Community Organization, Social Work skills, Working with Communities.

1. Social Work 440
Community Change and
Planning

2. Planned Change Process
Engagement Engaging stakeholders
Assessment Environmental assessment/scan
Planning Develop plan in group
Implementation Who will carry out what tasks
To implement plan
Evaluation Think about ways to evaluate
your project-report on outcomes
Closure How will you end involvement
with the project
Follow-up What processes do you need to
set in place to keep it going

3. What is your goal?
 Distinguish between your overall vision and a
realistic goal that is doable in the timeframe
 Lets think of a social issue and vision
 Deciding on goal
 Pick one thing that people really want to work on, not
necessarily the most important
 Should be feasible, generate excitement, clear enough and
consistent with the original vision

4. Identify current resources
and obstacles
 Resources- what programs currently serve
the population of interest, what people would
be most excited about your ideas
 Obstacles- Would anyone be opposed to the
project, or present barriers to it?
 Force field analysis especially useful for a social
change or policy change project

5. Identify stakeholders
 Professionals/service providers/organizers working
with the population of interest
 Will your project pose a threat or invasion of their turf
 Who do you think would welcome your project
 Consumers- those who would be served by the
project
 People who have a stake in you not succeeding

6. Involving supportive stakeholders
 those with influence, or resources
 Those who will benefit from program
 Those who will contribute time and energy
 How will you involve them?
 Make lists, who will call who?

7. Identify Actions
 Identify actions-use existing advantages to
overcome obstacles or make gains towards
goal. May want to consider:
 Assets easiest to use
 Actions that will develop broader participation
 Ones that you can see yourself doing
 Will get you closer to where you want to go

8. Planning actions/activities
 Prioritize actions
 Identify timeframes
 Who will do what?
Action/activity Timeframe Who completes

9. Outcomes/measuring success
 How will you know change has happened?
 Did people carry out activities that were planned?
 Are you closer to goal as a result
 What circumstances arose that require a change
in plan or a refinement of it?
 What’s next step based on this info?

10. Element of Plan
 Identify problem, vision and goal
 Describe current environment
 What are existing programs resources?
 What are obstacles?
 Identify stakeholders
 How will supportive stakeholders be involved
 What will you do about non-supportive stakeholders
 Determine actions/activities
 Prioritize, identify timeframes and who will do what
 Determine plan for determining progress
 What are the outcomes, when will you evaluate etc.