Learning path · I'm planning work with a community

Community engagement or co-design effort

You are planning community engagement and want the work to be respectful, useful, and grounded in what people actually need.

By the end, you will have an engagement plan grounded in the relevant Minnesota Communities briefs, with access needs, partners, and assumptions clearly addressed. Review each relevant brief before completing the plan.

Listening, engagement, and co-design

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Your path

Six steps to work through in order

Plan a respectful approachUse Ask to consider how the partnership commitments and anti-profiling practices apply to your work.Ask a question
Read the relevant community briefsNeeded for this optional worksheetOpen the brief for each community named in the work. Read the overview and the guidance on what to ask, access needs, who to involve, and what not to assume. Note in your plan which briefs you reviewed.Explore Minnesota Communities
Choose practical resourcesUse the meeting and outreach access checklist, partner map, and language access checklist as needed.Access checks before a meeting or outreach · Partner map
Draft your engagement planInclude the questions you will ask, access needs, who to involve, what not to assume, compensation, and how you will report back. Use the downloaded checklist to write your answers in a tool you normally use. This page does not save them.
Review your workConfirm that you reviewed the relevant briefs, recognized differences within each community, noted what remains unknown, and did not apply group information to any one person.
Find the right person when neededIf another perspective would help, use Find the right person to identify the responsible role or office. Staff consultation request forms are closed.Find the right person or office

Make the work meaningful

What a useful result looks like

Still needs work:

General cultural facts with no connection to the work
Applying information about a group to a named person

Ready to use:

The plan addresses questions, access, involvement, and assumptions
Differences within the community are recognized
Questions that remain are clearly noted

Privacy: Briefs do not describe any one person. Please leave case details out of your notes and seek the appropriate authority before using Nation-specific guidance. This page does not save your answers or progress. Notes saved through an earlier version may still be in this browser's site data; this page does not show or delete them.

Published checklist

Engagement plan

Browse and download only. This published checklist is not a form. Staff notes are not saved here.

Browse and download only. This checklist is published from the knowledge base. Staff notes are not filled in or saved on this page.

Effort name and purposeIn the published checklist
What decision this engagement will influence.
Community briefs you reviewedIn the published checklist
List each brief and note that you read its overview and practice guidance.
What you will askIn the published checklist
Use open questions without asking people to relive trauma unnecessarily.
Access needsIn the published checklist
Consider language and dialect, interpreters, captioning, timing, location, transportation, child care, and trust.
Who to involve, why, and in what roleIn the published checklist
Note their purpose, authority, compensation, and how you will report back. For Tribal Nations, consultation comes first.
What not to assumeIn the published checklist
Recognize differences within every community; immigration, faith, and language are not interchangeable.
Who is responsible for each follow-upIn the published checklist
Include the person who will report back to participants.
Report-back and review dateIn the published checklist
Questions that remain
Note what is still unknown and seek the appropriate guidance rather than guessing.

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Participation and course completion in this program do not count toward DHS-required training credits unless management, a director, or DHS leadership expressly approves an exception.

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Community engagement or co-design effort

You are planning community engagement and want the work to be respectful, useful, and grounded in what people actually need.

Six steps to work through in order

Plan a respectful approachUse Ask to consider how the partnership commitments and anti-profiling practices apply to your work.Ask a question

Read the relevant community briefsNeeded for this optional worksheetOpen the brief for each community named in the work. Read the overview and the guidance on what to ask, access needs, who to involve, and what not to assume. Note in your plan which briefs you reviewed.Explore Minnesota Communities

Choose practical resourcesUse the meeting and outreach access checklist, partner map, and language access checklist as needed.Access checks before a meeting or outreach · Partner map

Draft your engagement planInclude the questions you will ask, access needs, who to involve, what not to assume, compensation, and how you will report back. Use the downloaded checklist to write your answers in a tool you normally use. This page does not save them.

Review your workConfirm that you reviewed the relevant briefs, recognized differences within each community, noted what remains unknown, and did not apply group information to any one person.

Find the right person when neededIf another perspective would help, use Find the right person to identify the responsible role or office. Staff consultation request forms are closed.Find the right person or office

What a useful result looks like

Still needs work:

General cultural facts with no connection to the work

Applying information about a group to a named person