme or vision for revitalising the community needs to:
 be concrete so that people know what they are aiming at and when they have achieved it
 be achievable with community and other resources
 bring people together and use their skills
 reinforce their strengths and self-confidence.
What is an asset?
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“A health asset is any factor or resource which enhances the ability of individuals, communities
and populations to maintain and sustain health and well-being. These assets can operate at the
level of the individual, family or community as protective and promoting factors to buffer
against life’s stresses.”
Antony Morgan, associate director, National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE),
2009
An asset is any of the following:
 the practical skills, capacity and knowledge of local residents
 the passions and interests of local residents that give them energy for change
 the networks and connections – known as ‘social capital’ – in a community, including
friendships and neighbourliness
 the effectiveness of local community and voluntary associations
 the resources of public, private and third sector organisations that are available to
support a
 community
 the physical and economic resources of a place that enhance well-being.
Practically speaking assets can therefore be: the practical skills, capacity and knowledge of
local residents The passions and interests of local people that give the energy to change The
networks and connections in a community The effectiveness of local community and
voluntary associations The resources of public, private and third sector organisations that are
available to support a community The physical and economic resources of a place that
enhance wellbeing. (Foot and Hopkins, 2010)
Learn more
ABCD Institute: www.abcdinstitute.org
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3. Appreciative inquiry (AI)
“Appreciative inquiry is a new method of consulting the community which is based on the asset
model where what is good about something is considered as opposed to what is bad. Problems
tend to receive attention and resources so people tend to focus on solving the problems
sometimes at the cost of losing what is good. This method is the opposite of that and the
positivity it generates can be very energising as it can create its own solutions.”
South Ribble Borough Council report on its Scrutiny: Broadfield You Matter. August 2009.
What is it?
Appreciative inquiry (AI) is a process for valuing and drawing out the strengths and successes
in the history of a group, a community or an organisation. These are used to develop a
realistic and realisable vision for the future and a commitment to take sustainable action. AI is
not an uncritical or naïve approach; it creates a positive mindset by talking about success
rather than being defined by past failures. The inquiry starts with appreciating the best of
what is, thinking about what might be and should be, and ends with a shared commitment to
a vision and how to achieve it.
Principle
Learn from successes: look for what works well and do more of it.
Practice
The AI process is commonly described as having five stages:
1. Define: the key stakeholders agree the positive focus of the inquiry. For example, ‘how do
we make this a smoke-free town’, rather than ‘how do we stop people smoking’? This stage
might start with a problem but transforms it into a positive vision.
2. Discover: through storytelling, or a group inquiry process using appreciative interviewing
and conversations, the group draws out positive experiences and gifts, and collectively
discovers the common themes about what works and what they can build on.
3. Dream: what might be? From the ‘discovery’, the group develops a dream or shared vision
of the future. This is presented in a series of ‘provocative propositions’ that sum up how that
group would like to work in the future. The propositions have to be affirmative, challenging,
innovative and based on real experiences.
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4. Design: from their collective experience, what would they have to do to create the ideal
vision of the future? What innovative ways can they find to do this?
5. Delivery: plan the actions to deliver the dream. How can the group ensure the sustainability
of these changes in conversation as well as structures? How can it empower, learn, adjust and
improvise?
Learn more
The Thin Book of Appreciative Inquiry 1998 Sue Annis
Hammond Thin Book Publishing Co ISBN 0-9665373-1-9)
or www.thinbook.com
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4. Participatory appraisal
What is it?
Participatory appraisal (PA) is a methodology that creates a cycle of research, information
collection, reflection and learning. It is a broad empowerment approach that seeks to build
community knowledge and encourages collective community action. Although these
methods are mainly used to research needs and priorities, they can be used to collect
information about local skills and resources in line with the principles of asset based
approaches. Participatory appraisal aims to engage meaningfully with local residents,
ensuring that they are listened to and prioritises their views. The opinions and concerns of
local people have a central role in the process.
Principles
Local people are experts in their own lives and where they live. They are part of creating a
shared future.
Practice
Local people are trained to collect and analyse, in as accessible a way as possible, information
about the needs and priorities in their community, including the diversity of views, knowledge
and experience. The aim is to describe not only what the situation is, but also why and how it
came to be that way. They collect this information by talking to people on the street, going to
meetings and organising events.
Participatory appraisal emphasises that ‘the community’ is not a homogenous group and that
there are many diverse perspectives that should be actively sought out and taken into
account. Although this method is used mainly to research needs and priorities, the remit
could be extended to collect information about local skills, talents and resources – in line with
the asset model.
Learn more
Annett, H., Rifkin, S. (1995), Improving Urban Health, WHO, Geneva.
http://whqlibdoc.who.int/hq/1995/WHO_SHS_DHS_95.8.pdf
No more sticky dots: making progress with Participatory Appraisal in Salford.
www.oxfam.org.uk/resources/ukpoverty/downloads/nomorestickydots.pdf
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5. Co-production
Co-production essentially describes an equal and reciprocal relationship between service
provider and service user that draws on the knowledge, ability and resources of both to
develop solutions that are claimed to be successful, sustainable and cost-effective, changing
the balance of power from the professional towards the service user (SCDC, 2011). It involves
the active input by the people who use the services, as well as, or instead of, those who have
traditionally provided them, (Needham and Carr, 2009) effective collaboration on what to do
and taking mutual responsibility for agreed actions. The key characteristics of co-production
exemplify asset based principles (Stephens et al., 2008):
 Recognising people as assets rather than as problems
 Building on peoples existing skills and resources
 Promoting reciprocity, mutual respect and building trust
 Building strong and supportive social networks
 Valuing working differently, facilitating rather than delivering
 Breaking down the divisions between service providers and service users.
Co-production means involving individuals and communities in collaborative relationships
with more empowered frontline staff who are able and confident to share power and accept
user expertise (Needham and Carr, 2009). Co-produced services work with individuals in a
way that treats individuals as people with unique needs, assets and aspirations, but also as
people that want support that fits around them (Slay and Robinson, 2011).
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6. Timebanking
The core economy “constitutes the real work of society which is caring, loving, being a citizen,
a neighbour and a human being.” (Edgar Cahn, Founder of Time banking)
“You give an hour of help and earn one time credit. The person receiving your help owes one
time credit. They pay back by helping someone else. The circle of care and mutual support
expands: more people means more skills to share.”41
Timebanking creates relationships, activity, networks and mutuality that build community, as
well as ‘buying’ time, services and skills that people could not otherwise afford. The basic
principle of the ‘time economy’ is simple. Everyone has something to contribute: time, skills,
care, resources.
People deposit time when they give practical help to someone and withdraw time when they
need something done. Everyone’s time is valued equally. Time banks have developed from
the original idea of person-to-person exchange, such as the Rushey Green Time Bank (RGTB),
into facilitating exchanges between public agencies and individuals (see the Spice
organisation below) and between small voluntary and social enterprise organisations.
Councils are encouraging local timebanks to collaborate so their members can give time to
and access credits with other time banks in the area. This builds links across different
neighbourhoods, makes them more sustainable and means they have more to offer
members. Camden Shares is an example of this umbrella role.
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7. Social prescribing
Social prescribing links patients in primary care with non-medical sources of support within
the community. These are usually local voluntary groups or community organisations that
have signed up to the scheme. Many social prescribing schemes use asset mapping tools in
order to identify the potential sources of support so that GP practices and others can refer
their patients. It connects people to the assets on their doorsteps.
Research45 in the North West found that prescriptions were being written for exercise and
sport, book clubs, places to take part in the arts, green gyms, volunteering, mutual aid,
befriending and self-help, advice on debt, legal problems and parenting support.
The benefits included:
• increased awareness of what would improve wellbeing and how to take positive steps
towards this
• increased uptake of healthy activities by vulnerable and other groups
• increased levels of social contact among marginalised groups.
The Wellbeing Project in Halton and St Helens46 is an award-winning social enterprise that
offers social prescribing to people with mental health concerns. They run community-based
courses, self-help groups, training and leisure activities and connect people with sources of
support.
8. Peer support
There is a long history of peer support between people with long-term illnesses or who have
shared an experience such as alcohol misuse. These rely on the assets, skills and knowledge in
the community and the recognition that local people can offer help in ways that are
sometimes more effective than professional help. Befriending schemes have been shown to
be effective ways of reducing isolation and exclusion which in turn improves wellbeing.48
Through the Knowsley Volunteer Family Mentor scheme, 35 local residents have volunteered
to be trained to give help and encouragement to local families to help them increase their
stability, confidence, selfesteem and resilience so that they can start to tackle their
circumstances themselves. The evaluation found that families respond better to help from
people in their own community than to professional help; they have benefited from taking up
training, applying for jobs, getting help with drug use or health issues for example. The
volunteers also benefit by using the training they receive as the springboard to get
qualifications and jobs.
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9. Outcomes-based commissioning
The transformative potential of co-production is not best served by traditional procurement
models where providers are contracted to deliver a service defined by its inputs and outputs,
with little mention of the wider outcomes and how they could be achieved, and little or no
requirement to build on assets and capacity within the community. Councils and health
services are increasingly combining outcomes-based commissioning with coproduction when
they want to utilise and build on local assets.
Key elements include:
 The commissioning framework defines the long-term changes that are wanted. An
example would be the aim that young people have confidence.
 Because the activities are not specified, potential providers are incentivised to be
innovative and flexible about how they go about achieving the outcomes.
 Co-production is specified as an approach that providers must develop, meaning they are
required to work closely with clients, their families and communities using co-production
and other participative approaches to make best use of their assets.
 New providers can emerge bringing their local networks and knowledge of the area •
Commissioners can specify that providers develop preventative approaches to service
delivery to stop more acute needs arising in future.
 Wider social and environmental outcomes can be built into the assessment of value for
money, and the monitoring framework.
 Commissioning is designed around outcomes rather than service silos.
The table overpage is reproduced from the New Economic Foundation’s guide
“commissioning for outcomes”, which provides detailed guidance on this approach, with case
studies. The table contrasts traditional commissioning with the outcomes based approach.
Both approaches can be used within normal procurement legislation but organisational
processes may need to be revised.
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10. Supporting healthy behaviours
Risky health behaviours remain an important cause of ill-health. There is not a simple
correlation between health risks, health assets and levels of wellbeing. It is not always possible
to both increase health assets and reduce health risk, because people often make trade-offs
depending on their circumstances. Starting with an assets approach supports an increased
focus on understanding how and why people make positive and healthy choices and how
those choices can be supported.
Why don’t people smoke?
Campaigns to stop smoking have successfully increased the numbers of those who don’t
smoke from 48 per cent of the population in 1948 to 79 per cent in 2008, mainly because of
the increasing number of people who have never smoked. Salford Health, Wellbeing and
Social Care Scrutiny commissioned an appreciative inquiry to explore why people choose not
to smoke. It asked what people’s motivations and drivers were. What could the council and
other partners do to support non-smokers who live in an area with high levels of smoking
and foster a culture of not smoking?
 The scrutiny panel concluded there were things they could do to make it easier for people
to be non-smokers, especially young people:
 encourage young people’s own campaigns about smoking and the tobacco industry
 support work in schools on peer support and confidence building, and open
conversations about difficult issues such as peer pressure
 support hobbies, interests and activities that would be impaired by smoking
 work with parents and the smoke-free homes project run by Unlimited Potential on the
health impacts and the affect on home life.
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11. Asset-based service redesign
A powerful way to implement asset principles is to review the policies, practices and the
services that are delivered to client groups who have been defined almost solely in terms of
their deficits, and who often feel cut off from the wider community. This work continues in the
tradition of the ‘social model’ of disability and discrimination which has been very influential
in the fields of learning and physical disability, for instance. The focus of attention is on
integrating people with disabilities or dementia into the community, removing the social
barriers that make their lives difficult and building the community assets and resources that
can support them.
Dementia capable communities: ‘a community which is good for someone with
dementia is a community that is good for everyone’
Two thirds of people with dementia live in their own homes in the community, and participate
in everyday activities. One third live in long-term care settings which are also part of local
neighbourhoods and communities. The quality of the communities they live in is an essential
part of any strategy concerned with wellbeing, with breaking down stigma and isolation, and
with supporting independence as long as possible. Campaigners and professionals working
with people with dementia and their carers are using an assets approach to develop the
concept of a ‘dementia capable communities’ and nurture the assets that make a place safe,
welcoming and enabling to people with dementia
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12. Displaying and analysing asset mapping
This section deals with the way that information drawn from Asset Mapping can be collated
and displayed. There are many official and community based methods of collecting
information about local assets. These include:
 workshops
 storytelling
 games
 volunteer research
 surveys
 street theatre
There are several ways in which information on local assets can be collected, recorded and
made available to local communities and the agencies that serve them. Many local authorities
publish information on the availability of local services and premises in “catalogue” form lists
with indications of location, activities and opening times. Some local authorities publish these
on the internet in interactive maps that will show the availability of services and premises near
you with links to websites and so on.
Many of the assets that a community uses and cherishes may not be included in such lists. As
recent research by the TSRC and others indicates, many assets and organisations that are
important to community life may not be on the official radar. And yet it is these assets and
the place they have in community networks that make up the social capital of an area.
Recently some community groups and local authorities have started to use network maps to
show the interconnectedness of communities and agencies. These can be used to show who
controls assets, who uses them and how non tangible assets such as skills, advice and support
are shared and distributed. The diagram below shows the relationships between these types
of maps and
the people
and
organisations
that might be
involved in
their
preparation
and who may
use them.
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Basic Information Catalogues
Many local agencies hold lists of local information in a catalogue and often this is posted
online and searchable according to various tags and criteria.
The issue with paper publishing is keeping the information up to date. This is also true of
online publishing but changes can be made more easily. Also online publishing can be
updated by the organisations in the catalogue themselves, although someone has to manage
this process.
Geographic Maps
There are many examples of geographic maps being used to collect and display the location
of community information. Some Ageing Better partners already have online maps of local
services and asset locations. These will allow local people to access the information by
clicking on an interactive map. Often it is possible to query the information “ show me the
location of local schools” or “show the location of facilities near me”. The screenshot below
shows one such system that has been developed in Scotland – ALISS. This is available for
Ageing Better partnerships through the support team.
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The problem with geographic maps is that not all assets are geographically based. They may
be available throughout the whole community or may be national services that deliver locally.
Network Maps
Network mapping has developed as a method of analysing business and communities.
Although popular in the US and Australia it has few examples in the UK and these tend to be
associated with the security services and the identification of fraud, although the Royal
Society of Arts (RSA) has carried some major community network mapping and analysis work.
Drew Mackie Associates has been using network maps for a number of clients over the last
eight years. These range from government departments to local authorities to community
organisations. The purpose of a network map is to identify the key actors in a situation and to
explore ways of improving local networks for the community good.
Networks of all sorts are important in building the social capital of an area. These may be
support networks in the community the grannies, aunties and uncles that support young
families, the friends that call on older people to make sure they’re all right, the workmates
that you socialise with and so on.
As the Office for National statistics says:
● They are defined as the personal relationships which are accumulated when people interact
with each other in families, workplaces, neighbourhoods, local associations and a range of
informal and formal meeting places.
● Social capital describes the pattern and intensity of networks among people and the shared
values which arise from those networks.
● Research has shown that higher levels of social capital are associated with better health,
higher educational achievement, better employment outcomes, and lower crime rates. In other
words, those with extensive networks are more likely to be 'housed, healthy, hired and happy'
Network maps also encompass the links between organisations of all sorts. These can be
used to map who is central to the delivery of projects, programmes and policies. They can
also be used to identify the links that should be made between unconnected organisations
and community groups.
So why should we consider mapping networks? A network map can:
 reveal patterns that no individual can see
 indicate who can spread information and influence most effectively
 pinpoint possible bottlenecks
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 show possible clusters of interest
 compare network centrality with capability in structuring and allocating resources
 allow “what if” experimenting with new connections
 be used as an information store
The map below shows the delivery organisations involved in the regeneration of Stranraer
Seafront.
The Ageing Better support team can also provide access to and support with the software
used to develop network maps.
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References and source documents
Foot, J (2012), What makes us healthy? The asset approach in practice: evidence, action, evaluation
[Online] Available at http://www.janefoot.co.uk/downloads/files/healthy%20FINAL%20FINAL.pdf
(accessed 24th October 2014)
Foot, J., and Hopkins, T (2010), A glass half full: how an asset approach can improve community health
and wellbeing, [Online] Available at
http://www.janefoot.co.uk/downloads/files/Glass%20half%20full.pdf (accessed 24th October 2014)
Glasgow Centre for Population Health (2011), Asset based approaches for health improvement:
redressing the balance, [Online] Available at
http://www.gcph.co.uk/assets/0000/2627/GCPH_Briefing_Paper_CS9web.pdf (accessed 24th October
2014)
Kretzman, J.P., and McKnight, J.L. (1993) Building Communities from the Inside Out, ACTA Publications,
Illinois
Mackie, D. and Wilcox, D (2014) Assets and Networks, Drew Mackie Associates
Michigan State University (1998), ‘The assets/strength-based approach to programming’, Best Practice
Briefs No. 2, 1998-1999, [Online] Available at http://outreach.msu.edu/bpbriefs/issues/brief2.pdf
(accessed 24th October 2014)
Public Services Hub at RSA (2013), The New Social Care: strength-based approaches, [Online] Available
at http://www.rsa2020publicservices.org.uk/wpcontent/uploads/2013/05/RSAJ704_2020PSH_report_04-13_WEB.pdf (accessed 24th October 2014)
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