Toothbrushes and Screwdrivers: The First Step of Community Partner Relationship Building

Are there right and wrong ways to use civic engagement to make the world a better place?  Is any engagement work always better than no engagement work, or is it possible to do more harm than good? We hear all the time about the dangers of the “savior complex” and “voluntourism,” ways in which someone can think they are doing good work in a community while their accomplishments are far more problematic in reality.  “Voluntourism” – when a person or group travels to a foreign country (usually one that is considered less developed than the native country of the traveler) to do a service project and visit the country at the same time – is particularly problematic because it is a one-sided service.  The volunteers often don’t take time to check to see if the service they want to provide is actually helpful to the community they are interacting with.  There are countless stories of church mission groups or intrepid young post-grads visiting a third world country a building a school while there, only to later learn that this actually took work away from local builders.

This type of problematic service isn’t exclusive to travel abroad, either.  Without the proper education on both the community a volunteer plans to help and the background of the need for the service in the first place, it is possible to exacerbate the problem rather than really helping.  So how do we avoid this problem? The key is to have a relationship with community partners rather than just treating them as an outlet for service.

Civic engagement should always begin with the question, “what do you need?” followed immediately by the question “what can we provide?” Listening to and planning based on the words of the community voice is an essential first step if service and engagement is to be successful.  Lorrie Brown and Caroline Huck laid out five Critical Elements of Thoughtful Service, with community voice as the first (Brown & Huck, 2006) ¹.  Service and engagement are intended to be beneficial going both ways, but without a properly developed partnership between the civic engagement office and the community partner, the opportunity for benefit for both parties is significantly reduced. 

If the office just throws resources and volunteers at the partner without fully understanding their needs, it would be like someone asking you for help and you handing them a toothbrush when they need a screwdriver.  It’s not bad to have another toothbrush, but it doesn’t move the needle for their mission.  So the help wasn’t really as helpful as the community partner need it to be.  This failure affects the volunteers and civic engagement offices as well.  If you gave someone who needed a screwdriver a toothbrush and didn’t take the time to learn about the person’s problem and mission ahead of time, there is a chance that you would leave feeling accomplished.  But nothing was learned or gained.  The work was a waste of your time as well.  Therefore, not communicating with and developing a relationship with the person led to nothing more than a misunderstanding, a false sense of accomplishment, and a frustrated partner.

This scenario sounds silly and innocent when it’s applied to a toothbrush and a screwdriver.  But When you are doing serious work in a downtrodden community, the ramifications can be far more serious. Listening to the community voice is incredibly important, and a necessary first step in developing effective community partnerships and doing valuable community service.