Rarely a week goes by without a phone call from a passionate regional community member asking me asking for support to get a grant over the line. I get it, money feels like the answer. It’s tangible, it’s immediate, and it signals that someone, somewhere, believes your community is worth investing in.
But here’s what twenty-six years of community and economic development has taught me:
Money can start things, but it rarely sustains them.
Some of the best community programs I’ve seen have disappeared the moment the funding tap was turned off. Not because the people weren’t committed or the need went away, because the conditions that would have allowed those programs to survive on their own were never built in the first place.
What if we tilled the soil first?
This is the question that drives the work we do at Ready Communities. Not “how do we get the funding?” but “is this community ready to receive it?”
Tilling the soil means doing the unglamorous work before the money lands. Building shared understanding of what the community actually needs. Strengthening the relationships between the people who will deliver change. Developing the local capability and leadership that doesn’t pack up and leave when the contract ends.
There are two strong reasons to do this work first.
The first is practical: when funding does arrive, a ready community can move. Instead of spending the first six months working out who needs to be in the room, the community is already building. The stakeholders not only know, but they trust one another. The purpose is clear and the groundwork has been laid.
The second is protective: when the funding ebbs, and it always does, a ready community doesn’t collapse. The connections remain, the vision remains intact and the capability stays local. The change has somewhere to live that isn’t dependent on the next grant cycle.
In regional Australia, the stakes are higher. Distance, smaller ecosystems, and limited support mean the cost of getting it wrong is greater, and the communities that bear that cost are the ones who could least afford it. A failed program in a capital city is a footnote. In a regional town, it can set things back by years. (side note: look out for our next Impact Report, released on 20 May 2026 where we explore the notion of the ‘gap in the map’ and how service access is harder for these communities)
Investment ready isn’t just a business term
When a business is investment ready, it means the fundamentals are in place. An astute leadership team drives a solid plan and the organisational capacity is ready for growth when investment lands.
Somehow this isn’t always the case when funding lands in regional communities, particularly funding designed to solve our most wicked problems. So we build the plane as we fly it. And the human cost of doing this isn’t to be underestimated. It’s not only investment and projects that are at risk, it’s the people who are trying to learn to fly.
Readiness in practice
For the past 2.5 years my Ready Communities colleague, Chad Renando and I have self-funded a readiness journey of our own. Starting in Kempsey NSW, following on to Grafton NSW and now Stanthorpe QLD we have built a model that has explored the simple question – “what if readiness came first?”
Over the 2.5 years we’ve looked under, over and through readiness as a thesis, readiness in motion and readiness as a state and we’ve come to this conclusion. In this short time we’ve learned:
- Service maps aren’t always clear and sometimes funding goes to organisations that don’t even step into the town. Clarity and understanding identifies what is really needed, what exists and what needs to be delivered in a different, or more equitable way.
- The right people don’t always have the opportunity to come together to create change. We are yet to be in a room of people in the small communities we work in where we didn’t introduce at least one community leader to another. With connection and connectivity the right people can find one another and create change where it otherwise wouldn’t happen.
- There is latent capacity in communities which includes funding, resources and people power. Capacity that if configured differently can contribute to sustainable change. – With clarity and understanding duplication is obvious and opportunities are realised.
- The acquisition of grants can have the unintended consequence of competitive tension in the business of doing good. While a letter of support may imply a collaborative partnership, nothing can step into the place of turning up again and contributing. When communities truly collaborate for purpose they really start to move forward.
- The loudest voices aren’t always the most informed. Communities that effectively apply advocacy and promotion skills get their stories across.
Want to learn more?
There are many opportunities to learn more in coming months. Register for a workshop, our national conference Social Impact in the Regions, or get in touch kerry@readycommunities.com.au
- Webinar: Ready Communities 2026 Impact Report LAUNCH: (online) 10am 28 May https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/y54JOl1ERNKhA9AATVpbiQ
- Workshop: Investment Ready Communities: Make sustainable change possible in regional areas. (Brisbane CBD) 10am 3 June Register
- Workshop: (Forbes, NSW) 930am 15 July Register
- Conference: Social Impact in the Regions 2-4 September Learn more
Keep an eye on our events page for workshops in June: Kingaroy (QLD), Roma (QLD), Longreach (QLD), Dalby (QLD) and Charleville (QLD) and July Armidale (NSW), more locations to be announced.