Key Seven: Involve your community
Involving your community in a serious, considered and on-going way goes far beyond just asking them what their needs are.
Making a long-term commitment to community involvement means:
- Finding ways to build and maintain relationships with key stakeholders e.g. clients, councils and charities
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Providing opportunities for on-going, two-way dialogue
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Making sure you know who is doing what in the community
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Blessing others who are also working to bless your community (see Key 9)
More below...
Learn more about the 10 Keys for impact
Truly involving your community will keep you on the right track, make
sure you continue to meet local needs and help you work with others to
deliver the very best for your community.
One of the best ways we’ve found to involve our local community is
having four refugees on our board of Directors who help to shape the
work that we do. They know what works and what doesn’t because they are
in the same position as our clients. For our schools project we trained
some pupils so they could be on the board too. 
Tricia McConalogue, Bridging the Gap
When we started one of the first things we did was try to understand all
the issues in our community like housing, schools and health care. Then
we started to form relationships with all sorts of groups and experts
who were working in those areas to make sure we were all working
together to meet those needs.
Jason Scott, Compassion
Make room for people you are working for to become people you are
working with – this ensures that we are not ‘doing’ projects to people
but engaging with them and together shaping and delivering the project.
For instance when we engage with women in prostitution we want to create
space to ask their opinion, to give them the floor, and to support them
to lead or take initiative even when it’s messy or painful.
Josephine Knowles, Beyond the Streets
If you’re serious about your project succeeding you need to take the
time to build relationships with local statutory bodies. It can mean
sitting through boring meetings but it’s vital for people to get to know
you and see they can trust you. Conversations after those meetings are
often where key relationships are built.
Barry Cheesman and Phil Herbert, Healthy Living Projects
When we started the Hope Centre we chose to have key stakeholders from
the community on the board as well as members of our church. One person
we chose was a local ward councillor and the Deputy Elected Mayor though
he wasn’t a Christian. His input and help have been invaluable and I
think of him as our ‘Cyrus’ (Isaiah 44v28 and 45v1). Our councillor has
advocated for us whenever we’ve had problems at the council and helped
us enormously; it reminds me that sometimes God uses unusual sources to
fulfil his vision. One thing to be careful of is that you make sure
others really understand you and your agenda. Don’t be like Esau and
sell your birthright for a bowl of pottage! If you’re dependent on
particular groups for funding, it can put you in a vulnerable position. Be who you are and expect God to resource your work in
unexpected ways!
Patrick Parkes, Hope Centre
‘Turning the Key’ – Additional Tips:
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Ask local businesses to support your project
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Go to meetings to build relationships with statutory bodies
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Give space for your service users to shape where the project is going
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Conduct surveys to find out how community needs are changing
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Where possible employ people who have used your service
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You won’t have all the answers yourself so keep leaflets and contact information on other relevant community organisations
Helpful resources