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Promoting community collaboration: Interagency network connections and organizational capacity
Purpose: To promote community-based interventions needed to address health disparities in Chinese immigrant workers, we used an innovative approach to synthesize information about the inter-connectedness of community agencies and their ongoing involvement in immigrant worker health.
Methods: An iterative sample expansion approach identified 42 agencies representing 6 sectors (service agencies, faith-based organizations (FBO), unions, nonprofits, public agencies). Across agencies, data were gathered through joint interviews with one agency administrator and one direct service provider. Social network analysis (SNA) detailed network structures, strengths of connections, and agency positions within the networks. Descriptive and qualitative analyses were used to evaluate organizational capacities, including resources, commitment, and flexibility.
Results: Among six forms of connections, SNA revealed that information sharing was most prevalent among the 36 participating agencies. Cross-sector SNA showed that Pan-Asian service agencies had relatively strong connections with nonprofit and public sectors; Chinese FBO and labor union sectors’ connections with other sectors were weakest. A circumscribed number of Chinese and Pan-Asian service agencies and nonprofits showed notably high degrees of connection. For organizational capacity, most agencies (>50%) reported being understaffed, had limited involvement in preventive actions/programs, and lacked flexibility necessary for new programmatic planning and approval processes.
Discussion/Conclusions: Network and organizational capacity analyses yielded critical understanding of community structural links and assets. This innovative community assessment approach informs decisions about actual and potential community collaborations, strategies to build interagency linkages, and methods to shape resource distribution for health equity.
Learning Areas:
Implementation of health education strategies, interventions and programsOccupational health and safety
Public health or related nursing
Public health or related research
Social and behavioral sciences
Systems thinking models (conceptual and theoretical models), applications related to public health
Learning Objectives:
Identify a major aspect in network analysis and in organizational capacity analysis that are fundamental to determining community status for collaboration.
Describe how the one or more of the study results are directly applicable to public health practice and for research endeavors in order to promote of health equity for Asian Pacific Islanders.
Keyword(s): Health Disparities/Inequities, Asian and Pacific Islanders
Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have been the principal investigator (PI) of multiple federally funded grants focusing on Asian immigrant worker health using a community system-oriented prevention approach, and am the PI on this study. I have published in the areas of health disparities, immigrant worker health, and cross-cultural research.
Any relevant financial relationships? No
I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.