The practice of systems change: tips from a change agent
Professor Pennie Foster-Fishman, an expert in community-level systems change from the Department of Psychology at Michigan State University, said constantly defining the small steps that could lead to greater gains could shift the context of people’s day-to-day life and improve outcomes.
For example, conversations with families in one community had identified that most young people were not receiving mental health support due to an onerous assessment process. The simple solution – to reduce the number of steps from five to two – led to substantially more people accessing services.
Professor Foster-Fishman is the co-creator of the ABLe Change Framework, which provides a number of strategies to help communities achieve sustainable change around issues affecting children, youth and families.