Community asset mapping is a positive approach to building strong communities, developed by John Kretzmann and John McKnight, of the Asset-Based Community Development Institute at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.  The Community Asset Mapping process outlined by Kretzmann and McKnight in their guidebook Building Communities from the Inside Out: A Path Towards Finding and Mobilising a Communit's Assets[1] describes in detail a process to mobilize a community to use its assets to develop a plan to solve its problems and improve residents' quality of life.

Traditional methods of community work tend to focus on a community's deficits; i.e. their needs and problems. Often, one of the first steps of a community worker is to undertake a needs assessment of the community, which usually focusses on issues :such as unemployment, poverty, crime and illiteracy, while ignoring the assets that exist in the community. Working from a "needs" perspective generally leads to external funds and services being sought  to help the community. While these may indeed have positive benefits to community residents, often the result is a fragmented patchwork of services. Many of the services may not be appropriate to the culture and dynamics of that particular community, and do not contribute to building the capacity of the community or empower individuals to be self-sufficient. In a nutshell, "needs-based" assessments tend to lead to community dependence rather than community development.

Kretzmann and McKnight propose that community developers start with a "clear commitment to discovering a community's capacities and assets". (Kretzmann and McKnight 1993, p.1).  The asset-based approach does not remove the need for outside resources, but makes their use more effective by: 

starting with what is present in the community

concentrating on the agenda-building and problem-solving capacity of the residents

stressing local determination, investment, creativity, and control[2]

Each community has assets to be preserved and enhanced. These assets can be used by residents as the foundation from which to build a postive future. Beyond developing a simple inventory, this 'mapping' process is designed to promote connections or relationships between individuals, between individuals and organizations, and between organizations and organizations. Combining community assets creates a synergy that exponentially increases the capacity of the community to meet the needs of its residents. The  information collected through this asset-mapping process may also be used as the foundation for many other processes, such as strategic planning, community mobilization and community economic development.

Community assets include:

Skills, knowledge, talents and experience of local residents

Community associations, many of which provide benefits far beyond their mandate

Businesses

Schools, churches, libraries and other institutions that operate within the community

Municipal services such as police, fire, parks and recreation services

Other social services and community organizations

Physical structures; e.g. town square, heritage buildings

Natural resources; e.g. river, trees, green space

The first step in community asset mapping is to work with community members to develop a plan for documenting the community's assets.