Section 2: A Walk Through the PAR Process

This section walks you through a simplified PAR process. It sets the scene and looks at what you could usefully do before getting started. It then tracks through the practical steps and potential issues in the planning, management, facilitation and conclusion of a PAR process when facilitated through a community based organisation. The engagement and participation of stakeholders, the scope of action and the importance of documenting your process of evaluating and sharing your learning are explored.

2.1 Setting the scene

Your agency has its own unique context, has particular objectives, and is located in a specific locality or is working with a particular community of interest. This context will influence how you undertake intervention and how you might use PAR. PAR enables your agency, together with your community of stakeholders, to notice what is happening, ask questions and seek to improve the outcomes for those you seek to assist. The specific challenges and complexities facing you – the worker – will depend on the character of your agency and its community and institutional contexts. These include the expectations and mix of funding sources, the agency’s existing connections, the core values that underpin the agency, the models of service employed by your agency and others relevant to the target issue, the approach to management, your agency’s size and resources, the skills of staff and others you involve in a PAR process, and so on.

A PAR process should assist you to better understand:

• your agency’s strengths and resources
• your stakeholders’ strengths and resources
• the complexities of the issues at hand
• the opportunities for action, change and improvement.

PAR enables you and your stakeholders to ask in relation to a particular context: What works? What doesn’t? What should we do differently?

2.1.1 Agency managers are key enablers in PAR

The understanding and support of agency managers is critical to the development of an inclusive PAR process. Some funding programs, such as Reconnect, require PAR be used as a tool for service improvement. In other programs it may be recommended by the funding body. In many other instances it would be desirable but is not explicitly endorsed by the funding body. Understanding which of these applies to your service is important.

If you are a manager there are a number of things you can do to assist the development of PAR in your service. Getting a basic appreciation of PAR yourself will assist you to create an environment in which it can develop and contribute to service improvement. Ensuring you give organisational endorsement, space, practical support and staff development opportunities will be important.

Implementing PAR requires being open to change and to working with service users and other organisations and community groups. This asks something of your service and other stakeholder services. Can you work together and trust that in seeking this change you will not create havoc but assist in meeting the goals of your service?

There are a number of factors in the broader institutional human service environment that can limit the capacity of services to explore new ways of doing things. Contract management which specifies inputs and throughputs, risk-averse cultures, and insufficient recognition of staff development needs are some of these.

Management may be concerned that service funding will be at risk if they significantly change their service delivery approach or if the strategies tried are not successful. Certainly PAR does involve trying strategies which though thoughtfully developed, may not work, or may need revising. Using a systematic PAR process, however, brings you closer to understanding what will work better. A culture of inquiry means encouraging the exploration of what good practice means in your context and accepting that this may include going up a few dead ends in the short term.

2.1.2 Agency planning for PAR

Agency endorsement of roles in PAR coordination, training, facilitation of a specific project and ethics makes these a clear part of duties. Even if these tasks are shared, it is important to articulate clearly who is doing what and when. Ideally the key tasks related to the agency undertaking PAR should be clearly articulated in worker job descriptions and reflected in operational management and planning. Some agencies have found that it is useful for one person to have the overall responsibility for facilitating a specific PAR ‘project’. Agency planning processes (strategic and operational) can be used to identify priority projects suitable for PAR. Questions that can assist your agency develop a capacity for undertaking PAR include:

• do we support a culture of inquiry within the agency? How?
• who in the service is responsible for facilitating the development of PAR in the agency? Who else is involved?
• how - and who - provides supervision and support to workers involved in PAR?
• how can we support existing and new staff develop skills in PAR?

Addressing these questions can assist your agency to provide staff with a clear endorsement to be involved in PAR and provide a foundation for developing the agency’s capacity over time.

2.1.3 Making time for PAR

Time is a precious and limited resource. Inevitably you will face tensions over the balance of time spent on direct service delivery and PAR. If you are a small service this can be a particular problem. Single worker services can find their credibility is undermined if they have to choose between ‘being open or closed’.

In early intervention services there is normally a strong emphasis on building your community’s capacity for ‘intervening early’. Early intervention is rarely understood simply as only direct service delivery. So given that PAR builds the very relationships and collaborative linkages that are needed for greater community capacity in early intervention you have a good case for dedicating time to your PAR.

Over time you will gradually be able to incorporate elements of PAR into your everyday service delivery.

As one worker writes:

For me PAR IS direct service delivery. As a Community Development Worker I am constantly looking for ways to support communities to self-determine and develop. PAR is a simple framework that keeps me in ‘check’ to ensure ethical processes and outcomes.

Worker Colony 47

2.1.4 Strategies for managing PAR

Crisis and administrative priorities can push developmental processes such as PAR to the bottom or off agendas. If PAR discussions are only located within general meeting processes they may be swamped by more immediate demands, tasks and crises. Your PAR will need some space of its own for observation, reflection, planning, engagement of stakeholders and so on. In addition, a regular spot on a staff meeting agenda may be an important strategy for your agency to discuss the role of the PAR, note its progress, gather more resources and report on observations, reflections, plans and activity. Table 1 outlines some of the common approaches services use for managing their PAR. Most services use a number of these in conjunction.

*Most commonly used by Reconnect Services in recent years

Adapted from Porter Orchard 2009 Report 5: Analysis of trends in the Process and Content of Services AR from 2002-2007.

An analysis of Reconnect Action Research reports over 6 years concluded:

For many services a combination of these approaches is used, such that AR activities are not forgotten and AR is more easily integrated into everyday practice. Those services that hold separate, regular AR focused meetings tended not to include AR in staff meetings or in supervision. Some services have delegated specific AR explorations and their development to specific workers to ensure ownership and responsibility. This approach appears useful if individuals are then supported by other members of the team with ideas and energy in the development and implementation of the AR exploration.

AR has been incorporated by services into planning and evaluation sessions that may be held six monthly or yearly. This is imperative if the findings of AR explorations are to have any impact on service delivery.

Porter Orchard 2009 Report 5, p.22

2.1.5 Support, supervision and sounding boards for PAR

Agency processes that promote worker support, practice reflection, planning and review can also promote and support PAR. Supervision, team meetings, board meetings are all forums that can offer real support, feedback and recognition to workers. They can also provide the space to reflect on observations, ask the hard questions and propose ways of engaging stakeholders in solution focussed action. Other less formal support mechanisms and sounding boards may also be important for you. The pearls of wisdom Report talks of:

Finding someone or a number of people to rebound off after a meeting, forum or whatever will add critical checks and balances in the process and keep you on track as opposed to leading no one anywhere.

Frazer et al. 2003, p6

2.2 Appreciating the contexts in which your PAR will take place

PAR enables you to draw on the wide pool of strengths and resources in your team, your management, your clients and your network of related agencies and statutory services. Your task is to work with your stakeholders to identify and harness these capacities and resources and to decide where best to start your PAR. For PAR to be easily integrated into day to day practice it needs to draw on what it is you do well, what you would like to get better at, what you understand to be the resources available, and what you understand to be the realistic constraints. PAR should harness the strengths and resources of your organisation, your interagency community and your service users.

The strengths perspective (Saleebey 1997) was designed to focus on people’s strengths and resources rather than their problems, and was seen as a major shift in how to think about working with people in comparison with problem oriented approaches

O’Connor, Wilson, Setterlund and Hughes 2008, p. 65

Understanding these strengths and resources, as well as the constraints and realities of day to day workloads and other pressures, is a starting point for working together to seek improvement. To properly understand the resources and capacities of your agency and your external stakeholders you can undertake a scan of the internal and external environment and an audit of existing skills and capacities.

2.2.1 Scan for strengths and resources: internal and external

A scan of the internal environment will assist you to consider how your agency might contribute to, and affect the implementation of a PAR process. A scan of the external environment enables you to consider how the local community and service system environment might contribute to, and affect, the implementation of a PAR process. Both these provide a mechanism to identify strengths, resources, opportunities, critical factors for success, and challenges for undertaking a PAR process.

Section 4.1.1 contains a template for undertaking the internal and external scans.

2.2.2 Having a good look at the skills you have available

A PAR skills ‘audit’ is about identifying your existing skills and capacities and those involved in your PAR project. Keep in mind implementing PAR requires a set of skills and capacities that are common across human service work. Undertaking an audit allows you to consider not only where the strengths and capacities lie in your group, but what additional support and training may be useful to seek.

Many services already have practices that are consistent with or can contribute to the PAR process, including those for good communication, client responsiveness, strengths-based intervention, quality assurance, and inter‑-agency partnerships. PAR can dovetail with and build on these.

Within your agency or network of services there will be people who have particularly relevant skills and understandings. This said it is important to keep in mind that PAR is about ‘ordinary people becoming researchers in their own right, generating relevant knowledge in order to address issues that are of primary concern to them’ (Tsey, Patterson, Whiteside, Baird, Baird and Tsey 2004, p. 65). If a PAR process explores how services are delivered, your clients should have opportunities to be key informants, active participants, peer facilitators or peer interviewers. Their views, ideas and feedback will be critical. The young people, parents and adults, who your agency is targeting, are experts in their own lives and ‘should be actively involved in decision making, planning, and then implementing and reviewing change’ (Tsey et.al. 2004, p.70). They will have first hand knowledge because they are most affected by the situation everyone is seeking to change or improve.

Section 4.1.2 contains a template for undertaking a PAR Skills Audit.

2.2.3 Identifying ethical considerations

Even at the earliest stages of undertaking a PAR process there could be ethical issues to consider. These could include how you undertake a scan or audit of skills, how you negotiate what you do within your agency, and what information you record and share. There may be others. Section 3.3 outlines a range of things to consider in ‘being ethical’.

2.3 Getting started

Section 4.2 of this manual contains a checklist for starting PAR. This prompts you to work through the tasks identified so far in this section, to identify the strengths, opportunities and challenges in your context, and to consider what might be useful to do before you fully embark on a project.

Let’s assume that you are no longer just you by yourself but you and one or more others involved in looking at doing a PAR project. This process starts with your awareness that something needs to be changed or improved or developed. Document what you became aware of and what you are observing. Share this with colleagues, clients and other stakeholders. Keep it simple and keep a record.

2.3.1 Documenting the critical issues for your agency and your community

For your PAR to be useful, the area for investigation should address something you and your stakeholders are trying to change or improve. So what theme or issue that relates to your core business is currently challenging or frustrating your attempts to improve service delivery or community capacity building? What are you noticing needs attention or a different approach to get better outcomes for your target group? At this stage it is best to be tentative and have an attitude of exploration; to wonder if this is something to look at more closely.

A good way to start is to talk with others and write down the thoughts and ideas that are mentioned. You could take these initial thoughts to your team meetings or supervision. It is important to note all the ideas. When you have the support of your service you can begin to more formally involve all the stakeholders.

2.3.2 Keeping records

From the beginning you should have a place to file and collate your notes and other key documents such as relevant meeting minutes. Even at an early stage you could start to use a documentation template. Section 4.6 contains a number of templates for documentation.

At the start it is useful if someone is given the task of ensuring the process is recorded and that those records are accessible and coherent so they can assist in the process and form the foundation of a final reflection, analysis and written report.

There are many ways to record your PAR and most services use a mix of strategies. Different methods suit different situations and audiences. Ensure the system you use is:

• relatively simple
• suitable for your PAR process and each particular aspect of the process
• well understood by those involved.

Every Monday morning is set aside for a staff meeting and Action Research. A standard format is used for recording the Action Research cycles. At most Reference Group meetings one Action Research topic is featured.

A Reconnect service

There are many ways to document PAR and with developments in technology the options are increasing. Most agencies utilise a range of strategies for recording what happens, and what interpretations are made. A combination of written and audio/ visual/ experiential strategies is most likely to engage and interest a diversity of participants in the process.

We found it helpful to develop the practice of jotting down and recording thoughts, events, client comments and anything related to the question, filing these ‘scraps’ of information, to compile and analyse them at a later date.

A Reconnect service

2.3.3 Involving other stakeholders

Involving others as soon as possible means people are more likely to feel they are part of determining the focus of a PAR project. Look for informal and formal opportunities to meet, brainstorm, swap ideas, and find common ground.

Your contacts and networks provide a great place to start. These may not necessarily be the particular representatives other agencies would nominate onto a formal committee but may be those best placed to help you navigate through the challenges of engaging all the stakeholders into a PAR process. A NAYSS worker writes:

I always attend sector meetings where possible. It’s incredibly important that a sector works together. With dispersed funding and focus, authentic collaboration and partnership are essential for optimum community outcomes. I’m currently in the ‘observe’ stage of a project. It’s been months … a bit of an ‘off the side of the desk’ project. The question I have framed is “What would it take to broaden the opportunities for newly arrived young people with disrupted education and low levels of English?” In the ‘observe’ stage, the insights, experiences and participation of all stakeholders needs to be included for a holistic picture of the issues and of the possibilities. The key insights come from the key stakeholders. In this example, newly arrived young people.

Colony 47

Another agency uses emailing as a strategy for developing a ‘culture of invitation’:

We put out emails regularly to our network asking what’s working?, what’s not working? & what could we be doing better? This invites services to be open about processes that aren’t working ok. These standard questions have helped us to improve our services, including our feedback processes to the reference group.

Connect - Darwin

2.3.4 Making space for people to come together

You need space for ‘yarnin up’. PAR needs spaces – large and small – for people to come together – formally and informally – in mutually acceptable ways for the benefit of all participants. You may need to establish new ways for people to connect to discuss and reflect upon critical observations and PAR questions. Existing agency meeting structures, interagency meetings and your current ways of engaging your clients will all be starting points for talking with people about PAR. Convening, facilitating, supporting and listening to the participation of everyone will create the ground on which your AR and learning can emerge. It is critical that these spaces and processes are safe, respectful, and culturally responsive and open to the contributions of all involved.

The research of Janet Kelly and Kim O’Donnell (2007) sought to understand how they could improve opportunities for people to come together for AR utilising Aboriginal ways of knowing and doing. Their larger goal was to harness Aboriginal knowledge and practice in addressing the health and well being issues of their community. Together with their community colleagues, Kelly and O’Donnell wanted to create a rich and productive learning environment that pooled the knowledge, skills, abilities and networks of their community. They took time and created space for ‘yarnin up’. They talked with people about ‘the challenges of ethical research and practices between blackfullas and whitefullas’. They created space for people to ‘come, hear each other, share our knowledge, celebrate what has worked, discuss what has not and be invigorated to go out there and try again’. It sounds simple but it requires thoughtful action and a determination to provide space and a place in the process for everyone affected by the action (O’Donnell and Kelly 2007 p. 13).

Section 4.3 outlines a range of participation strategies to consider.

Reference groups can offer an effective structured and ongoing mechanism to ensure clarification of the critical issues. They can facilitate the:

• articulation of different positions, power and meanings for all stakeholders
• acknowledgement of shared understandings, different understandings and role differences
• establishment of reflection and decision making processes for the research question and action inquiry
• coordination of the action and the documentation of findings and sharing of the learning.

Specific meetings provide an opportunity to outline your agency’s core work, its responsibility to undertake PAR and your observations and concerns. You may seek the assistance of a worker who is internal or external to your agency to facilitate initial meetings with larger institutional stakeholders – like a school or groups of schools, Centrelink or large housing providers – or a large group of diverse stakeholders. These meetings can seek the feedback of your stakeholders and formally invite their participation. At this type of meeting it will be important to create an atmosphere of interest in, and openness to, the stakeholder’s views. The aim is to understand their issues, challenges and ideas.

2.3.5 Doing an initial investigation

The canvassing of ideas and interests from other stakeholders is part of the initial ‘observation’ phase of PAR.

A common characteristic of good PAR is the seeking of other sources of information relevant to the particular topic or theme. This information can be used to provide some background or inspiration. Specific information can also be incorporated into the development of a plan or initiative. Services can seek out information in a number of ways. They can include:

• internet searches on specific topics
• looking for relevant reports and journal articles
• interrogating their own service data
• talking to other similar services about relevant information they know about
• getting local demographic and service information from ABS or local councils, and
• talking to specialist services and peak bodies (including Reconnect specialists) that service specific groups such as Indigenous, CaLD, GLBTI and newly arrived (Porter Orchard Report 1 2006/2007 p. 10).

Drawing on other sources of information in the early development stages of a PAR project can:

• save time and energy by utilising the insights and wisdom of others
• build on a body of knowledge rather than reinventing the wheel, and
• enable you to avoid the hurdles or pitfalls that have already been experienced by others (Porter Orchard Report 1 2006/2007 p.10).

Section 4.5 contains a more detailed outline of strategies for reflecting.

2.3.6 Coming up with questions

Most inquiry is question driven. That means you come up with something you want to look at, decide on how you could phrase that as a question, then come up with a process to ‘answer’ the question. This sounds like a step by step process but most of the time it is not. Don’t be surprised if you change the way you express your question as you find things out. But like everything in PAR, it is important to start somewhere and use this as a platform.

The early part of your process may well start with you starting with a hunch – this is fine particularly if you try to make sure that this is a meaningful, and relevant or useful hunch (Wadsworth 1997, p.78).

Macro questions are broad questions that are clearly linked to the goals of your service delivery. In Reconnect services these are expressed in the program goals and relate to early intervention into youth homelessness.

It is important that your macro question links to getting better outcomes for the people you are trying to assist – not to things associated simply with the service delivery process or the popularity of your services.

In your agency a number of big questions may be being thrashed around. You may be wondering what you could be doing to improve a specific aspect of young people’s lives or the situations of their families. You may want to achieve improved communication and collaboration with key institutions and groups which are ‘first to know’ a young person or family is experiencing difficulty or instability (Crane and Brannock 1996), such as schools, TAFE, Centrelink, housing and accommodation providers.

Early interventions into youth homelessness must address a range of complex risk factors and questions affecting the lives of young people. These risk factors can include family violence or family breakdown, exclusion from school, underdeveloped literacy and numeracy skills, poor employment skills and prospects, mental health concerns, challenging behaviours, criminal activity, incarceration and so on. In early intervention into youth homelessness PAR should aim to improve the living stability for vulnerable young people, maximise their engagement and access to key supports, and minimise the risk of further disconnection and homelessness.

Micro questions are smaller more focussed questions that contribute to being able to answer the macro question. There will usually be a number of these in a PAR process. Smaller questions will start to emerge as you tackle a big question and break it down into identifiable factors and manageable parts.

Figure 7: A question ‘tree’

If one of your PAR questions is about a small, specific, localised issue you may be able to express this simply in terms of the macro and micro questions you are asking (a small ‘tree’). Other questions which involve complex/inter-related or systemic components will need longer and more careful processes with a larger number of inquiry branches (a big ‘tree’). Keep in mind how ‘big’ you and your co-inquirers are able to cope with. Generally it is better to start small and grow the scope of your PAR over time.

Below are a range of macro and micro questions that Reconnect services have asked over the years.

Don’t get too bothered about categorising questions as macro and micro. In reality there is a continuum from very macro to very micro. The micro questions you ask should be specific enough to provide a focus for collaborative planning.

2.4 Planning for action: What will you try?

2.4.1 Engaging stakeholders in planning

Levels of stakeholder participation in planning will vary according to how willing and prepared the participants are to be involved and consulted. Enabling real participation is about creating access and building trust. Suzi Quixley cautions that ‘this is the phase where stakeholders can vote with their feet...often providing a clearer indication of their interests than they might verbally’ (Quixley 1997, p. 17). People will want to be involved if they understand the process has both value and the potential to improve their situation and the situation of those they care about. People will generally need to have some degree of confidence that it will be safe, their contribution will be valued and they will see some result that is meaningful for them in their context.

2.4.2 Developing a plan for action

There is no formula for ‘good planning’. It will depend on your local context, the question/s being asked and the individual, organisational and cultural factors operating in your environment. The plan should be flexible, coherent, and coordinated in a way that enables the participation of everyone affected by the action. The plan should be the outcome of work with stakeholders to understand what is being observed, what that means and what could be tried. This should result in a plan for new action that can sit easily alongside the current work of your agency and can actively involve your stakeholders.

So what are you going to try? Or in other words ‘What strategy are you going to use to explore your question/s?’

Suzi Quixley (1997, p.16) provides a set of step-by-step questions to use when generating a PAR plan with a group of stakeholders (reproduced below - original emphasis).

1. What are all the possible actions that could arise from your thinking at a theoretical level?
   Test your answers with as many stakeholders in this question as you can, to ensure that as many ideas as possible are included.
2. What is the most widely preferred order of priority of the ideas? Which would stakeholders most like to see implemented?
   Seek feedback from as many stakeholders in this question as possible, to ensure that you’ve taken account of the full range of preferences.
3. What would be the resource implications (eg money, time) of pursuing, for example, the top 3 ideas? Could they be undertaken in addition to existing tasks – or would they need to replace something?
   Engage stakeholders in this question throughout this exploration process, so they can extend your thinking in this area, and make an informed choice when revising priorities.
4. So … given the resource implications, do the priorities need to be reviewed?
   Again, fully involve stakeholders in this question at this stage.
5. What would it take to be able to implement the preferred action ideas? What strategies need to be explored/ put in place?
   Many people enjoy this stage of the planning process most!
6. Timetable the changes!

2.5 Into action

2.5.1 What range of actions can you try?

Depending on your earlier analysis and planning, your PAR might do anything from launch a comprehensive in-depth investigation, to engage other agencies in a community capacity building effort, to run a specific activity or group that you think has potential to better meet client needs. Keep in mind that if you undertake further investigation you should later turn this into an action to be trialled. Below is the range of strategies Reconnect and NAYSS services used in their AR projects over the 3 years from 2005-2007.

From Porter Orchard (2009) Report 5: Analysis of Trends in the Process and Content of Services AR from 2002-2007.

Engagement of key agencies or communities: This involves building relationships with other services or sections of the local community and sometimes across a region or state. Engagement strategies (involving conversations, meetings and forums with key people) are often used in the initial phases of the PAR cycle when services are trying to better understand a specific issue/s or group, or are building participation in the PAR process.

Capacity building: This involves strategies to increase the range of people, organisations, and even communities able to address particular problems or issues contributing to homelessness and amenable to early intervention. Stakeholders are enabled to develop and sustain practices that assist in effective early intervention, including strategies which enable services or communities to respond in a more ‘joined up’ way.

Activities for service users: Some PAR projects involve trialling a particular activity that is potentially useful in achieving outcomes. In Reconnect the most commonly tried activities with young people involve cultural development, sports (broadly defined), and adventure/ camping experiences.

Group work with a specific focus: This involves the development of group programs for the target group, usually oriented to a specific area of clients’ lives that is understood as contributing to the larger problem. In the Reconnect program specific group work has been undertaken around school difficulties, anger and violence, and family conflict.

Model of service development or reform: This involves focusing on a particular aspect of, or approach to, service delivery that is critical to achieving effective outcomes. For example, intake processes, referral and inter-agency protocol arrangements, approaches to family support, more inclusive schooling strategies for vulnerable students, models for building better relationships between young people and their parent/s, and the articulation of case work and group work have all been the focus of PAR strategies.

Information provision: This involves the development of initiatives or materials that provide information about a particular topic or about the service and its projects. The audience can be young people and/or families, and/or the wider community more generally. These strategies have included both written (printed information packages), DVDs and verbal (meetings/forums) formats and are often not ongoing initiatives.

In the action phase you are actually testing possible ‘answers’ to the question/s you are exploring through action. This is where you implement the plan and stay flexible, where you attempt to do something different and then observe and reflect upon its affects. Your action should be deliberate and purposeful, a careful and thoughtful variation of practice which is critically informed (Quixley 1997).

There will be ups and downs, diversions and adjustments. These are unavoidable in a PAR process. Expect and embrace them! Don’t be tricked into thinking that a straightforward plan will smoothly unfold, deliver clear outcomes, and be easily captured in the documentation. Life is too complex and changeable for it to be that straightforward. As you commence your planned actions with your participants, there will be stops and starts, ‘failures to appear’, meetings that go well, others that don’t. Participants may want new issues to be tackled, or be reluctant/unable to deliver on something they previously committed to. A key person from another agency may change role or leave. Getting the balance right between staying on track and accommodating new information and concerns will be an inevitable part of the journey.

2.5.2 Watch what happens and record the journey

It is one thing to plan – another to carry it out. Remember to carefully watch what happens while implementing your plan! And record your observations, reflections, plans, actions and the affects of your actions. Make sure your PAR story - or project narrative - is captured by the project’s records. The road blocks or diversions also need to be noted and attempted to be understood in the context of your research question and the bigger questions for your agency and your stakeholders.

How one PAR project captured their ‘action’

Workers on a PAR project aimed at improving rural Aboriginal men’s health developed a strategy, in conjunction with their workplace supervisor, to ensure ongoing reflection and evaluation of their operational plan. This strategy was a three-tier system for capturing their action, the ‘yarning’ and their learning. It worked as follows:

1. The Workers kept diaries and noted:
   • What was working well (the positive effects of their men’s group in the community)
   • The challenges (implementing the men’s group)
   • The strategies they tried to overcome the challenges.
2. Feedback from the participants: They created ‘feedback boxes’ with the same headings as above – ‘what works’, ‘the challenges’ and ‘strategies to address challenges’. At regular weekly meetings men were encouraged to give written or oral feedback to slot into the relevant box.
3. The project workers ‘collated and presented data from their diaries and feedback boxes at monthly planning and evaluation session for reflection, strategy refinement and action’.

Tsey et.al. 2004

Another excellent recording strategy to utilise with young people is video. With cheap cameras available, and everyone a potential Academy Award winner, video footage is a practical and engaging way to record what happens. Video can also be used to record participant feedback and gather input for the PAR process itself. Remember to get permission to film and depict participants and make sure that the production process recognises and respects participants’ input in any resource development that follows (e.g. the project ‘show-reel’).

2.6 Evaluating what happens

[Make] clear what has been learnt from the process, and what should be retained, and might be done differently to strengthen this approach in the future.

Porter Orchard and Associates Report 3 2007: p. 3 cited in Report 1 2006/2007 p.8

It is important that you make observations and reflections at the end of each cycle and link any conclusions back to the issue(s) or question you posed. You can then consider whether you:

• undertake another cycle so as to deepen your understandings and further develop your strategies
• refine or develop a new question (a new branch to your question tree)
• conclude this PAR project partially or fully.

If your action was quite ‘small’ this part of the process may be very swift, involving no more than a discussion amongst your PAR group, but it may be large. You may be at the end of the final cycle in a long complex process and therefore your analysis, conclusions and writing up will require a lot of attention. Regardless of how large or small, the process of analysis involves a number of elements. A model for this is depicted in Figure 8..

Figure 8: The process of analysis in PAR

The process of reflecting on a strategy, whether small or large, involves ‘analysis’ and requires that you undertake some form of ‘evaluation’. In PAR this process is not externalised but is an embedded component of the inquiry cycle. There is a substantial literature on evaluation. Yoland Wadsworth’s Everyday Evaluation on the Run is particularly useful for using in a PAR process. Section 6.2 contains full details of this and other references and resources that may be useful.

Reflecting on the ‘success’ or otherwise of a particular action or set of actions is important. Participants in the process should have input into the determination of findings and outcomes. You will need to consider what additional insight into your question/s you now have. Do you use these insights to refine your action and test this through another cycle? Make sure your PAR does not end abruptly and leave people wondering whether anything was learnt or changed as a result.

… these observations and reflections could be considered the most important aspect of the AR cycle [for] without these there is no evidence to suggest that any one strategy is better than another. Without the documentation of these observations and reflections, what has been learnt may be lost.

Porter Orchard and Associates Report 3 2007: p.3 cited in Report 1 2006/2007 p.8

It takes time and space to properly observe and reflect on what happened. The following questions may assist your reflection and writing up. As you can see, they require you to identify evidence for the conclusions you make, and for the strategies you consider to be ‘improvements’. This is where your recording of your processes with your stakeholders becomes the basis for drawing well-founded conclusions.

2.7 Sharing your PAR

Ideally sharing beyond the core group involved in your PAR should occur throughout the process. This in-house sharing is an important mechanism for getting feedback from across your stakeholders, for growing the awareness of what you are finding out, and for broadening participation in the process.

Sharing can be relatively informal or quite formal. It may be quite appropriate during the PAR process to share your progress verbally through conversations and meetings, or in written form through blogs, email groups, updates, newsletters or notices.

Sharing is also about letting people know what you have found out: the story and lessons of your PAR journey. Sometimes referred to as ‘publishing’, this is a critical part of the PAR process. Sharing in this sense means more than celebrating or showcasing. It means genuinely inviting others to look at what you have done and provide them with a meaningful opportunity to agree and disagree with your conclusions and strategies. ‘Inviting disagreement’ is one way PAR is able to establish its trustworthiness (see Section 3.4 for more on this). In traditional research external review is often done via ‘seminars’ as well as through external review by people knowledgeable in the particular topic. In PAR the emphasis is on making sure your interpretations reflect and fit the experiences of those involved. There are a wide range of strategies you can use to share and review your PAR including:

• Writing a summary of your report and seeking feedback on conclusions or ‘the stories’ from your community before distributing it. This was done for the … pearls of wisdom Report (Frazer et al. 2003). See Hill (2003) for more information on using storytelling in your PAR.
• Creating a DVD or video and showing drafts to your community before finalising and distributing. It is also possible to use drama, song, poetry, dance role plays and works of art to share what has been found. Depending on the context this may need some accompanying interpretation so that the audience ‘get it’.
• Holding one or more meetings at which you invite a broader group from your organisations and communities to hear about your PAR project via summaries or diagrams that are open to clarification and improvement.
• Posting draft material on your website for comment.

Accounts should provide sufficient material to enable intended audiences to understand the experience and perspectives of key people in the primary stakeholding group.

Stringer 2007, p.181.

The process of writing or producing accounts of your PAR for public distribution should actively involve your stakeholders, including service users. Strategies used to facilitate this, identified by Waldman (2005: p.977-978) are:

• Early in the process invite participation in the writing process
• Run workshops or build into reference group discussions about what strategy to use to share ideas for writing and develop roles/ topics
• Generate options and action plans about who will write something individually or as part of a group (co-author)
• Provide follow-up support to complete writing tasks
• Provide editing and feedback on drafts and discussion of ideas for further collaboration.

Writing has a lot to do with confidence. It is very useful to have someone available who has prior writing experience who can advise and support others in a way that builds their confidence and ownership.

Having checked out your understandings and strategies with a broader audience you can put your PAR on the public record. Sharing publicly might be done using your website, a report or DVD able to be distributed, a photo board etc.

Remember to:

• make sure you have informed written consent from participants and authors before you ‘publish’ any material
• respect privacy and adhere to ethics around confidentiality and not doing harm
• properly acknowledge people’s contributions
• give (if possible) a copy to everyone who contributed
• use the opportunity of ‘publishing’ to further the recognition of the work your participants do, the importance of early intervention and your insights into how to best support people in your community.

2.8 Closure

The process of ending a PAR project raises many of the same considerations as with ending any other process. Endings are important and celebration can be an important form of validation and recognition. In PAR it is often the case that professional relationships will not completely come to an end, though they may alter. Pay particular attention to the needs and vulnerabilities of those who have associated closely with the project or for whom involvement has meant a great deal. Social work literature on closure is useful here.

2.9 … pearls of wisdom

The following extract is from the report … pearls of wisdom (Frazer et al. 2003). The information in the report was collated from anecdotes and records of Reconnect services in Darwin and Palmerston, and from the many people involved in the Action Research training held in Brisbane 2002, as well as from Action Research training held in Broome 2003.

The authors seek to engage stakeholders in critical and continual review of this document, which too demonstrates Action Research processes (p.4).

The report includes the following tips for people who are working together to make things better.

• Participate at a practical level
• Explain situations and issues using real and practical examples
• Always be aware of your influence and impact on other people and processes
• Rushing things will lose people and their support
• Listen well, hard and long
• Set out to build confidence and trust
• Out with all jargon
• Find ways to identify small wins
• Wrestle with the hard questions - but be realistic
• Invent ways and have fun collecting information and data
• Strength based approaches will engage people
• Don’t miss an opportunity to celebrate
• Offer opportunities for story telling
• Make time to think and reflect

… pearls of wisdom report (2003) prepared by Dean Frazer in collaboration with Kay Gehan, Ann Mills and Christine Smart

2.10 Summary and reflections

This section has taken you through the central processes involved in initiating, implementing and concluding a PAR process. This has included:

• the importance of management endorsement, support and supervision
• understanding how PAR would work in your agency
• ensuring that time and space is made for PAR
• the importance of identifying stakeholders and the practicalities of creating opportunities for people to come together
• how to ask questions and distinguish between the ‘big’ questions (macros) and the ‘smaller’ (micro) contributing questions
• how to plan for action
• the process of documenting and sharing your PAR
• considerations for telling the story of your PAR process and insights
• closing your PAR process.

Being creative whilst employing a sufficiently structured process, and utilising all the strengths and resources within you, your agency and your stakeholder community, will enable a richer more exciting inquiry process.

Some questions to consider

What barriers to your client group getting good outcomes have you noticed?

What questions would you like to explore with your workgroup?

When and how could you appropriately discuss questions about improving service outcomes and delivery processes?

Who are the key stakeholders in your practice? Where do service users fit?

How would you begin talking to these stakeholders about what it would take to improve outcomes?

What formal and informal strategies could you use to bring people together and encourage discussion about how to improve the situations for the people your service aims to assist?

If you chose to convene a reference group to initiate a PAR process, who could be involved?

How could you begin to record your PAR?

How would you build in time for observation and reflection? (That is regular times to stop and notice what is happening and thinking about and discussing what that means.)

Section 3 of this manual digs deeper into some of the complexities of implementing PAR in social programs and community agency contexts.