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Collaborative �Assessment & Action

Susan Elks, AICP

Gateway Forward Planning & Consulting

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Collaborative Assessment & Action�Process & Framework for Collaboration

What’s the community?
Who needs to be involved?
What building blocks? (Assessment+)

Why? Why bother being collaborative?

Lasting impact with the broader support
More cohesive/more efficient with time and $$
Funders

Why? What are you working toward?

What is creating the interest to work collaboratively?
What need, what person, what opportunity, what challenge?
Develop the answer, share and evolve

My information: focused on the process and framework to do good collaborative work…so you can take the framework back to your gateway community.

Collaborative work requires significant intentionality from those involved, but when its worth it, its worth it. Tom will present a collaborative effort to bring a real world perspective.

Why – What are you working toward? Answer the why. Be as transparent as possible. Be open. It may evolve, but people need to understand the why to join in.

This “why” could result in a project that ranges from bricks and mortar/on the ground infrastructure to a new/evolved process – sometimes it’s a physical product and sometimes its not, sometimes its visible to everyone and sometimes its foundational process to enable new work or partnerships

Why – Why bother being collaborative?

The 3 items shown at the bottom – more on each to follow.

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Geography

Focus/Interest Area

Collaborative Assessment & Action�Community

“Community” that is choosing a collaborative process –

Is this a “community” by geography or jurisdiction, or area of focus/interest?

These are the most common “communities” that form and return value for collaborative projects

What can these look like?

Main street/Town/County/Multi-county…portions of…may need to think like a heat map – jurisdiction (hard lines on a map and how they influence your community)

Area of Interest/Focus: Recreation? Arts? Workforce? Housing? Main street or downtown? Watershed? What entities already work in these areas and what geographies do these entities cover?

Consider jurisdictions, plus where resources or businesses or natural features create natural clusters or divides (calling someone or something in or out)

Clarify and clarify again

On top of this: how do visitors perceive this “community”? What makes sense to aim toward work that creates outcomes for visitors? (Jump from intention to outcomes – what and for who - and back.)

It will never be 100% clean/clear. Get started and be willing to adjust…but hold to the driving intention (WHY).

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Recruit your dream team:

Individuals…Organizations

Implementers, influencers, community representation/cross-section, holders of knowledge

Who is needed at the beginning, middle and end for a potential project?

Public, private and nonprofit sectors; academic interests; civic groups; health interests…

Consider:

Who can bring a group together?

Who could stop a project?

Who makes the ask?

Communicate with your collaborators with their workload in mind

Collaborative Assessment & Action�Who

What size?

How many in your team/teams?

How much time and money do you have?

Who do you need to address the WHY?

Who is involved in your collaborative effort?

Individuals and organizations.

Cross-section of the community to build support from the beginning,

People who can influence & implement

People who know what is going on

Who can think through the collaborative aspects early

Who will build lasting partnerships that are impactful?

There are a few ways to think about who is involved – think through these in at least a couple of ways

Recruitment: Your ask, or the ask of someone already in the team?

When in the group: Use “tiers” of contact to manage how often you reach out, but keep information as accessible as possible

Time is finite and inboxes are full – make good use of your interactions with team members

Sort your collaborators out…how many overall, what roles, what balance to keep moving but arrive at a supported answer.

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What to assess:

Assets & amenities
Programming & interpretation
Visitor services
Marketing & communications
Commitment & capacity

Collaborative Assessment & Action�Assessment+

Outcomes from assessment:

Consistent baseline across participants
Foundation for informed prioritization+
Connections

Assess

Prioritize

Act

Evaluate

Assessment+

Planning/PM 101: Assess (analyze), Prioritize (decide) (to guide time, money, effort), Act, Evaluate (monitor/metrics/report) and cycling back as needed (Why sits above this – goals, objectives, etc.)

What to assess in a gateway community? The five listed. My current checklist for gateway communities starts with these five, with many things under each. Narrow according to the focus on your collaborative project/the WHY

Within the collaborative effort, what are the building blocks?

What is on the ground and coming, what are strengths to build from/gaps to close/opportunities to act on.

If a new effort + new team, more effort in the assessment baseline; at least a refresher for any new project.

Why do assessment? What does this accomplish? Needed in collaborative processes, where you are bringing together a diverse group/cross-section/connecting silos.

Get your team started from the same baseline of information
Form the foundation for deciding what efforts will return the best value
Get your team familiar with each other
Do this as a team (for the most part)

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Strengths/gaps/opportunities/challenges

Prioritize

Return for investment (dollars, time, energy)

Value to community and visitors

A visible win soon or background work on underlying systems & structures?

Future operations and maintenance of any new infrastructure or process

Details to guide implementation

Collaborative Assessment & Action�Act – the steps to and for implementation

Implement!

Build from strengths…close gaps as needed…jump on opportunities…address challenges that are holding your community back

Prioritization (what is the need for a specific initial project? – the “soft” list of considerations):

Does this serve community members and visitors?

What return will come from this investment of time, funding?

Does this community need a visible win?

Does the community need a project that is done quickly to generate momentum?

Is work on “invisible” systems and structures needed to springboard from later?

Is there a need for focus on a Step 1 of a LT project?

Can the “project” be operated and maintained LT?

Always think about how operations and maintenance go – keep assets/products and their maintenance part of the conversation

Details to guide implementation…yes.

Bring the team along the steps involved in advancing a project – the implementation itself may fall to a single entity (or two), but the team should understand what this is requiring (and bring relevant resources as appropriate)

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Collaborative Assessment & Action�Implementation

Publicize

Celebrate

Share credit

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Collaborative Assessment & Action

When & To What Extent

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Collaborative Assessment & Action

Why…

Community…

Who…

Plan it and do it!

What does this look like in the real world?

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Collaborative Assessment & Action

Susan Elks, AICP

susanelks@gatewayforward.com

610-563-1516

www.gatewayforward.com