Importance of Community Engagement in Age UK

This report discusses the importance of community engagement in Age UK, a charitable organization that provides services to the aged people facing community issues. It describes the relationship between stakeholders and strategies suitable for engagement, engagement with the help of social media platforms, different social media platforms that support the program, internal and external factors that influence community development, and more.

Engagement

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
TASK ..............................................................................................................................................3
Describe project or programme..............................................................................................3
Relationship between the stakeholders and strategies are suitable for engagement..............4
Engagement with the help of Social media platforms............................................................4
Different social media platforms that supports programme ..................................................5
Internal and external factors that influence community development...................................7
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES:...............................................................................................................................9
Books and Journals:................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Community engagement is the process where NPOs and other organisations which
focuses on increasing engagement of people in order to find out solutions of community issues. It
is identifying by many charity organisations that day by day community issues are increasing
that includes insecurity, crime, social deprivation, lack of recreational facilities, concerns about
discrimination and environmental concerns (Grobbelaar, Napier, and Maistry, 2017). That's why
it becomes necessary for people that they need to find solutions. The reason behind these issues
are increasing in competition, unemployment, illiteracy, etc. Due to this, people facing
community issues that leads to increase community engagement so that they can resolve these
issues. This report will be discussing community engagement importance in the context of Age
UK is undertaken which is the charity organisation. Age UK is the charity organisation that is
registered. They are providing services to the aged people that are facing many community
issues. This report is discussing the issues and challenges that should be resolve by taking an
necessary corrective actions.
MAIN BODY
TASK
Describe project or programme
Community engagement is defined as the process where people are ready to share their
thoughts, ideas, feelings, products, etc. They also ready to work collaboratively that includes
varieties of people that have different perception, interest, nature, feelings, thoughts, way of
work, etc. But still they are working with each other because they know that it is not possible by
one person to accomplish any task (Resnik, 2019). It also use for the purpose of well being of
people. Age UK is the charitable organisation that registered in UK which is focusing on elder
people. They found after second world war that elder people get effected due to family
breakdowns and dislocation. That's why they formed a committee which provides many services
and products to the aged people. They found that aged people need proper care and support so
Age UK helps in fundraising. Age UK is also developed a booklet for the purpose of effective
engagement of older people. They know that community issues are rising such as social
deprivation, discrimination, crime, insecurity, etc. Due to these issues they believe that
community engagement is very necessary. They found that community engagement is very

necessary for older people as they are facing loneliness that can be effectively treated with this
solution. It is the practice that promotes collaboration and coordination between people so they
can achieve their objective. Due to their programme, stakeholders get many benefits that are
mentioned below:
 They get support and advice from the members of Age UK which work like a treatment
and solutions for the aged people (Tirres, and Schikore, 2020). Day by day the family
breakdown is increasing that increase the loneliness for aged people which should be
resolved in order to stay them happy.
 They provide many advices in their programmes to the young people that they should
increase interaction with the old people so that they their loneliness can reduce.
 Social deprivation can also reduce with this programme that increasing day by day. Age
UK has a separate community engagement manager that always take care about the
involvement, communication, interaction between community and organisation. This will
beneficial to stakeholders that include members, investors, government, clients, aged
people, etc.
Relationship between the stakeholders and strategies are suitable for engagement
It is necessary for Age UK that they maintain the relationships with their stakeholders.
They believe that relationship is the key element of achievement of success. That's why Age UK
is focusing on building relationship with their stakeholders (Ashraf, 2017). In addition to this,
Age UK is building relationship between stakeholders and strategies that are crucial for
engagement of people. They found that strategies are very necessary to make in order to promote
engagement. So they find that social media platforms plays a very important role in the process
of engagement. In today's digital organisation, day by day the use of digital media is increasing
in every field so that's why Age UK is using social media platform for the purpose of effective
communication.
Engagement with the help of Social media platforms
Social media platforms are becoming the most effective tool for increasing interaction,
communication and involvement. There are many examples that shows the use of social media
platform for engaging people (Grant, and Drew, 2017). In Facebook, generally people are
interacted with their post and always get connected with each other. This shows that how much
people are trusted on social media platforms. They use social media platforms as a means so that

they can interact and communicate with other people. It becomes the most important tool for
people. Some pictures shows that how Age UK is using social media platform for the purpose of
increasing community engagement. In UK, Facebook platform is most widely used by
organisation and that's why they are continue to post on website.
The above image is taking from the Facebook account of Age UK that in which they was
awaking about the new website that launch in their company. In this way they are trying to
interact with their stakeholders (Trejo, and Lewis, 2017). It is also find out from their official
website that they are giving lessons to old aged people that they should learn about social media
apps in order to reduce the social deprivation. This is very necessary for people to know the
importance of social media platforms which are increasing day by day for the purpose of
interaction and communication. In the time of COVID-19, the use of social media platforms was
increasing and that's why Age UK providing lessons of how social media platforms can be used
by aged people.
Different social media platforms that supports programme
There are many different social media platform available in the market that promotes
collaboration, involvement, communication and interaction (Holliday, 2018). Some important
social media platforms are mentioned below:
 Facebook
 Instagram
 Twitter
 You Tube

All above mentioned platforms are stated that is currently using by Age UK for the
purpose of achievement of their goals and objectives. In the present scenario, after post pandemic
situation Age UK is trying to convince old aged people that social media platforms should be use
in order to reduce their loneliness and get updated and connected with people (Flener-Lovitt,
Shinneman, and Adams, 2019). They use mainly Facebook, Instagram and Twitter in order to
support their programmes. When they are launching any kind of programme in near future then
they publish all the details related to their project. This will show to every stakeholder who are
connected with the social media platforms. They also post many pictures and quotes in order to
support and motivate aged people. But in this process they should consider some important
points that are mentioned below:
 Interpersonal skills are very necessary in their post and pictures. That means their post on
social media platforms is able to interact with people. This is very necessary for Age UK
in order to interact with the people.
 Their posts and pictures should include professional skills and creativity in order to
improve the interaction and connectivity with the people. Professionalism should not be
forget in their content and pictures.
Benefits of Social media platforms
It is identifying that social media platforms provide many benefits to Age UK which are
mentioned below:
Community participations
Age UK is found that they get many benefits with the help of social media platform such
as promote in community participations. Day by day the importance of community participation
is becoming very necessary as they need in the process of supporting elder people (Spector, and
Leard, 017). For example, community issues such as social deprivation which refers to the
reduction of interaction between people with society. This is due to increasing in busy life as
every people want that every can generate more and more income. In this scenario, community
participations should be increasing which can be increase with the help of social media
platforms.
Collaboration
Collaboration is the key of success in which people are ready to work together for a
common purpose. In today's life, collaboration is reducing day by day that creates many

complexities for organisation as well as for personal life. Organisation is not able to achieve their
desired goals whereas personal life of an individual get depressed due to loneliness. So that's
why Age UK is using social media in order to promote collaborations.
Socio-cultural integration
Social media platforms are the best source of socio-cultural integration in which every
people get interacted and connected with each other. It maintains the social life of an individual
where they need to integrate their goals with society. For example, every person is now focusing
on earning income which is necessary definitely but they are forgetting their personal life that is
more important for them. In this scenario, social media integrated the individual goal with
personal goals.
Multiculturalism
Social media platforms are the source of meeting with different people that have different
talents, perception, thoughts, culture, language, etc. It will leads to multiculturalism which is the
synonym of diversity that is necessary in every field.
With the discussion of social media platform, it is analysed that their relationship is very
important for engaging them. This can be done with the help of building relationship between
stakeholders and strategies.
Internal and external factors that influence community development
It is identifying that community engagement practitioner should adopt a forward-looking
approach so that they can educate community members about all the factors that influence
community development. It is identifying that there are two types of factors that influence
community development such as internal and external factors (GLOCER 2017). Internal factors
are the factors that are in hand of members of Age UK. That means those factors which can be
controllable. But in the case of external factors, they are not controlling nature. Age UK needs to
take a corrective action in which they should ensure that community development can be
possible. For that purpose, they should educate their community members about internal and
external factors.
Internal factors
Internal factors are considered to all those factors which are necessary to analyse by
community members in order to reduce the negative influence. It includes all problems that are
related to the internal environment of Age UK such as members of the trust, owners,

stakeholders, etc. Sometimes conflicts are arising between stakeholders which should be solved
by community members. This can be done with the help of adopting a forward looking approach.
This approach is using in order to foresee the futuristic things in order to reduce uncertainties.
External factors
With the use of forward-looking approach, community members are able to reduce the
complexities of organisation. It is necessary for the members of community that they should
understand the dynamic nature of business environment and there are many factors that
uncontrollable. If they are able to understand the dynamic nature then they definitely achieve
their goals and objectives with the help of forward looking approach. It reduces the uncertainties
of external environment.
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded from the above discussion that community engagement become the
necessity of society due to increasing in community issues. It is necessary for an individual that
they should understand the importance of community engagement in which they have to work in
a collaborative manner. This report analysed the challenges that are facing by people in now-a-
days that include social deprivation, discrimination, lack of recreational facilities, etc. It also
gives solutions to individual and groups that how they can overcome with the challenges.

REFERENCES:
Books and Journals:
Ashraf, T., 2017. Transforming libraries into centers of community engagement: Towards
inclusion, equality & empowerment.
Flener-Lovitt, C., Shinneman, A.C. and Adams, K., 2019. Building Scientific Communication
Skills through MythBusters Videos and Community Engagement. In Communication in
Chemistry (pp. 187-203). American Chemical Society.
Grant, B. and Drew, J., 2017. Community and community engagement in Australian local
government. In Local Government in Australia (pp. 217-264). Springer, Singapore.
Grobbelaar, H., Napier, C. and Maistry, S., 2017. Reinforcing paternalism? The need for a social
justice approach to prepare students for community engagement at universities of
technology. Journal for New Generation Sciences, 15(1), pp.74-93.
Holliday, C.M., 2018. A Snapshot of Community Engagement in Research in the Context of an
Evolving Public Health Paradigm. Journal of Participatory Medicine, 10(1), p.e8939.
Resnik, D.B., 2019. Two unresolved issues in community engagement for field trials of
genetically modified mosquitoes. Pathogens and global health, 113(5), pp.238-245.
Spector, B.S. and Leard, C., 2017, May. Community engagement model for course and program
development. In Global Conference on Education and Research.
Tirres, C.D. and Schikore, M.C., 2020. Faith in Action and Community Engagement: Realizing
Mission through Immersion Experiences. Christian Higher Education, 19(1-2), pp.91-
108.
Trejo, H.X. and Lewis, T.L., 2017. Slow fashion and fiber farming: Nexus for community
engagement. Fashion Practice, 9(1), pp.120-142.