Community Engagement: Best Practices and Approaches - Desklib

This report discusses the importance of community engagement for the welfare of society and compares the community engagement approaches of two charitable organizations. It also highlights the significance of effective communication, active stakeholder participation, and inclusion in community engagement. The report provides insights into the best practices for community engagement and the process used to achieve them.

Assessment 2
Community
Engagement

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY.............................................................................................................................3
Difference between both project and evaluate the best practices on their community
engagement approaches.........................................................................................................3
Community engagement approaches.....................................................................................4
Relationship of communication, active stakeholders participation and inclusion in
community engagement.........................................................................................................5
Process used to achieve best practices...................................................................................6
CONCLUSION..........................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES...........................................................................................................................8
Books and Journals:...............................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
In today's business environment, every organisation has the main motive to earn
profits. They are not thinking about the society which gives resources to the company. This is
the reason that there are some organisations that are not doing business for profit as they are
non-profit organisations and some of them are charitable organisations (Gilmore and et.al.,
2020). These organisations are focusing on community engagement as community
engagement is very important for the survival of people who are suffering from problems.
Community engagement is an important process that focus is on working together for the
welfare of society. In this context, Age UK Sutton will be undertaken for analysing the issues
in society. It is down independent charity that is working in Sutton. They are offering support
services to older people. This report will discuss the difference between the two projects and
evaluate the best practices of their community engagement approaches. It will also reflect the
differences according to effective communication, inclusion and stakeholder participation.
MAIN BODY
Difference between both project and evaluate the best practices on their community
engagement approaches
In the modern era, it is found that everywhere is selfishness so it is very important that
the local community is focusing on community engagement which helps to involve in the
activity for the welfare of society (Henry Akintobi and et.al., 2020). For that purpose, there
are many charitable trusts which are aiming to work together for the welfare of society. In
this context, two charitable trusts our undertaken in which one of them is Age UK Sutton and
the other one is Home-Start Sutton. The comparison between both trusts a mentioned below:
Home-Start Sutton
Home-Start Sutton is found to be a
voluntary organisation that is committed to
promoting the welfare of children and
families who are living in the London
Borough of Sutton. They are designed their
support services in order to meet the local
families and children. These volunteers are
having the experience of parenting and aim
to create a nurturing in order to connect the
Age UK Sutton
Age UK Sutton has the vision to provide an
environment in which older people are able
to feel that they belong in a community
where they are not alone. It is an
independent local charity organisation that
support older people and their family. They
do this with the help of providing services
and improving understanding of what older
people need. They are also enabling us to

local community with each and every
person. Their ethos is providing
encouragement, respect understanding based
support services to the people. During the
pandemic situation, it is identified that they
are facing many complex problems as the
services are risk assessed and become
difficult to take guidelines into account (De
Weger and et.al., 2018). That's why they
provided remote services in that
circumstance which includes home visiting,
perinatal support, outreach, etc.
hear the voices of older people as generally
it is avoided.
Community engagement approaches
It is necessary for charitable trust to increase community engagement in the society.
For that purpose, it is identified that community engagement approaches will be undertaken
for increasing collaborative working. Age UK Sutton is using many approaches for the
purpose of community engagement in which some of them are mentioned below:
Focus Groups: Focus groups is found to be an approach in which a Focus group is
encouraging work and discussion when reaching out to marginalized or smaller stakeholder
groups (Kumar and Kumar, 2020). It is identified that a focus group is found to be an
efficient way in order to use resources. It is also very helpful to identify the important issues
which can be handled very easily in a small group. It can be planned and organised in order
to reach a specific group of stakeholders.
Community meetings: It is very important to know that face to face nature events are
found to be very helpful in order to engage the community as it provides a great opportunity
to demonstrate transparency and openness in front of the shareholders. It provides an
opportunity to deliver information and able to get feedback. It is a great option for the
meeting is stakeholders and also be very useful for community outreach.
Web based engagement: In the modern era, it is identified that every day the use of
the internet is increasing and people are using online communication which includes social
media, online discussion platforms and web-based service systems (World Health

Organization, 2020). This type of communication channel is found to be important for the
purpose of increasing the engagement of the community. It is necessary to understand that
online public participation is becoming an important way in order to engage in reaching the
stakeholders. It provides convenience and flexibility for participants and encourages them
toward community engagement. It is also really helpful for collecting data from the last group
of people. To encourage reflection and discussion about topics.
Surveys: In today's time, surveys or questionnaires are found to be the most common
methods for increasing community engagement as it is used for collecting data in which
research and need to work with people and contact them (Galiatsatos and et.al., 2020). It
consists of a set of questions that are important for the purpose of understanding the needs
and wants of customers.
These are the important approaches used by Age UK Sutton in order to increase
community engagement. In the above approaches, they are using a Focus group.
Relationship of communication, active stakeholders participation and inclusion in community
engagement
Every community engagement company are focusing on implementing actions that
are always in favour of the welfare of society. It is identified that in this process, stakeholders
are playing a very important role and their engagement with the organisation is found to be
crucial for the success of the community. In that case, there are some components that need to
be included:
Effective communication is found to be one of the most important components
which are necessary for the success of any community engagement. With the help of
communication, people are able to convey their message to another person. Team members
are able to interact with people when they have good and effective communication. For the
purpose of effective communication, it is identified that is UK certain is providing training to
the members so that they are able to interact with people in an effective way. It is also very
helpful to make wise decisions (Kim, Newman and Jiang, 2020). In addition to this, it is
necessary that Age UK Sutton should understand the application of effective communication
in the community so that it will result in effective engagement of stakeholders. Stakeholders
are playing an important role in the community as they are the main player who performs
their activities in order to achieve a common goal and purpose which is always related to the
welfare of society. It is identified that stakeholder engagement can be achieved with the help

of effective communication. For that purpose, Age UK Sutton launched many campaigns
which help them to communicate with stakeholders in an effective way.
It is identified that the participation of stakeholders is very important for
community engagement but it is not an easy task as generally, stakeholders are not ready to
involve in the community engagement programs (Tan and et.al., 2022). In addition to this, it
is also identified that employees are found to be important stakeholders of the community and
participation is similarly important for making effective decisions. They are providing
communication directly to the customers and also provide good suggestions that how they
will need to live their life.
The practice of inclusion is found to be an important component that focuses on the
mutual understanding of members of the community. A community can be engaged when its
members are able to understand the importance of the practice of inclusion. Inclusion is the
key to success as it emphasizes increasing the engagement in the community and for that
purpose, the community focus on the practice of inclusion. With the help of inclusion,
making the right decisions and community will be beneficial to the result.
Process used to achieve best practices
It is important to understand that each and every organisation should perform their
work in an efficient and effective manner than only they are able to achieve their goal send
object is for the welfare of society (Tajvidi and Tajvidi, 2020). In the case of Age UK Sutton,
the stages are mentioned below which they used for achieving best practices:
 Starting with research is found to be the first and former system in which a company
is focusing on conducting research. In this research, it is necessary for the member of
a group needs to work together and understand and analyse the market in which they
are able to understand what the problem of society is. This is really very helpful for
identifying the issues of society.
 The second established community mapping which is found to be an important
section that needs to understand by each and every community (Kakuhikire and et.al.,
2021). It is identified that Age UK Sutton needs to create a map of persona in a
systematic manner so that they are able to identify the issues and problems and
effectively able to place them on the map. This will help in making the right decisions
and taking action in order to improve and resolve the issues. For that purpose, they
also need to give priorities.

 Social media engagement is becoming an important channel that is able to increase
community engagement. It is identified by charitable organisations that the use of
social media is increasing every day and it becomes necessary for each type of
organisation to use social media for the purpose of community engagement. Every
people is now connected with social media so it becomes very easy for charitable
organisations to connect with society (Singh, Mehra and Sikes, 2021). This is the
main reason that social media engagement is found to be crucial for maintaining
regular communication.
 The next step is monitoring performance which is found to be the most important
stage. In this stage, it is identified that performance measurement is becoming
necessary for the charitable organisation so that they can understand whether they will
be able to achieve goals in objective or not. It is also identified that Age UK Sutton is
currently focusing on monitoring the gap which the field during the conversation with
their clients and monitoring the performance of their team members so that they can
understand the reason. It is really very helpful for achieving the best practices.
These are the above steps that are necessary for making the best practices and
implementing them in the organisation in order to enhance community engagement (Johnston
and Lane, 2018). It is crucial for a charitable organisations to perform their practices in such a
way so that they are able to achieve their aims and objectives.
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded from the above discussion that committing engagement is very
important in every society as it performs duties for the welfare of society. This report
discussed the comparison of two charitable Organisations in which it is analysed that
community engagement is the activity which both of them is performed in different ways.
But they have a common goal to achieve their objective. This report also discussed
community engagement strategies that are necessary for the success of any charitable
organisation. It also discusses the relationship between communication, inclusion and active
stakeholder participation in community engagement.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals:
De Weger, E., and et.al., 2018. Achieving successful community engagement: a rapid realist
review. BMC health services research, 18(1), pp.1-18.
Gilmore, B., and et.al., 2020. Community engagement for COVID-19 prevention and control:
a rapid evidence synthesis. BMJ global health, 5(10), p.e003188.
Henry Akintobi, T., and et.al., 2020. Community engagement of African Americans in the era
of COVID-19: considerations, challenges, implications, and recommendations for
public health. Preventing chronic disease, 17, p.E83.
Johnston, K.A. and Lane, A.B., 2018. Building relational capital: The contribution of
episodic and relational community engagement. Public Relations Review, 44(5),
pp.633-644.
Kakuhikire, B., and et.al., 2021. Correlates of attendance at community engagement meetings
held in advance of bio-behavioral research studies: A longitudinal, sociocentric
social network study in rural Uganda. PLoS medicine, 18(7), p.e1003705.
Kim, G., Newman, G. and Jiang, B., 2020. Urban regeneration: Community engagement
process for vacant land in declining cities. Cities, 102, p.102730.
Kumar, J. and Kumar, V., 2020. Drivers of brand community engagement. Journal of
Retailing and Consumer Services, 54, p.101949.
Singh, V., Mehra, B. and Sikes, E.S., 2021. Agriculture-based community engagement in
rural libraries. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science,
p.09610006211015788.
Tajvidi, R. and Tajvidi, M., 2020. The growth of cyber entrepreneurship in the food industry:
virtual community engagement in the COVID-19 era. British Food Journal.
Tan, R.K., and et.al., 2022. Digital approaches to enhancing community engagement in
clinical trials. npj Digital Medicine, 5(1), pp.1-8.
World Health Organization, 2020. Risk communication and community engagement (RCCE)
readiness and response to the 2019 novel coronaviruses (2019-nCoV): interim
guidance, 26 January 2020.