4 June 2015 | General Interest
Many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations are successfully managing a broad range of programs and services for their communities. A new paper from Child Family Community Australia reviews evidence on Indigenous community-managed programs and organisations and their implementation of community development approaches to identify factors for success.
The paper, What works in effective Indigenous community-managed programs and organisations, gathered evidence from peer-reviewed articles and organisation in-house publications and found the following eight factors to demonstrate effective Indigenous program management:
- facilitating community ownership and control;
- embedding culture;
- employing local Indigenous staff;
- harnessing existing community capacity and its leaders;
- implementing good governance;
- establishing good governance;
- keeping the implementation timelines flexible; and
- using community development approaches.
The paper recognises the need for culturally appropriate practices in community development approaches. These approaches should incorporate local knowledge and acknowledge healthy family and community ties, as well as land-based relationships, as central to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture.
One example of an effective model highlights the partnership approach supported by AbSec to develop Aboriginal community-controlled out-of-home care services in New South Wales.
The paper also mentions ongoing barriers to maximising community development outcomes.
To view the key messages of the paper, or to read the publication in full, visit the Child Family Community Australia website.
