The Organizing Sentence

*The need:* Teams drift when the plan lives in a document nobody rereads.

The organizing sentence is the smallest complete container for a campaign plan:

We are organizing (our people) to (strategic goal) through (tactics) by (timeline).

Every team in an effort — the core team and each local team — writes its own. A neighborhood example: *We are organizing renters on the six blocks around Hart Park to win weekly repairs office hours with the property manager, through door-knocking all 214 units and a joint letter, by March 1.*

The sentence forces the four honest answers: who exactly are our people (not "the community" — which people?); what outcome, with a number where possible; which tactics we're actually committing to; and by when. It also makes nested strategy legible — a citywide effort's sentence and a single block's sentence should visibly add up.

Write it at the team launch, put it at the top of every agenda, and rewrite it when strategy changes. When someone new joins, the sentence is the fastest true answer to "so what is this?"

Details

• ingredients: a team, a strategic goal, ten minutes at the end of a planning meeting
• source note: From 'Organizing: People, Power, Change' (2014), Acting: Tactics & Timelines.
• how it works: Fill the frame: we are organizing WHO to WHAT through HOW by WHEN., Make WHO specific people, WHAT a measurable outcome, HOW real tactics, WHEN a date., Each team writes its own; check that local sentences add up to the shared one., Put it at the top of every agenda; rewrite when strategy changes.
• min resources: Free.
• practice kind: recipe
• success signals: new members can repeat it after one meeting, agenda items visibly serve the sentence, local and core sentences sum