Choose Your Pathway

Begin by reviewing TOM’s playbook (in the resource section). Select from three options: a Build Party,  a Makeathon or a TOM Workshop. Each offers a different scale of commitment and impact. Assess your community’s resources — available space, partners, tools, and volunteers. If you have limited capacity, start small; if you already run a lab, aim for a permanent space.

Invite several local collaborators — educators, disability advocates, or makers — to a short planning meeting. Discuss local needs and decide which format could create the greatest benefit. Use TOM’s planning templates to visualize your timeline, materials, and costs.

If unsure which to start with, begin with a pilot event and scale later. Reach out to TOM mentors or the ChangeX community for personalized guidance.

Document your decision, your goals, and your first concrete milestone — such as setting a date or booking a venue. This shared clarity launches your journey with confidence and focus.

Plan and Prepare

Once you’ve chosen your approach, form an organizing team and assign clear roles: coordinator, logistics, communications, technical lead, and documentation. Book an accessible venue and check for essential infrastructure — power supply, safety, and accessible entrances. Develop a timeline with recruitment, material sourcing, and outreach milestones.

Hold planning meetings to align on goals, inclusion principles, and safety guidelines. Recruit diverse participants: students, designers, engineers, caregivers, and Need-Knowers. Use TOM’s available resources to create a checklist for equipment, setup, and accessibility.

If tool access is limited, partner with a local FabLab, university, or high-school workshop. If registration lags, highlight learning, collaboration, and social impact in your communications. For tight budgets, seek small local sponsors or in-kind donations.

Finalize logistics and share your plan with all volunteers. Confirm that safety, accessibility, and inclusion are central. Careful preparation ensures your event runs smoothly and sets a positive, collaborative tone.

Design and Build

Depending on the pathway chosen, it is now time to roll up your sleeves.

For Build Parties- prefabricate the pieces of the item you are assembling. Make sure to order all the materials and tools ahead of time and follow the instructions in the product file to ensure a seamless process. Arrange workstations for each assembly team and organize all the tools and materials in each workstation. 

Invite Need-Knowers to participate in the assembly process and test the devices in real-time. Make sure to document with lots of pictures, videos and testimonies.

For Makeathons- identify the challenges and Need-Knowers, recruit makers, gather prototyping materials and make sure there are enough materials and tools to go around. Create small, multi-diciplinary teams of Makers and Need-Knowers and brief them on the design process. Throughout the 72-hour sprint, teams should be encouraged to ideate, prototype, test and iterate as much as possible in collaboration with the Need-Knower.

If teams overcomplicate solutions, refocus them on simplicity, affordability, and usability. Manage fatigue by making sure there are some built-in R&R sessions, lots of refreshments and a fun, dynamic atmosphere.

Conclude with a demo session where each team presents their prototype and what they learned. Capture stories, feedback, and images for documentation. Emphasize that every design, even unfinished, contributes to the growing global library of TOM solutions.

For TOM Workshops- Begin by identifying a suitable space that is accessible, has reliable electricity and internet, and has room for basic equipment, tools and workstations. Next, equip the space with tools and materials that allow quick experimentation, fabrication, and repair such as digital fabrication tools, hand tools, electronics etc'. Don't forget to stock on consumables such as filament, foam, fabric, cardboard and more.

In addition to the look and feel of the space, think about its function and purpose and how will it serve the local community and beyond. As a TOM workshop, prepare to serve as a local distribution hub for open-source assistive tech and as a go-to for people in the community who need affordable, innovative solutions. 

A detailed guide with more information and resources for each of the pathways can be found in the TOM Community Playbook.

Document and Share

Collect all files, notes, and media from your build/ makeathon/ workshop. If doing a Makeathon, assign a documentation lead for each project and make sure all the information is uploaded to the TOM Documentation System. If needed, run a post-event documentation sprint where each team completes the required data, including the problem addressed, bill of materias, step-by-step assembly instructions, and safety and maintenance tips.

Include clear photos, videos and sketches. Upload everything to the TOM Global Portfolio and your ChangeX project page.

Celebrate your results publicly. Share your documentation link on social media, tag TOM Global and ChangeX, and invite others to replicate your design. Publishing your work ensures local creativity contributes to global accessibility.

Grow and Sustain 

After your event or first builds, plan for continuity. Identify partners — schools, NGOs, or municipal programs — who can host regular sessions or integrate TOM activities into their missions. Develop a simple sustainability plan covering funding, storage, maintenance, and outreach.

Hold a debrief session to gather participant feedback and lessons learned. Schedule future builds or workshops and explore forming a permanent TOM Community. Encourage experienced participants to mentor newcomers and document progress.

If enthusiasm drops, maintain momentum with monthly micro-builds, repair events, or showcases. If funding runs low, leverage your open documentation and impact stories to attract local sponsors or grants. If tools wear out, organize a community “tool-drive.”

Track your impact — devices built, people involved, solutions replicated. Share these metrics on ChangeX and TOM Global. As your initiative grows, it can evolve into a self-sustaining hub of inclusion and innovation, contributing to a global effort to “repair the world.”