Transcript Introduction to Strategic Planning

Building Community
Capacity
For:
Foundations of Community Vitality Workshop
and/or Resource Packet
Presented By:
Steve Grabow, Professor and Community Development Educator
UW-Extension, Jefferson County Office
Will Andersen, Professor and Community Development Educator
UW-Extension, Iron County Office
Resource:
David G. Hinds, AICP
Professor Emeritus
University of Wisconsin-Extension
DRAFT 7/31/2014
Introduction to Building
Community Capacity
Review of…
Community Transformation
Community Capacity Model
Community Development…
• Includes the idea of transforming
communities
– Which, in turn, includes the concept of
building community capacity
3
Transforming Communities
• Development in the community
– Community is seen as a given
– Development is seen as enhancing this existing
entity
– Clearly defined outcomes, and their achievement
means success and the end of development
• Development of the community
– Enhances the social realm and the relationships
between people
– A process of interaction, communication, and
collective mobilization
– Accomplished through community action and the
purposive interaction of community members
4
Community Transformation
Occurs When a Community…
• Develops a sufficient organizational and
network base that enables effective
participation, communication, and
collaboration
• Acquires and becomes proficient in the
knowledge, abilities, skills, and tools
necessary to address successfully
challenges and achieve desired purposes
5
Community Capacity
Mancini, Martin & Bowen
• The degree to which people in a community
demonstrate a sense of shared responsibility
for the general welfare for the community and
its individual members
• The degree to which they also demonstrate
collective competence by taking advantage of
opportunities for addressing community needs
and confronting situations that threaten the
safety and well-being of community members
6
Exercise Question 1:
What are the various “communities”
that you regularly work with as an
Extension professional?
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Types of
Community Development Knowledge
• Knowledge about substantive matters of an
issue (e.g. child development, economic
development, farm management, housing)
• Knowledge about how communities are
identified and defined
• Knowledge about individuals, organizations,
and networks and how they function
• Knowledge about purposeful action strategies
(e.g. planning, learning research, evaluation,
etc.)
• Local knowledge
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The Importance of Purpose
• The concept of purpose is essential to
any successful effort
• Purpose means “intent”
• In community development purpose
means focus, decisions, and consensus
around what is to be done
• Purpose also brings content or concern
into what is to be done
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A Model for
Community Capacity
Community Environment
Community Structures
Purpose-Based Action
I. Community Environment
The capacity and ability to define
a community, describe and
understand its unique environment,
and take responsibility for
community issues and common
purposes.
Sense of Community
Chaskin
•
•
•
•
…a degree of connectedness among members and a
recognition of mutuality of circumstance
One component may be the existence of a threshold
level of collectively held values, norms, and vision
It may include both an affective dimension (including a
sense of trust, ownership, belonging, and recognized
mutuality) and a cognitive dimension (including ways
in which community members ascribe meaning to
their membership in a group)
Shared social interests and characteristics (language,
customs, class, ethnicity, etc.) can be used to define a
community
12
Community
S.A. Small & A. Supple
• …social relationships that individuals
have based on group consensus, shared
norms and values, common goals and
feelings of identification, belonging and
trust.
13
Basic Way to Define Communities
• Communities of place
– Defined geographic boundaries
• Communities of interest
– Groups of people united, cooperating, or interacting
with regard to a common topic, concern, interest, or
shared history, culture, ethnicity, etc.
• Communities of practice
– Groups of persons in a particular profession or
discipline interacting around their common interest
14
What is the nature of communities?
• Some sources say communities are forms or
structure.
• Other sources try to say they are function or
process.
• In reality, though, they are, in themselves,
neither.
• S.A. Small & A. Supple describe communities
as “setting.”
• A more generic, systems-related term is
“environment.”
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Community Environment
• Communities are not the means but the
milieu or context in which form is created
and function carried out
• Communities have unique environments
• The idea of communities should be
thought of in the broadest possible ways
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II. Community Structures
The capacity and ability to create,
manage, and maintain appropriate
community structures that
address community issues and
achieve community purposes.
Definition of Structure
Chaskin
• First he asks “Where does community capacity
reside, and how is it engaged?”
– In this sense he is viewing structure as the first part
of his definition of capacity: the idea of containing
(holding, storing)
• He answers his question by proposing that
capacity resides in three levels of social
interaction or social agency:
– The individual
– Organizations
– Networks of association
18
Forms of Community Capital
• Individuals – Human capital
• Organizations – Organizational capital
• Networks – Social capital
19
Interim Structures
• Created to accomplish short-term
purposes or as a means of creating
permanent structures
• Created at a stage in community
development when there is no need or
desire for a permanent structure
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Interim Structures - Examples
• Study committees to identify and frame
community issues
• Informal sponsor groups to gather resources for
and legitimize special projects
• Study groups to gather information and conduct
community learning
• Planning & design committees to modify or
create new community systems or propose
changes in policies
• Special task forces to investigate and correct
specific problems
21
Community Structures
• Are not part of community environment—
they are (or should be) created as a part
of a solution.
• Are form, and need to be created
following the determination of function.
• Are not what needs to be done; they are
part of how something gets done.
22
Exercise Question 2:
What are examples of “community
structures” that you work with and
what is a typical need for Extension
assistance?
23
III. Purpose-Based Action
The capacity and ability to take
appropriate actions to address
community issues and achieve
community purposes.
Purposeful Activities
• Diagnosis should lead to determining
which purposeful activity should be
pursued…
–
–
–
–
–
Learning
Research
Planning & Design
Evaluation
Operating & Supervising
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Fundamental Purposeful Activities
1. Operating & Supervising – operate and
supervise an existing solution or system
2. Planning & Design – create or restructure a
situation-specific solution or system
3. Research – search for causes, seek
generalizations, and attempt to disprove
hypotheses
4. Evaluation – evaluate performance of previous
solutions or other purposeful activities
5. Learning – gain skills and acquire knowledge
about existing information and generalizations
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Secondary Purposeful Activities
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Make a decision
Maintain a standard of achievement
Resolve a conflict
Make a model of or abstract a phenomenon
Develop creative ideas
Establish priorities
Practice and exercise
Focus and motivate individual efforts
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Skills
• A learned power of doing something
competently, a developed aptitude or
ability
• A combination of applied knowledge,
experience and learned behaviors
• Effective use involves knowing what to
do, why something is to be done, how to
do it, and also when and where to do it
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Some Important
Community Development Skills
•
•
•
•
Learning skills
Teaching skills
Leadership skills
Group membership
skills
• Listening skills
• Interviewing skills
• Diagnostic skills
•
•
•
•
Facilitation skills
Organizational skills
Analytical skills
Conflict resolution
skills
• Computer skills
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Tools
•
A tool is something used in performing an operation or
necessary in the practice of a vocation or profession.
•
“Tools are relatively small, often parts of a larger unit;
they do something; each is designed for a very specific
purpose.” Nancy Tague
•
Tools are not designed to be used singly, as ends onto
themselves. They generally do not provide any context
or sense of overall strategy.
•
Tools are most effectively used in combination, in the
context of the overall strategy.
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Examples of Tools
• Generate ideas and information
– Brainstorming, surveys, observation tools
• Organize information
– Hierarchies, diagrams, classifications
• Aid decision making
– Decision matrix, decision tree
• Analyze data
– Statistical tools, Pareto Charts
• Evaluate performance
– Pre-test/post-test analysis, performance index, surveys, focus
groups
• Enable learning
– Practice exercises, learning/study circles, systems thinking
• Involve community stakeholders
– Nominal Group Technique, Charette, World Café, public
meetings
• Manage projects
– Gantt Charts, PERT/CPM
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SUMMARY
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A Community Capacity Model
Community Capacity Elements
•
The capacity and ability to define a community,
describe and understand its unique environment, and
take responsibility for community issues and common
purposes.
•
The capacity and ability to create, manage, and
maintain appropriate community structures that
address community issues and achieve community
purposes.
•
The capacity and ability to take appropriate actions to
address community issues and achieve community
purposes.
34
Exercise Question 3:
What are ways that you have
the most impact in applying
one or more of the
purposeful activities with
community structures?
35
Exercise Question 4:
How does this Community
Capacity Model help
conceptualize capacity
building?
36
Exercise Question 5:
What are some ideas to
enhance the capacity of
community leaders and key
“communities”?
37