Community Engagement: Approaches, Stakeholder Participation, and Best Practices

This report discusses community engagement approaches, the role of communication and active stakeholder participation, and the process used to achieve best practices. It also compares the programs of Age UK and similar organizations. The report emphasizes the importance of engaging stakeholders and tracking staff performance to operate more efficiently and achieve best practices.

2 Community
Engagement

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Community engagement approaches......................................................................................4
Role of communication, active stakeholders participation and inclusion in community
engagement.............................................................................................................................5
Process used to achieve best practices...................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8
Books and Journals.................................................................................................................8
Online.....................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Community engagement includes the working together to serve society. It is important to
first know about the problems that the society is facing and then making efforts to solve the
issue. It is necessary to know about the interest of society. There are so many changes that these
communities solve (Adhikari, Pell and Cheah, 2020). This report is based on Age UK. It is a
registered trust that works to support old people. They work to enhance the digital skills of old
people and to reduce the loneliness and live happily. This report is includes comparison of
programmes of Age UK and similar organisation. There are some approaches that are used by all
these organisations to serve the stakeholders in an effective manner. It is important for an
organisation to understand the importance of communication, as well as of active stakeholders is
also discussed in this report. There are some steps that are followed by the communities in order
to achieve best practices. As the main aim of community is to help the society and this report is
based on the same.
MAIN BODY
Each and every community works for welfare of society. The charitable trusts work to
accomplish the goals and objectives with collaboration (Martinez and et.al., 2020). There are so
many stakeholder and all they play an important role in success of organisation. The main work
that is carried on by these communities is called as programmes and projects undertaken by
them. They work by conducting proper research and analysing all the points to take suitable
actions. The comparison among the programs of Age UK and Friends of the Elderly.
 Age UK: It is working to provide various services to the old people. It is seen that they
provide exercise classes, digital and IT training, Foot care, home help as well as dementia
support to the old people (Age UK, 2020). They want that to enhance the lifestyle of old
people and help them. The focus is to provide all type of support to them. It is seen that
all this is necessary to remove loneliness and problems from their life.
 Friends of the Elderly: The organisation focuses on providing home like environment to
old age people. They provide residential care so as to provide the, felling like home, care
against dementia, nursing and other services. It is important so that old people are also
able to work effectively and achieve success and growth.

Community engagement approaches
It is important to engage the stake holders that will help to take effective initiatives. It is
seen that approaches help the community to achieve the objective and solve the issues that come
across. There are various resources that are used by the communities in order to gauge the
stakeholders and achieve goals and objectives.
First of all there is dispersion related to the approaches that are used by age UK:
Community meetings: these meetings can be defined as face-to-face opportunity given to all the
stakeholders. All the issues are discussed openly and with full transparency (Brunton and
et.al.,2017). It helps to take wise decisions and encourage other peoples at the same time. They
are able to analyse the available information and gather feedback to take the further steps.
Web based engagement: it is another approach that is used by age UK. It helps to reach and
engage more stakeholders through using online communication platforms like web social media
online discussion platforms etc. It helps to reach large number of people and collect more data
using effective ways (Lin and et.al., 2020). This approach is flexible and convenient for the
participants and there is no problem of time or location. It provides opportunity to take complex
decision within the available span of time and improve the outcomes.
The Friends of the Elderly also uses some approaches to operate in an effective manner
and they are also discussed below:
Focus group: this approach is used to encourage the discussion among the stakeholders. The
group is active and discussed the solution. The problems are told to them and they work to find
the solution. Each and everything is planned and done in an organised manner to the reach the
stakeholders and development. There are various branches of conflicts that may arrive among the
members.
Surveys: the conduct various service in which the questions asked are generally objective type
so that people are ready to respond to them. Through this method you are able to collect data
related to large number of people and compare the results with another and previous information
(Rine and Quiñones, 2020). Quick and effective responsive can be taken out in order to achieve
goals and objectives in an effective manner. Better decision making and action can be taken
within limited time by using this approach.

Role of communication, active stakeholders participation and inclusion in community
engagement
It is important to emphasise that community engagement includes all actions made by
members in the interest of society. Every stakeholder has a specific job to play, and involving
them in the organisation is critical to the community's success.
Communication is a two process and there is need of effective interaction so as to engage
the stakeholders. Each and every organisation needs proper communication. To help the society
and solve their problem, it is necessary to talk to them in an effective manner (Johnston and
et.al., 2018). It is seen that by communication all their problems can be understood and known to
the people. There are so many people that are unable to share the issue that they are facing and
at the same time some don’t want to disclose. But Age UK directly contacts them and tries to
identify the issue faces by them. This is helpful to know about their needs and problems. This is
necessary to take effective decisions by community and to engage more and more people.
Stakeholders include all the people that have stake in the organisation. It is necessary to
have active stakeholders. If the community is able to know about the issue at the time is happens
they are able to resolve it at earliest. It is seen there are different ways that are used by Age UK
to engage the stakeholders and to let them participate in meetings. This ensures the success of
organisation and leads to good and desirable results. To make effective decisions, community
stakeholders and their participation are required. Employees should also be involved in decision-
making. They have direct contact with customers and can provide effective recommendations.
Employees work hard to attain the goals and objectives in a timely and efficient manner
(Reynolds and Sariola, 2018). The stakeholders participate in the campaigns and help to develop
them. These stakeholders provide solution to all the issues that the community may face. For
members and other stakeholders to understand each other practice of inclusion is important.
People have good and positive relationships with one another, and their job is done to benefit the
community (Gilmore, and et.al., 2020). It's vital to remember that this is accomplished by
considering the interests of all parties. It assists in the making of sound decisions and the
development of a community and society as a whole.
Process used to achieve best practices
These communities work with their full efforts and to achieve the social welfare. They
analyse the market and want to who developed the same. All the communities want to achieve

the best practice that is beneficial for more and more people. As discussed above age UK is a
registered charitable trust that wants that the old people do not face any issue at the time of
covid-19 and for that purpose they have trained them and develop the digital skills (World
Health Organization, 2018). It is one of the best practices the community has been indulged in so
that they are able to interact with each other. So for this purpose they take some steps and that
are discussed below:
Research: Research means knowing the current situation by analysing the market. So the
age UK believes in conducting a proper research about the condition of market. The organisation
tries to identify the issues with their team and then note them. It is a lengthy process and there is
need of active team members to analyse the information that us gathered from the market
(Brown and et.al, 2019). It is most vital step that helps the community to take wise actions that
are favourable for them as well as for the society
Community Mapping: In the next stage each and every point is noted. It becomes
important to map each and every work in a systematic manner. This enables them to recognise
the difficulties and issues that the society is experiencing and to take steps to address them. The
priority areas are determined, and the organisation works to attain the goals and objectives by
focusing on them. An organisation that is able to map the work and conduct research properly
will achieve success.
Engagement through social media: Here is the role of social media. It is time of
digitalisation and to spread awareness social media is a good platform. They community used
platforms like Instagram, Facebook and You Tube to reach the people. There are so many people
that get engaged due to social media. It is the right platform in today’s time that helps to engage
the people around. They are able to communicate on regular basis and achieve success.
Monitor performance: It is the last but not the least step. This helps to know about the
work that is done by employees (Smith and et.al., 2019). All the members work together and
with their full efforts to achieve goals and objectives but they have to face certain issues that may
lower down their performance. So the community is able to know about the problems and then
they take corrective measures for the same.
If all these steps are carefully followed then the community is able to achieve the best
practices. Above discussed are some of the actions that community takes in order to meet its
goals and objectives. To conduct future outcomes, proper study and mapping are required.

Engaging stakeholders and tracking staff performance at the same time allows them to operate
more efficiently and achieve best practises.
CONCLUSION
From the above report, it is concluded that community engagement are doing good
activities. All the activities that they are indulged in will benefit the society. It is necessary to
motivate them and help them in best possible manner. There are so many people that come
together and want to work for the benefit of society. There are so many issues around and these
communities take actions to solve them and help the people. As nowadays older people have to
face various issues and Age UK is working to solve them. They do various projects and
programs that are for the benefit of these old people. So, in the report there is discussion related
to the programs undertaken by them and are also compared with other charity organization in
UK. Along with that it is analysed that these organisations have their own approach to engage
the stakeholders. So the approaches are also discussed in the report. Each and every organisation
has its own way of dealing and planning. That shows the approaches used by them are also
different from each other. But it is necessary to choose the right approach and then use the same
to achieve success. The use of social media and web based approach is helpful for the
organisation. There is important role of communication, active stakeholders in community
engagement. In the end these is discussion related to best practices of the community and the
actions taken by them to achieve the same. The steps that are followed by the organisation are
helpful as they assist in knowing about the market and then working to monitor the performance
of employees. Which helps to know about the gaps and then taking measures to fill them and
achieving success.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Adhikari, B., Pell, C. and Cheah, P.Y., 2020. Community engagement and ethical global health
research. Global Bioethics, 31(1), pp.1-12.
Brown and et.al., 2019. Community engagement to address cancer health disparities: a process
EVALUATION using the partnership self-assessment tool. Progress in community
health partnerships: research, education, and action, 13(1), pp.97-104.
Brunton and et.al.,2017. Narratives of community engagement: a systematic review-derived
conceptual framework for public health interventions. BMC Public Health, 17(1), pp.1-
15.
Gilmore, and et.al.,2020. Community engagement for COVID-19 prevention and control: a rapid
evidence synthesis. BMJ global health, 5(10), p.e003188.
Johnston and et.al., 2018. Episodic and Relational Community Engagement. The handbook of
communication engagement, p.169.
Lin and et.al., 2020. Community engagement approaches for Indigenous health research:
recommendations based on an integrative review. BMJ open, 10(11), p.e039736.
Martinez and et.al., 2020. Community engagement to implement evidence-based practices in the
HEALing Communities Study. Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 217, p.108326.
Reynolds, L. and Sariola, S., 2018. The ethics and politics of community engagement in global
health research.
Rine, P.J. and Quiñones, S., 2020. Doing Justice, Loving Kindness, Walking Humbly: Christian
Approaches to Community Engagement.
Smith and et.al., 2019. Science Community Engagement Best Practices: a white paper from the
observatory best practices/lessons learned series.
World Health Organization, 2018. Risk communication and community engagement
preparedness and readiness framework: Ebola response in the Democratic Republic of
Congo in North Kivu.
Online
Age UK, 2020. [online] Available Through: <https://www.ageuk.org.uk/>