Readiness:

• Is my community or organization ready to use THRIVE?
• Is there a chance we could do damage to the community or its members?

Planning Process:

• What are the elements of a community planning process?
• What is the relationship between THRIVE and the elements of community planning process?

Collaboration:

• Who should I include in the process?
• Should I include the health sector?
• What might I say to engage different stakeholders in a planning process centered on THRIVE?

Getting Started with THRIVE: PLANNING

What are the elements of a community planning process?

Elements of a community planning process include the following:

• Needs assessment: identifying the needs and assets of the community or neighborhood and the particular health concerns and disparities,
• Strategic planning: clarifying vision, goal, and directives, establishing decision making processes and criteria, fostering sustainability, and ensuring that resources are being appropriately used.
• Building understanding about multiple determinants of health : raising awareness about what contributes to good health and fostering buy-in into a preventive approach to improving health and safety outcomes
• Partnership and coalition building: determining and engaging the support of key stakeholders and decision makers, including community engagement
• Prioritization: selecting the appropriate factors and combination of factors
• Comprehensive approaches: implementing multifaceted activities to achieve desired outcomes
• Evaluation: ongoing assessment and evaluation of community efforts

What is the relationship between THRIVE and the elements of community planning process?

THRIVE is a framework for thinking about how to improve health outcomes reduce disparities in health. The tool, along with a community planning process, can help establish a broad community vision about health, prioritize specific factors that the community wants to strengthen, identify specific activities, and catalyze action. THRIVE is not an end in itself; rather it is a tool that can be used as part of a community process to improve health.

THRIVE can be used to inform all of the elements of a community planning process. For example, the information gleaned from the tool can be part of the needs assessment and identify priority areas for action. It can also serve as a framework for strategic planning, help identify which partners to engage in a coalition, and provide the context for community participation.