I recently discovered the term “Collective Mindset”.

I’ve worked in the community development space throughout my entire career and this term somehow never came up for me. That was until I read this article last summer about how a positive form of this collective mindset is used to solve some of the biggest challenges society is faced with today.

What is a positive collective mindset? Picture it as the shared commitment to growth, innovation, and teamwork for the advancement of civic society. When folks in a community or society believe in their potential for economic progress, are up for trying new things, and actively join in efforts to make things better, that's a positive collective mindset.

How does it apply to Ginkgo?

I think it applies quite well to the work our customers do in the place management space, among other community development roles.

Here’s the gist. Place management organizations, such as Business Improvement Districts (BIDs), are able to play crucial roles in fostering a positive collective mindset and advancing economic goals in a region or city. Some of the ways they do this include:

Local Empowerment: BIDs are local organizations that bring together businesses within a specific district to collectively manage and improve the area. This localized approach empowers businesses to actively contribute to the economic development of their immediate surroundings, creating a shared sense of purpose.

Community Engagement: BIDs involve local businesses, property owners, and residents in decision-making processes. This engagement builds a collective mindset by ensuring that everyone has a voice in shaping the economic goals of the district. It promotes a shared vision for the community.

Place Branding: BIDs often engage in place branding and marketing efforts to enhance the image of the district. This not only attracts investment but also instills a positive collective identity among stakeholders. A strong, positive identity contributes to a shared belief in the potential for economic success.

BIDs provide the political and financial vehicles for a collective mindset by promoting collaboration, resource sharing, community engagement, and a shared sense of responsibility. These approaches bring together public and private entities to work towards common economic goals, fostering a positive and unified vision for the development of a neighborhood, region or city.

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So if you’re interested in forming a place management organization like a BID in order to cultivate your community’s collective mindset, I’d recommend focusing efforts around these three steps:

1. Find your community's leader(s). These might be existing stakeholders with a little extra passion and energy to push for progress than others. In fact, I’d wager you’re one of them if you’ve read this far into this.

2. Empower these people with the roles they’re willing to take on in order to move your neighborhood toward what you all desire and envision. Finding alignment on a common vision as a community is often a challenge, but it is doable through community engagement work.

3. Establish a framework for collaboration so that your community can stay focused and informed. In today’s world, this framework should consist of an online data sharing platform.

There will inevitably be controversy, misalignment and even failures throughout the process of reaching your goals for the neighborhood. As long as the collective mindset of your community is able to stay focused on what you want through clear communication and access to the right information when you need it, these challenges will be your opportunities to learn, recalibrate and push on toward a better future than the one we all thought we knew so well yesterday and the day before that.
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As a Neighborhood Intelligence Platform, Ginkgo is a proven framework for data about places. It’s become an invaluable tool for the place management organizations, among other community groups that use it to achieve a positive collective mindset among their stakeholders. Let's talk about how we can put Ginkgo to work for your community’s collective mindset.