STANDARDS FOR

COMMUNITY SPECIALIST/ORGANIZERS

 

The responsibilities of a professional community organizer/specialist are written below as a guide for what is expected, as the most crucial aspects, community organizing.

This description is limited to the organizing aspects of the position, and does not describe the administrative responsibilities usually associated with managing a non-profit organization.

I.  INSTITUTIONAL ORGANIZING  

The community organizer/specialist for the organization is to work with existing organizations and public agencies in a community, including congregations. The organizer must be capable of understanding the self-interest of each individual institution.  He/ she must be able to talk intelligently and creatively with the leaders, judges, board of directors and pastors or the director of these institutions and their community members about the program vision and goals. The community specialist, organizer will be judged and the organization will grow by the number of such institutions that are actively supporting and partnering in support of the community organization.

Core of leaders  

The organization must have a core of leaders that relate to the community organization and who are able to involve members of that institution and other organizations in campaigns of the community organization. Even though it is a difficult task, this leadership team must be fully aware of and committed to the self-interest of the member organization and simultaneously to the self-‑ interest of the primary community organization to which to organizer/specialist is employed. A mature community specialist/organizer should be able to recruit leaders from its partnering organizations for critical events during the year. The community specialist/organizer must be responsible to develop strategies to insure this will happen.

II.  LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT  

Primarily, the community specialist/organizer's job is to help people in a community become empowered to participate effectively in critical decisions affecting themselves, their families and their neighborhoods. A community specialist therefore must be judged primarily on the quality and quantity of leadership development in a community organization.

A community specialists/organizer must have a plan to identify, recruit and develop leadership. It will be expected of an organizer that he or she has a list of current and potential leaders and that the organizer be able to discuss the interest, development and growth of each of the leaders on his or her list.

The number of leaders that they involve in local and formal training programs will help to judge an organizer. A mature organizer should be able to send leaders to training, during the year and to conduct weekend training’s for at least 25 of his or her leaders, volunteers or community leaders.

The community specialist's primary task is to develop leaders to the point where they can conduct negotiations for the organization task at hand. The specialist should always be putting board members in a position of spokesperson for the organization if at all possible. The community specialist should never appear as the spokesperson for the neighborhood organization at formal negotiating sessions between the organization and public and corporate officials. The organizer may prepare media releases and organize press conferences on behalf of the community organization leaders, and be prepared to speak for the organization if an officer is not available at that moment.

III. COMMUNITY POWER ANALYSIS:  

A community specialist/organizer must be attuned to social, political and economic forces acting on a community. The organizer therefore will be judged on the capacity to do a power analysis in a community so that when issues are selected the organization will be building its base rather than creating division and turmoil in the community.

The community specialist/organizer must be in relationship with the key political, economic and religious leaders of his or her community. The community specialist/organizer therefore will be, judged on his or her increasing ability to conduct one-on‑ones with such leadership on a regular basis. In addition, on his or her ability to get present leaders in the organization to talk with their peers in the community and bring them into the organization, as leaders, volunteers or supporters.

IV.  ISSUE DEVELOPMENT  

The community specialist/organizer must be able to help the organization’s members select and define those issues leading to actions which create a positive impact on members of a community, develop new leadership for the organization, and draw in new member institutional partners and further educate existing leadership. Public policy issues, local, state or national that may impact the community are opportunities for development.

V.  ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT  

An organizer/specialist is to organize an organization. It is therefore the role of the specialist/organizer to see that people and structures are put into place in such a way that they will create coherence and integrity within an organization. This means that there will be a functioning board of directors, an effective fundraising strategy, issues and organizational committees that tie into the board structure and an annual meeting that enables the membership to select its leadership and its programs.

An organization should have a fundraising plan that not only provides long term financial security for the organization, but also constantly increase the capacity of the organization to support it more independently with dues, grassroots fundraisers and other special events.  It is a fundamental principle of organizers/specialists that community people must have a strategy to pay for the organizing that is being conducted by their organization. An organizer who primarily and constantly relies on foundation grants and is not moving toward self-sufficiency for the organization does not comprehend the nature of a self‑directed power organization.

VI. MEETINGS

One of the primary tools of a community specialist/organizer/ is an effective meeting. The organizer must enable the leadership to hold meetings that are productive, focused and educational for the leadership. The organizer must ensure that the leadership understands the organizational processes governing their actions and must evaluate all small committee meetings, board meetings, and large community meetings.

VII. PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT 

Community specialist/organizers must, as they are attempting to do with leadership, be themselves in a self-development program. It is expected that an organizer in training will, for instance, be reading a minimum of one book per month on topics relevant to this profession and doing weekly reports that are primarily a tool to reflect, and develop an organizational and personal annual development plan.

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