Asset Mapping

Asset mapping is a collaborative exercise designed to help identify the strengths and resources of a community and can help uncover solutions.

It’s the first step in recognizing a community as rich in assets, and not simply an accumulation of needs and deficits. Assets typically inventoried and depicted in a map or database in three categories; Individuals, Associations, and Institutions. 

Individual Assets include the gifts, talents, dreams and hopes held by youth, adults, and seniors in a community.

Association Assets include the missions, relationships and physical spaces of small/informal groups who voluntarily come together because of a shared interest. They may include clubs, interest groups, and faith communities.

Institutional Assets are groups of people who work together as paid employees within a highly organized structure. They include schools, hospitals, businesses and government agencies.

All of the above may hold physical assets include land, building spaces, and funding, as well as people who serve as connectors and build relationships across lines of difference.