How to Conduct Equitable Community Engagement

Equitable community engagement for strategic planning, program design, and process improvement is a key factor of success. Diverse perspectives from the communities who use a program or process will help to create a solution that works and meets user needs. Conducting equitable community engagement is easier said than done, however. Here are a few tips to ensure you’re reaching all of your communities in your solution design.

Do Your Research

Data is a beautiful thing. Use census or other available population data to understand the diverse makeup of your community and how to reach them. Understanding what percent of city residents have access to the internet and a personal computer, what percent will need translation services, and what percent have access to transportation, will help you design engagement methods to best connect with all members of your community. For existing programs, review program data to see who are the highest users. Make sure those users are actively involved in your engagement sessions and feedback collection.

Stakeholder Mapping

Once you know who it is you want to reach, you need to figure out how to reach them. Low-income communities, communities of color, new Americans, and many other segments of your population may be reluctant to engage with government agencies. It’s important to be genuine and build trust with these communities. One way to do that is to work with organizations and community leaders that are already well-known and trusted. Are there community centers, non-profits, or religious institutions that your communities frequent that you can partner with for your community engagement? Can a community leader participate as a facilitator for your engagement sessions? Partner with the community organizations who have the expertise to appropriately design your sessions and reach your target audiences. 

Make It Easy

Now that you know your audience and where they already engage, make it easy for them to engage with you too. Host sessions and workshops at the organizations and places where your audience already gathers. Send out surveys on any digital platform your audiences use and have paper versions available at local community centers like libraries. Make sure your public meetings are transportation accessible or set up a transportation request for potential participants. Host events in a variety of locations around the community and at a variety of times (lunch is great for some people, evenings better for others). Provide childcare at community workshops so parents can participate even with the kids. Be sure to have translation services available and advertise your sessions on more than the city website and social media pages; you have to reach your audiences where they already communicate.

Make It Fun

I don’t know many people who are excited to go to “this month’s town hall” or come home raving about how good the public meeting was (including the officials hosting them!). Make it so your communities actually want to participate in your public engagements. Host public sessions in a workshop style, setting up stations with different activities (games, even!) for providing input. Use tools such as brightly colored sticky notes, pipe cleaners, and legos to get people’s creative juices flowing. Provide snacks and drinks if you can, and a play area for older kids. Give out prizes for the most creative ideas. Turn public meetings into an event instead of a vent session.

Follow Up     

People’s time is limited and valuable so you want to make sure they are happy they gave theirs to you and would be willing to do so again. Never forget to follow-up with the communities you engage to let them know how helpful their feedback was and what came of it. Go beyond the public announcement of the new and improved program and make your follow-up more personal. For small groups, write thank you notes to your participants. For larger efforts, go on a road show to the centers and organizations where you hosted your sessions and present on the solution they helped come up with. Be specific about how their feedback led to the end result. And if you can, don’t just do this at the end, but throughout the solution development process so your residents feel included in the design efforts.    

We hope this was a helpful look at how to conduct equitable community engagement! Still need some help? Linnett Loving works with you to design and action on strategies tailored  specifically to your needs. Reach out to learn how we can help you!