Community Engagement Strategies
Change always operates in both directions—people change communities
and communities change people.
~ Annie E Casey Foundation
What is Community Engagement?
The word “community” can apply to many different groups of people -- those
identified by common location, interest, fellowship, faith, government or any
other shared circumstance. For our purposes, community is whatever grouping
of people we want to “engage.”
Engagement involves action – getting engaged to be married, taking a pledge,
engaging in a work agreement, fighting or putting something in gear.
Engagement is doing something.
Community engagement is a process whereby one party (your agency or
coalition) motivates (engages) a targeted group (community) to take action, in
this case related to end-of-life issues.
Developing a Community Engagement Campaign
An engagement campaign that is driven by the needs, resources and energy of
providers or business interests is not true community engagement. Community
engagement involves the active participation of consumers and community
representatives in all facets of the campaign. Agencies contribute to community
engagement efforts, but consumers must be active participants – not simply
passive recipients.
Engaging or empowering the people isn’t as easy as it sounds. Individual people
often don’t have the time, energy, resources and/or expertise to develop and
implement an engagement campaign. Typically, service provider agencies
provide the infrastructure for community engagement campaigns.
The key to inviting participation is for the staff leading the campaign to let go of
control of some aspects of it, and let volunteers, consumers and partner
agencies participate in the design and implementation of the campaign.
Sometimes that means that the goals of the “lead agency” have to take a back
seat to the desires of the community representatives working on the campaign.
10 Keys to Success
Community engagement plans utilize the following strategies to ensure success.
Successful engagement plans:
1. Align with agency/coalition goals - The development of an
engagement plan does not happen in a vacuum – it requires goals,
Copyright 2007 by The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
information, partners, clear messages, and people to share the message
out in the community.
2. Focus on target audiences - Your engagement plan must specify how
you will engage the target audience to achieve your goal.
3. Involve key partners - Your engagement plan is strengthened when
multiple organizations support the work and promote it to their
constituencies.
4. Capitalize on existing opportunities - There are ways to capitalize on
other existing opportunities to bolster your engagement activities. Call
your partners and see if they have activities related to end-of-life care
where you could weave in the LIVE campaign materials. Also, you can
“piggyback” the LIVE campaign with other health related issues - a
calendar of national health observances is provided in this section.
5. Creatively find and use resources - Most organizations don’t have a
budget line item for community engagement. However, your organization
or coalition does have resources it can use for the campaign such as inkind donations and connections in the community that can lead to
donations. For more information about funding, go to Section VI in the
Toolkit.
6. Utilize effective and efficient channels - Successful engagement
campaigns blend several channels or methods to deliver messages, and to
reinforce one another and increase the chance of exposure.
7. Develop meaningful and memorable messages - Messages are the
core of what you tell the public about your campaign. Refer to the LIVE
‘community’ presentation for messages about the LIVE campaign in
Section III.
8. Have effective messengers - Messengers convey your message to the
public. It is important to have the “right” messenger so that your
message will be received and your audience will be engaged.
9. Pay attention to timing - Timing is everything. You’ll want to pay
attention to other activities in the community, the amount of time you
have to complete a specific aspect of your campaign and your ability to
promote and implement your events.
10. Engage naturally occurring communities – see below
Naturally Occurring Communities
Often community organizers publicize events and hope that people who care
about the issue will attend. The problem is that everyone is busy – the average
person receives hundreds of requests for their time and attention every day from
television, radio, print advertisements, email, phones and individuals. So how
can you stand out in the crowd and attract attention to your campaign?
Simply put, don’t wait for people to come to you – you must go to them. Find
groups within your community that will allow you to host an event during their
Copyright 2007 by The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
regular meeting times or in their space. In any given town or small city there
are literally hundreds of naturally occurring communities of people who come
together for a common purpose. Examples include:
 Faith communities
 Social clubs or interest groups
 Businesses – the workplace
 Residential communities
Think about the groups or communities to which you belong. Most people have
affiliations with multiple groups of people. These are people you have something
in common with – be it a faith tradition, interest in a hobby or other activity,
place of employment or geographic neighborhood. You may not know all the
people in your communities, but you may gather together at specific times for a
common purpose. These community gatherings are ideal places to ask people to
join your campaign and become involved.
Some groups or communities have a mission which involves helping others.
Many faith communities, social clubs, sororities/fraternities, and even businesses
devote time and/or money to worthwhile causes. These groups within your
community are natural places to canvass for people to become involved in the
LIVE campaign.
Resources – provided in this section
 Specific suggestions about how to implement the LIVE campaign in your
community
 A PowerPoint ‘buy-in’ presentation about the LIVE campaign to use for
your staff, board of directors or coalition members
 An Event Planning Guide and Checklist to plan a successful community
program
 A calendar of national observances to piggyback the LIVE campaign
 Statewide outreach ideas for the LIVE campaign
Additional Resources
For additional information about community outreach and engagement, go to:
 Caring Connections - www.carininfo.org - free tools and resources for
hospices, coalitions and other organizations to improve end-of-life care
 Community Toolbox - http://ctb.ku.edu/tools - practical information about
how to promote community health and development
 Tom Wolff & Associates - www.tomwolff.com – great newsletters, tip
sheets and other resources to mobilize social change in communities
 Advocacy Institute – www.advocacy.org – great website and newsletter
loaded with inspiration and tools for coalition building and collaboration
Copyright 2007 by The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization