0 How Community Groups Work

Last Monday I explored what community groups do.  Today, how do they work?  First, some terminology.  It is easy to be self-deceiving.

What is the difference between neighbourhood and community?  Neighbourhood is a geographical area and the people who live there are residents, not “the community”.  “The community” is a fiction; nobody represents “the community” because it does not exist.

One example of how this can impact an organisation is the idea every resident belongs to your community group because they live in the neighbourhood.  This implies the group represents the views of people who don’t take part and may not even know it exists!

Residents must have a right not to be a member and to refuse to be co-opted to the community group’s plans.  With a constitution this can be easily covered by defining a member.  Groups can charge for membership but it is often someone who signs up to a mailing list.  These days this should be an email list.  If people sign up at meetings it is essential they understand their email address will be added to an email list, if they declare it.

Using an Email List

An email list is a good way to penetrate a neighbourhood.  People on the list can forward a link to the group’s website, so recruiting more members.  A big list can remind people of forum meetings and may be more effective than leaflets through the door, so long as you design an effective sequence of emails.

Link your list to a Facebook page and you have a simple online forum that can support the group’s meetings.  Quarterly meetings supported by online media plus specialist groups meeting between them can work well.  Remember though the strength of community groups is meetings where issues can be debated and consensus sought.  You can’t do this properly online, although I’d be delighted to hear of examples where an online forum has worked.  (A free lunch is particularly helpful but can’t be delivered online.)

These are foundations for good practice and if you want to meet one or more of the three objectives in my last post, you must get these basics right.

Do you have examples of local groups using online media?

0 Asset-based Planning, Research and Negotiation

If you subscribe to this blog, you used to receive an email sequence about Real Community Development.  This Monday I referred to a model I use in the sequence, about three roles of community groups; representation, planning and delivery.  Mark Woodhead has responded to my email about planning (number 10 in the sequence).

You are quite right about different organisations having their own plans. However, they ought to be willing to take local residents’ plans seriously. I encourage local people to take approaches to developing their own plans that are participatory and empowering – approaches such as participatory appraisal/participatory learning and action, and Planning for Real. Yes, think about how you are going to present the plan, but also, at an earlier stage, think carefully about how you put the plan together, in a way that gives a voice to quiet/marginalised people and not just to people who are articulate or just plain loud. Tony Gibson, who invented Planning for Real, summed up such an approach in the words ‘eyes down, hands on, rubbing shoulders, a lot less big mouth’.

While there is some truth in saying ‘you won’t have a lot of money or assets compared with other partners’, it is nonetheless worth taking some time to think about or to discover what assets you do have in your neighbourhood, paying particular attention to such things as skills, local knowledge, experience, and networks. These are assets. Use them. Value them. See, for example, The Asset-based Community Development Institute.

Two Stages to Community Planning

There are always two stages to community planning. The local plan is a small part of it, although central to community development work.

1. Each potential partner (local authority, NHS, police, businesses, etc) prepares their own plans. This must include local residents if they are to play a meaningful role in community planning.  This is a research stage and for local planning as Mark says it should include participatory methods. This means voices not normally heard are able to make their contribution.  If the local plan shows who has contributed, it has more credibility.
2. In my email I dwell on the second negotiation stage. Here the various groups get together and work out an agreed community plan.

Take care you don’t confuse these stages.  Mark’s emphasis on stage one is important.  If it is under-resourced the chances are the local plan will lack credibility.  Other plans from the agencies are likely to cover a larger area, such as the local authority area. So they will not solely focus on the assets within the neighbourhood.  So, the plan can be promoted on the grounds that it has those assets.

But most people seem to use the word “assets” to mean buildings (which are often liabilities) and not the skills, experience,  knowledge and relationships of local residents.  So, you see a well researched local plan brings something of great value to the negotiations.

I would love to hear about your experiences developing this type of plan and especially if you used online resources to help with the research.  A major issue is exclusion of people who are not online.  How do you make sure this does not happen?

1 Set Up Your Content Management System

Once you have chosen your domain name, the next step is to set up your content management system (cms).  Your web designer or consultant may have a cms they favour.  You need to check out a few things about it.

1. Will it be easy to change to another designer in the future?  If the cms is something your designer has sole access to or it’s not well-known, a change may be difficult.  There may be a number of reasons you will need to change designer and not all of them because you lose faith in your designer.  Ultimately you need to know you control your site.
2. Is the cms likely to be around for the foreseeable future?  If it belongs to a company, how likely is it the company will be around in a few years?
3. What are the costs for now and in the future?
4. How easy will it be to add content yourself?
5. What if you wish to extend your site’s functionality ?  Are you confident you will be able to extend it in five years time?

WordPress

I recommend WordPress because it is open source (which means it is not dependent on a single company) and offers you loads of potential functionality.   It is well-known should you need help from other sources after your contract with your designer is over.

For the rest of this series I shall assume you are using WordPress.  The next question is WordPress.org or WordPress.com?

If you have a designer, then opt for .org because it has extended functionality.  WordPress.com is really a blog; if you are on your own it is easier to set up but doesn’t have the potential for expansion of .org.  You can assign your domain name to it.

Your designer will help you purchase a host and domain name for your site if you choose .org.

Remember if you take this route you will need to renew your host and domain name, usually once a year. Failure to do this will jeopardise your site.  Some designers look after your site for you but remember you may have difficulties if you want to change designer in the future.

Remember to discuss these issues with your designer before s/he makes a start.

What cms do you use?  Do you have a cms other than WordPress you recommend?  Why?

2 Four Models of Consultancy: Cases

What is the difference between a problem and a case?  A case is a problem handled in a different way.  A problem is shared with other organisations; it emerges from practice and resists ready solutions.  Cases are problems with a history; stories about someone’s failure.  For this reason, there is usually a worker at the core of a case.  Usually the story is about broken relationships.

Whilst there may be a technical fix, with a case it’s likely the problem is about personalities and relationships.  This is why I’ve put cases as fourth in this sequence.  If an organisation is having serious relationship problems, it is unlikely they would call on a web consultant to help resolve them!

However, the four models are not static.  A consultant called in to help with a situation, project or problem may realise they have a case.  They must find out what the case is and respond accordingly.

If there is a case, the web consultant may need to deal with it.  It may not initially be clear there is a case that prevents a website from being successful, but once it becomes clear someone has to deal with it.  Even if the web consultant can’t cope, they should at least be able to recognise a case and suggest how the consultor might deal with it (presumably by seeking help elsewhere).  If the web consultant is able to discuss the case, so much the better.

How to Approach Cases

There are three purposes to tackling a case:

1. The main purpose is to discover the action the consultor needs to take to discuss the specific situation.
2. It helps to clarify what needs to be considered.  This is sometimes called “the authority of the situation”.  Whatever the text books say, some situations need to be addressed before you can get on with the work.  They demand a response and progress is not possible until there is a response.
3. Discover how the consultor can do things better and become a better worker.

Note how none of this is necessarily anything to do with the organisation’s web presence.  A web consultant must understand  sometimes the issues that need to be addressed are offline.

So, how do you tackle a case?  There are 6 stages in any consultation about a case.  These conversations can get out of hand because there is often a lot of emotion sloshing around.  So, you both, consultant and consultor, need to return to these steps and work out which ones you’ve done and which you still need to discuss.

How to Resolve and Learn from a Case

1. Get a clear statement of the case story.  The consultor needs to tell the story about what happened in a disciplined and structured way.
2. Define the overall change for the worst and for the better.  Compare things as they were at the start and end of the consultor’s story.  This defines what went wrong.
3. Diagnose where the consultor went wrong and the steps the consultor could have taken for the better.   Now you need to define how the consultor contributed to what went wrong.  This should be specific and explore the things the consultor might have done.
4. Assess the strengths and weaknesses of the current working situation and the implications for the consultor.  This lays the groundwork for the next step.  The strengths are important for the consultor’s morale as well as possible foundations for the action steps.
5. Work out the action the consultor can take.  You need to analyse the pros and cons of possible actions for this consultor in this situation.  Each action is not simply doing something; when, where and how the consultor does it is important.  You need to consider all the likely outcomes of any action.  Don’t assume the proposed action will work – what happens if it doesn’t?
6. Learn as much as possible about the case so that the consultor can improve their performance in the future.  This can help the consultor in future situations.

I haven’t gone into a lot of detail here but hopefully this overview will help you know when you have a case.

Can you think of instances online where you or someone else would benefit from this type of help?

0 Your Relationship with Your Subscribers

This is the last in a series of five posts about promoting your website locally.

When people visit your site they will join your email list if they find your site content of  helpful.  So, you need to focus  on your offer to your subscribers.

You can offer additional material through an email sequence, email broadcasts or downloads (perhaps in a password protected part of your site).  Some sites charge and others offer content for free.  Offering free material to subscribers encourages them to join your email list.  This means you can tell them when you add new material to your site.

If visitors can comment then it is worth notifying your email list when there is something new to share.  Other reasons may be you want to recruit visitors to a cause or sell them a product or service.

Good content is also a reason for other sites to link to yours.  If people link their site to yours, this increases its chances of showing up in a search.  Links to pages and blog posts increase the online presence or authority of your site.  As more people visit your site, they are likely to sign up to your list.

Resist the temptation to link back to these sites unless you really want to recommend their content.  Reciprocal links have a mutual advantage as both sites experience increased traffic.  However there are two disadvantages to reciprocal links.  First, search engines ignore them because closely related sites often have this arrangement.  Also, if you have many miscellaneous links for no reason other than misguided politeness your site will become cluttered.

Take a back-link to your site as a complement, by all means acknowledge it and thank the people  who set it up but only return the favour where it will really help.

That completes my suggestions for now about increasing local traffic to your website.  There are more ways than the ones I’ve touched upon and I’ll return to the topic from time to time.  If you have any ideas, do share them in the comments.  This is a fascinating area and it would be good to build up a resource of ideas, especially ones that can be shown to work!

2 What Community Groups Do

Last Monday, I wrote about churches within the community sector, which is a part of the third sector.  Today I write about the role of community groups in the third sector.

Community groups can be even more diverse than churches.  When residents find common cause, they seek recognition by other agencies as a group.  Recognition is essential to the success of community groups and so they often form alliances with statutory or voluntary sector agencies.

The reason for statutory and voluntary sector alliances is usually outputs because funding bodies often set working with the community as a condition.  I’m sure this can work but funding can skew objectives and community groups need to be alert to the dangers of mission creep, where someone else’s funding body overwhelms their objectives; this possibility increases when a community group applies for its own funding.

A Community Development Model

You can find in my sequence about community development a community development model, with three objectives.  Whatever the concerns a community group has, they find their activities fall under these headings.

1. Representation – as a group develops, it needs to show it represents the views of most residents and not a small group of activists.  There’s nothing wrong with being a small group of activists, it can be very effective; just don’t claim to be something you are not.  Do you wish to campaign or to be a forum to express local views?  Citizens’ Organising is one approach that combines both.  Sadly it has not taken root in the UK.
2. Planning –  If you seek to influence service delivery in your neighbourhood, you need a community plan.  Statutory and professional voluntary organisations will welcome you onto their committees but don’t care if you don’t have your own plan.  I’ve never seen the point of sitting on a committee where everyone else has a plan but you don’t.  You are simply endorsing their plans; you need a mandate.
3. Delivery – some groups take on service delivery.  It’s usually best to separate delivery from representation.  If you don’t, it means the representative group may be competing for funds with its members.  Also, as the delivery arm becomes more like a voluntary sector organisation; accountability is sometimes easier if it’s arm’s length from the representative group.

I like to see independent campaigning organisations working locally. The need for funding inevitably leads to control of the agenda by funding bodies.  This leads to an ethos of control where communities cannot make a real difference to local policy.

What is your experience?  Can you share stories of campaigns where community groups have brought about real change?

0 Website Review 1: Building Effective Community Ventures

You may need to check a few previous posts to catch up with what this is about:

The image on the right is the home page of the site I’m reviewing.  The reason it’s there is if the site owners find my comments they might change the site!  I shall mainly comment on the home page for this reason!  If you click on the image it will open up and click again to get to full size.

The Association of Bridge Building Churches owns the Building Effective Community Ventures  website.  I was marginally involved with this group a few years ago but have no ongoing involvement with it.  My interest is in the site as a learning opportunity and I hope my comments will be found to be constructive.

The site has a domain authority of 11, which is not brilliant.  It has a few backlinks and is recognised by Google.  This site resources owners of a manual and so it is perhaps not essential it is easy to find.  However, if they wish to sell the manual through the site, they may need to do more work to raise its profile.

Site Structure

Appearance

The site uses a free CSS template and a link can be found at the bottom of the page.  It is a basic site and this has a lot to recommend it.  The background is a single tone of blue and the central column is black text on a white background.  This enhances readability and reduces distractions.  The header has an attractive image although the text is perhaps not so easy to read.  There is a mysterious box on the left with the word “Contacts” in it.

Navigation

The navigation is easy to follow although I do find it irritating when the top item (capitalised) in the drop down menu is the same as the item in the main menu.  The visitor has to check that both target the same page.  The last item in the “Interest Areas” menu is incomplete and so it is not clear what it is.  If you click on it, you arrive on a page without a heading.  The page is not very helpful and I found more useful information on this theme elsewhere on the site.  This leads me to think the navigation perhaps needs to be checked by someone familiar with the site.  The header does not include a link to the home page.

Clutter

The site is not at all cluttered.  Each page seems to have one topic.  In this sense the site works very well.  Overall the content needs to be reviewed, as I think the site might benefit from losing a few pages.

Site Content

Market

The market seems to be people who purchase the manual, who can access to more material.  The second paragraph on the home page lists the people expected to take an interest.

Purpose

Similar to many (most?) church-related sites, the first heading reads “Welcome”.  It is a h2 heading and I’m not sure what has happened to the h1 heading.  The word “welcome” should be banned.  Why?

The first paragraph does not really include a benefit for the visitor.  If they are setting up a project they need to be told how this site will help them!

Overall the copy on the first page could focus on how the site will help the visitor.  The copy focuses on what the website offers, with links to pages.  It would be better to say “If you want to know x, then try page y.”

Call to Action

The biggest weakness of this site is that it is not very clear what it wants the visitor to do.  Is its main purpose to add value for owners of the manual, or to persuade visitors to purchase the manual?  I would have a clear means, perhaps in a sidebar, to register or sign up for the extras.

Then I would sell the manual from the home page.  As it stands if you click on the link below the heading “The Workbook” you go to a sales page which then links to an external site called Fast Print Publishing, which you have to search to find the manual.  I couldn’t remember the name of the manual and so I think many visitors would give up at this point.

I don’t have the space to analyse the sales pitch for the manual except to say it could be better.

Neglect

Finally, whilst there is nothing on the site to suggest it is not up-to-date, equally there is nothing on it to suggest it is!  Is this a current project or was it abandoned several years ago?  There is a 2014 date in the footer, which suggests it is still current.  However the comments page and blog (do they mean biogs?) are not dated.  If you’re not signed up, you can’t access the Forum and so it is hard to tell if it is active.

Verdict:  The site has some strengths but would benefit from a clearer purpose and some evidence of activity.  Like many sites in this sector, most of the issues are to do with content and not the site’s structure.

Do you agree?  Leave your comments about this site here.

1 On the Naming of Sites

Last Thursday I introduced a sequence about how to manage your website designer or consultant as they help you develop your site.  An early decision, in any new relationship with a designer, is the naming of sites.

So, you know what you want from your new web presence and you’re planning to set up a website?  Don’t let your designer name the site – it is your decision.

Your aim is to choose a domain name, the address visitors type into their browser to find your site.

So, here are some things to consider:

Don’t forget you hire domain names and pay a fee every year.  They’re not terrifically expensive, usually under £15 and the extensions make a bit of a difference.  And don’t forget to renew it – if you don’t want to lose your site!

Website domain name disasters – any offers?  Examples of where things have gone wrong, that we can learn from might be helpful.

2 Four Models of Consultancy: Problems

This is the third post about four models of consultancy.  This post introduces the four models.

What is a problem?  You may hit a problem when developing a project.  Perhaps a good question to ask is: what prevents you from addressing the problem?  If it is a technical issue, why are you unable to resolve it?  Sometimes organisations would rather ignore a problem than deal with it.  However, many find that actively tackling a problem can be very rewarding.

Intractable problems are often shared with other groups.  The way your organisation works may be the solution to your problem and other groups often share similar issues.  Comparing experiences can bring insights and new approaches to an old problem.

I shall illustrate this consultancy model with the problem of an out-of-date website.  Many groups experience this and if they ignore it, the problem becomes worse.

Six Helpful Questions

1. What is the problem?  Defining the problem often helps!  An out of date website may have several causes and working out which apply to you may not be easy.  Is the problem an inaccessible content management system?  Or is it a lack of people who understand the cms?  What is the problem behind the problem?  Are you sure you are analysing the right problem?
2. What have you tried so far?  Listing the various attempts might be frustrating but it is helpful to recall previous attempts to resolve the problem.  If more than one group is experiencing the problem, they may find sharing past attempts  an inspiration.  Someone else’s failure might just work for your group!  This question may uncover problems met when dealing with the problem.  You need to build up a picture of the impact the problem is having not only on the website but on your organisation.
3. What specific change does your client desire and why?  So, what is the point of solving this problem?  How will solving the problem bring about the changes you want to see?
4. What are the causes and sources of the problem we need to examine?  By now the causes and sources should be clearer, summarise them and see whether you can nail the root of the problem.  Understanding can lead to insights into how to approach a problem in the future.  Note there will be historic causes, based upon decisions made in the past, eg the choice of CMS may be one reason site maintenance is difficult.  Other causes tend to sustain the problem in the present.  Why does this continue to be a problem?
5. What are we going to do about it?  The consultor must own the solution.  It should be specific and practical.  The problem will need to be monitored and reviewed to see whether it is in fact working.
6. What are we learning from our study of this problem?  This question can help you get a different perspective on the problem.  Asking this helps you take a step back and review the whole picture.

Be Problem-Conscious

Problems can be intractable and one reason is a problem-centred approach.  This can result in a negative approach where  allocation of blame becomes the main approach.  It is better to be problem-conscious, aware of the issues or difficulties faced and taking a developmental approach to resolving them.  Whilst planning is always helpful, it is often found that taking action and evaluating the outcomes is effective.  If you have analysed causes and sources, really understand the problem, then you are more likely to see opportunities as they arise from your activities.

Have you ever been stuck and then found a creative resolution to your problem?

1 Manage your email list

This is the fourth in a series of five posts about promoting your website locally.

Lots of organisations have email lists and in the community sector they’re often kept in a spreadsheet or distribution list.

This is not sustainable.  As your list grows in size, your Internet Service Provider will think you’re spamming because you’re sending a few hundred emails at once.   Also if you are going to send a lot of emails, recipients should be able to unsubscribe.

So, you need to manage your list!  The big advantage is once you have a list, you can grow your followers.  As people sign up to your site, you alert them to new material as you put it on the site, remind them about events and offer products or services.  This blog has an email service and if you look below, you will see a sign-up form that links directly to an email service.  I don’t need to think about it, as the service does everything for me.  Sign up to see how it works.  You receive a weekly summary of this blog and an email sequence about community development.

You can do this through an email subscription service, where you can manage more than one list, whilst confident you are fulfilling the requirements of the law and etiquette.

Some Email Services

If your organisation has a limited budget there is a good deal with MailChimp.  They allow you can have up to 2000 subscribers free of charge and you can send a maximum of 12 000 emails per month.  However, you can’t sequence your emails with the free offer and once you go over the limits it is marginally more expensive than other similar services.  So, go for this if you expect to stay small and just want to send newsletters and occasional emails.

AWeber charge from the start but they’re a little cheaper than MailChimp and include email sequences from the lowest prices.  This is probably the best service for medium to large lists, particularly if you expect to expand your activities.

Both services provide loads of guidelines about how to get the best out of them.  They generally simplify your lists and so they are worth exploring.

There are other email list services and you might want to check them out before you make a final decision.

Do you use an email service in the voluntary or community sector?  What offers do you make to your subscribers?