3 Steps to Revitalize Your Community Coalition Shelisa Howard-Martinez, Director of Community Engagement Wednesday, January 14, 2015: 10-11am

Community Coalitions

Desired Outcomes 1.3 concrete steps to revitalize your coalition 1.Promising practices for building an effective stakeholder engagement approach 1.Share collaboration tools and templates

3 Concrete Steps

1. Regularly assess your coalition Assessing your partnership at least once a year is a promising practice Opportunity for entire group to identify emerging challenges & opportunities Use the assessment design process to enhance engagement with your partners

Assessing Your Coalition 1.Focus on the functions/ types of support that you provide to your coalition 2.Ask for recommendations that will increase member engagement & not just place extra work on your plate 3.Consider using a neutral third party

2. Build-in practices and agreements Partnership/ coalition agreement: Defines how your coalition will work together Is different than bylaws or a charter All coalition partners should participate in the creation of the Agreement and adopt the Agreement in some way This agreement is a working document and should be tweaked as needed

Partnership/ Coalition Agreement Components: Guiding principles Structure Partner roles & responsibilities Decision-making process Conflict resolution

3. Develop an actionable plan for your coalition A plan that will specifically speak to your coalition’s collaboration, direction, and sustainability Strategic plan or a modified one May need third-party neutral facilitator

Stakeholder Engagement Expertise/ Perspectives EnergyRelationships

Stakeholder Mapping Who is not at the table? Think of in terms of stakeholder groups & organizations What is the approach Expertise/ Perspective Energy Relationships

Stakeholder Approach

Stakeholder Approach Process  Who within the organization is your coalition going to approach  Who is the most appropriate person from your coalition to do the approach  What are 2-3 key messages that all coalition members will use to invite in new members

Crafting Stakeholder Approach Messages  Overall purpose of your coalition - What are trying to accomplish together?  Why are you approaching the stakeholder - What do they bring to the table: expertise/ perspective, relationships, energy, that your coalition needs?  What are you asking the stakeholder to do - Become a member of the coalition, serve in advisory capacity, to bring in voices/ perspectives/ relationships that the coalition doesn’t have but needs?

Stakeholder Engagement - Orientation  Do you need a small packet?  How about hosting a lunch n learn?  Avoid frustrating existing members and/ or making your meetings appear to be inefficient to the newer ones

Tools & Templates Peer-to-peer support & learning via the HCP list serve

Questions? Shelisa Howard-Martinez, MPA Director of Community Engagement

THANK YOU!