The Future of Community Management: NGO Perspectives - A Practitioner's View

NGO Perspectives – what works, what doesn’t?

A Practitioner’s View

NCOSS Conference
22nd November 2010

Renée Koonin
General Manager, The Housing Connection

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What is Community Management?

Despite the fact that voluntary Boards are the primary model of governance in the community services not-for-profit sector, there is little agreement on the precise meaning of the term.

• If we accept the definition by Henry, Land and Roach used in the background paper prepared for this conference that community management is ‘a strategy of community development whereby a service or project is managed and controlled….by a group of people who are its consumers and/or constituents; that is, members of the defined community which the service or project targets’ then we are most certainly facing challenges. How many boards are truly comprised of consumer and constituent representatives?
• The term ‘community management’ is itself confusing: While it speaks of management it is the generally the governance of the organization that we are describing.
• If Boards do not comprise of consumer representatives, is it management/governance by citizens passionate about the cause or purpose of the organisation?

When I use the term ‘community management’, I am referring to the voluntary participation of citizens in the governance of an organization which aims to fulfill service to the community or parts of it. It represents an opportunity for citizen action separate from government or from bureaucratic, institutionalized service provision. While community management refers to a wide range of organizations including social clubs, trade unions, Parents and Citizens Associations and sporting clubs, the particular focus of our discussion today is on the appropriateness of a community management model for the non-profit community services sector – generally those in receipt of government funding.

In Australia there are approximately 600,000 nonprofit organizations – of which approximately 440,000 are small, unincorporated associations; or less than 160,000 incorporated associations which deliver community services. The ABS has identified less than 59000 ‘economically significant NFPs’ – those that have an active tax role – and only 20000 in the community sector rely on government funding. It is this smaller number of organizations with which we are concerned today.

While community management may well work for associations designed to meet the needs of members such as sporting bodies or hobby groups, it may well be that we are asking too much of this model when we examine the governance requirements of funded community service organizations with their complex accountabilities.

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