RECRUITING TIPS AND STRATEGIES FOR COMMUNITY ORGANIZING

Presented by…

Here’s how it works…

Action Forum

Individual Change

Institutional and Policy Impact

Collective Action

Set Goals

Facilitator Training

Plan for Action

Recruit Participants and

Facilitators

Kick Off

DialogueOrganize Action

Com

mun

ity C

hang

e

Dialogue

Here’s how it works…

Action Forum

Individual Change

Institutional and Policy Impact

Collective Action

Set Goals

Facilitator Training

Plan for Action

Recruit Participants and

Facilitators

Kick Off

DialogueOrganize Action

Com

mun

ity C

hang

e

Dialogue

RECRUITING PARTICIPANTS AND FACILITATORS

Recruiting goals

When recruiting participants and facilitators for community conversations, work to:

oReflect the diversity of your community

oWork to include underrepresented groups

oAppeal to people who don’t usually participate

oUse culturally appropriate and socially responsive recruitment strategies

oAddress potential barriers and obstacles starting now

Deciding who and how many people to reach out to

o How many participants do we want?

o How many facilitators do we need?

o Which groups of people should we invite?

o How many people from each group should we invite?

o Have we made sure to include official and unofficial community leaders?

The Recruitment Funnel

To determine how many people you need to reach out to, think about:

oHow many people you want involved

oHow many people you need signed up to have that number of people show up

oHow many people need to be interested enough to want to sign up

oHow many people you need to contact to create a critical mass of interested people

RECRUITING TIPS

70% of participants join because someone they trusted asked them to be in a dialogue

or to be a facilitator.

Photo credit: http://www.freeimages.com/profile/Eastop

Recruiting tips

o Most people respond when invited by a friend or someone they respect. This is why word of mouth is the best recruiting tool.

o Use your vision statement in your recruitment materials, i.e.: “Hope for a better future through strong community and family involvement.”

o People need to hear a message from three to five times before they act on it. Use multiple ways to get the word out.

o Work with the communications committee to create materials.

The first step: Using your contacts

You and your coalition members may already have a relationship with key people and/or groups.

Tap into these connections!

Tap into the contacts of your coalition

1. Ask each coalition member to give you a list of 10 people (name, address, phone number, email) to send to invitations to.

2. Send invitations!

3. Have coalition members make follow up phone calls to their list.

4. Follow up with coalition members to let them know who has, and has not replied.

RECRUITING UNDERREPRESENTED GROUPS

Recruiting underrepresented groups

We want to include residents who don’t often participate. Often times a newspaper article, radio announcement, or a flyer will not be enough to get them to attend. What’s your strategy going to be to reach them?

What do we mean by “hard to reach”?

Exercise

Activity to explore community demographics available at:

http://everyday-democracy.org/resources/activity-explore-community-demographics

Who, Why, Where, How

At your next meeting, think about:oWho is hard to reach in our community? Why?

oWhere can we find them?

oHow can we invite them so that the “why” and “where” are addressed?

The three “L’s”

Language

Location

Literacy

One success story on recruiting underrepresented people

Think outside the [pizza] box

STRATEGIES TO RECRUIT NEW LEADERS

Recruit beyond…

The. Same. Ten. People.

#1: Ask “Who’s not here?”

Photo credit: Ben Earwicker, garrisonphoto.org

#2: Look for people with specific skills

#3: Ask for a small commitment first

Photo credit: http://www.freeimages.com/profile/BloodlessR

#4: Appeal to self interests

#5: Show how their involvement will result in positive change

#6: Clearly define the task

#7: Use current leaders to recruit new leaders

#8: Show people you value their time

#9: Offer benefits for participating

#10: Publicize your efforts

Communicate that they are important and that you value them and the contribution they can

make.

Tell them:

“We need you to help shape the future of our community. You have valuable insights and

abilities, and we need you to make this initiative and our community very successful.”

TYPES OF PEOPLE TO RECRUIT

People with communications, graphic design, and/or public relations skills

Good planners

Good writers

People with facilitation, mediation, and conflict resolution skills

Participants from every part of the community