Base Building for Power conducts intensive hands-on training programs that equip today’s emerging leaders with concrete organizing skills to be effective movement leaders, an then connect them with both paid and volunteer opportunities.  We partner with unions, community, and voter mobilization organizations throughout the United States and Canada to add training capacity to movements for justice.  

The last election showed us that deep relationship-based organizing is needed now more than ever. We need more people participating in organizations and elections to defend our communities in the short term and build for justice in the long term. We particularly need more volunteers to step up and fight for our communities. We have found that when empowered with the tools, training, and confidence, members of our communities will step up to the plate to grow our movements for racial and economic justice. 

Base Building For Power is an international base building training organization and a community of over 300 organizers actively building movements for racial, economic, climate, reproductive justice, and peace. 

Our relationship-based trainings are inspired by the house meeting campaign, a strategy used by the United Farm Workers to rapidly build community organizations throughout North America to win the historic Grape Boycott. This relational strategy is a fast way to build an organization or supercharge a volunteer base, while training organizers with life long organizing skills in the process. This model has been used by generations of organizers to grow unions, win elections, and create lasting community power. 

Trainings We Provide for Organizations and Individuals

Two-hour interactive online trainings: These interactive in-person or online trainings focus on a particular skills, such as identifying issues, agitation, vision, direct asks, follow-up, inoculation, setting goals, making a status report, relationship building, strategies for talking with people you disagree with, integrating role plays into organizing, volunteer recruitment and retention, grassroots fundraising, mobilization, accountability conversations, mapping, campaign planning/strategy, and self-care/sustainability strategies. 

1-week in-person House Meeting training with ongoing support: In this highly interactive training we teach organizations how to build a base through a multi-week house meeting campaign. The training will include many of the trainings mentioned above, along with ongoing coaching as participants put they learn into practice. This training can be done online only if cameras on and mute off is required. 

1-1 mentorship for all levels of leadership: We provide one-on-one base building leadership support and coaching for all levels of leadership to add training capacity to base building organizations.

Small group support: We facilitate groups of staff at a similar level to discuss challenges, role play, and support each other in the same organization, or across several organizations.  

Grassroots Fundraising Training: We train organizations on how to boost their grassroots fundraising programs through individual donors, monthly pledges, events, and large donor cultivation. 

Organizing, and base building in particular, is hard work.  We believe in urgently recruiting more people into justice organizations, growing the base and power of organizations.  We also believe organizing in a way that is sustainable, builds community, and minimizes burnout.  Caring for ourselves and each other is critical to the health and sustainability of our movements.