Growth, the result, is easy to see. But what creates community growth is hard-to-see. A subtle force transforms seeds to scale impact—that force is an interaction of rising quality of life that draws in more people. Rising quality of life is like a magnet; people want better lives, this sparks their hopes. So, some ‘thing’ that was created by people’s actions now draws new people to it. Quality of Life draws in a rising Quantity of People.
The Revolution of Rising Aspirations feedback loop is the growth process: Hopes to Aspirations to Action to Rising Aspirations to Actions Improving. This process is the growing. As these seeds undergo this growth: Communities Transform. That transformation is what is called Scaling.
Scaling in community development is too often narrowly defined. In this narrow definition, scaling means growing numbers. That is one aspect of Scaling. If that is the only way Scaling is understood, then typically needed to drive that are resources, resources from outside that pay people in the community to do work. For example, money is provided to pay people to be health workers, and the health workers provide health services. When more money is provided, then more workers can be hired, or more technology so the work improves. This is scaling by growing in size.
Scaling has a second aspect, though, where growth can occur that does not require external resources. Scaling emerges from inside the community being transformed. A re-assembly grows in which community capacity rises. That is, rising quality of functioning by the community makes community life better. Improved communities then become the magnet and call more people to come. More people joining communities add their aspiring human energies, and those energies grow quality.
It is this second aspect of scaling that is shown in the feedback loop below. Rising aspirations enter, this time from outside the community. These aspirations accelerate the feedback loop, accelerating scaling impact. Indeed, two positive feedback loops are operating. One is the Aspirations-Action-Rising Aspirations noted above. The second is the Rising Quality-Rising Numbers-Improved Quality-More Numbers feedback loop implied by the trajectory of Scale Impact below.
