Community Capacity Builders is a South Australian social enterprise. Through its training programs and tools Community Capacity Builders:
Builds the capacity of active citizens and social entrepreneurs to create systems change,
Builds the capacity of communities to address complex wicked problems,
Builds the capacity of communities to create entrepreneurial ecosystems that support autistic social entrepreneurs.
Community Capacity Builders is currently developing My Home Manual - a manual that provides step by step instructions for the use of everyday items in a person's home. Research has highlighted that autistic adults are being diagnosed with dementia at rates up to 8 times higher than the general population, with onset occurring years or decades earlier than typical. My Home Manual aims to build the capacity of autistic individuals who have a cognitive impairment to live independently.
Our core values are:
Build capacity: it’s in our name! We focus on building the capacity of others.
Evidence based: all of our products and processes are based on peer-reviewed research.
Continuous learning: we pride ourselves on continually adapting our products and processes to reflect the latest research.
Self-determination: we value equity, inclusion, and self-determination for all.
Dr Sharon Zivkovic is the Founder and CEO of Community Capacity Builders. As an autistic social entrepreneur and systems thinker, Sharon has used her innate bottom-up and associative thinking skills, and systemising capabilities, to develop and commercialise a number of social innovations. Back in 2001, Sharon received an Enterprising Woman of the Year Award for making communities more enterprising by taking advantage of their communal strengths. In 2016, she received a Fresh Scientist Award for her innovative work in addressing wicked problems using complexity science, and in 2021 Sharon’s work in Applied Complexity (Social Entrepreneurship & Wicked Problems) was recognised on the Map of the Complexity Sciences. As a proudly autistic social innovator and entrepreneur, Sharon established a Centre for Autistic Social Entrepreneurship within Community Capacity Builders in 2023. This Centre has the overarching mission of creating an enabling environment for autistic social innovators and social entrepreneurs. Sharon is currently developing My Home Manual - a home manual for autistic individuals who have a cognitive impairment.