When it comes to thinking about the impact of AI on our charity’s mission, there are a lot of unknowns. This is tool can help us explore them in a structured way - it is called a knowledge board. When considering the impact of AI on your mission we invite you to map these things:
- How would you define your mission?
- What are your mission characteristics? These will be nouns, people, and change wanted. We’ll explore an example below.
- What you know about the impact of AI on your mission and your mission characteristics (these should be things you have evidence for)
- What you think you know about the impact of AI on your mission and your mission characteristics (there might be assumptions that you want to verify or gather more information about)
- What you don’t know about the impact of AI on your mission and your mission characteristics (these might be things you want to learn more about)
What is it good for?
- This tool support strategic thinking, bringing together your team to discuss how AI might impact your mission, service users - and how you support them.
When to use it
Get the tool
How to use it
Step 1. Bring your team or senior leaders together to try this activity. Everyone will have different knowledge to share on how AI could impact your mission. Who at your organisation has access to insight, data or past projects that can help you? Set up a meeting together.
Step 2. During the meeting you'll define your mission together. Write it on a post-it note in the 'mission' box.
Step 3. Now consider your mission characteristics. These will be nouns, people, and change wanted. Let’s explore an example, for charities with a mission to support young people aged 16 - 18 to develop the skills they need to reach their career aspirations in the UK, how would you define the mission characteristic? We might say things like: young people aged 16 - 18 years old, employment, entry level roles, confidence, careers advice. Try to be specific, but don’t overthink it. Write what comes to mind in the 'mission characteristics' box.
Step 4. What do you know about the impact of AI on your mission and your mission characteristics? These should be things you have evidence for. Now consider what do you think you know? And lastly, what don't you know? Invite everyone to add their post-it notes. Ask questions to gather as much insight as you can from each other.
Let’s re-visit the example we shared earlier. If your organisation supports young people to develop the skills they need to reach their career aspirations, how might AI impact this goal? Explore each mission characteristic one-by-one.
- Entry level roles: What impact is AI having on entry level roles in the UK? What do you know? What do you think you know? What don’t you know?
- Young people aged 16 — 18 years old: What impact does AI have on the behaviours, expectations and needs of young people aged 16 - 18 years old? What do you know? What do you think you know? What don’t you know?
Step 5. Acknowledge that there will be uncertainty. We can't answer every question. We need to prioritise. What feels important to find out right now? What is too risky to ignore? You could invite everyone to vote on their top three post-it notes.
Step 6. What actions do you need to take individually or collectively to move forward and build your knowledge? Write them in post-it notes in the 'next steps' box. Agree deadlines and when you will next re-group to discuss what you have learned. Keep your knowledge board updated - it will evolve as you explore this topic.
We recommend spending at least 1.5 hours on this activity. We provide more information including an example in the workbook.