Who is AssetMap.com?

Last week one of our research fellows came across an intriging site; Assetmap.com Her discovery likely resulted from getting sick of hearing me drill into our project teams that "Every good project begins with an Asset Map."

For the last few years, every time I transitioned from ideation to realization of a thought I always constructed what I called an "Asset Map". This could take the form of a digital mind-map, a CRM account, or most likely a google docs spreadsheet. Whatever tool I deployed, the intent was always the same; help myself or a team visualize the "assets" (contacts, infrastructure, collateral, etc) currently at our disposal, or within two degrees of aquiring. Nothing especially profound, just extremely useful.

It never ceases to amaze me what happens when you get 3-5 capable people brainstorming about a big idea or project, then have them all take the time to put to paper their relevant "assets". Seeing the glimer in each others eyes and the collective understanding, "Yeah, we can totally do this" will never get old for me, especially as the projects get bigger and more bold.

Then here I go, thinking I'm the only tool ridiculous enough to regularly use a buzz-term like Asset Map, when these guys go and make a business out it. Their pitch is brillant, and irresistably simple, with subtitles like "Discovering Better Connections" and "Every Project is a Puzzle". The boiler plate on their one-page site reads:

The pieces of this puzzle are the ideas, skills, materials, relationships and other assets that must be assembled for success. Assetmap builds online tools that help you and your team inventory the assets you have, visualize your wider network of resources, and find what you're missing. We work....to help people with common interests and complementary needs find one another.

And these guys aren't messing around, with clients like Social Capital Markets Conference, Skoll World Forum, MacArthur Foundation, Ugandan National Fair Trade Association, and Northwestern University. With industry boundries blurring and market realities rapidly evolving, people trying to solve important problems are going to have to get really good at coalition-building, interdisciplinary management, and project mobilization. It's probably going to take organizations like AssetMap to help networks realize their potential.

Our research fellow sent a quick email asking for more info on AssetMap.com, and ended up with a polite email which essentially said: "That's neat, who the hell are you?" All is well though, we look forward to hearing more of AssetMap's exploits and successes in the near future.