Nonprofits, funders, and partners working to meaningfully engage the people at the heart of their work and advance equity can consider the following observations gleaned from our work with the six partner organizations.

  1. High-quality feedback can be a first step to include clients’ voices in guiding equity work. Efforts to understand and address inequities are complex and unique for every organization. However, high-quality feedback can act as a starting point for organizations that want to move further along their equity journey. It can uncover new ways of partnering with clients and identify specific practices that help organizations play their part in advancing equity.
  2. Not all feedback and listening practices are created equal – their design influences what they yield. Before designing listening practices, organizations should have a clear learning agenda tied to their equity work. The learnings they need to advance those efforts should inform which mechanisms to use when engaging clients.
  3. Nonprofits cannot do this work alone. Both high-quality feedback and intentional equity work take resources and expertise. Funders play an important role in ensuring that nonprofits have the necessary support to do this well.

Read the full article about feedback and equity by Juan Clavijo at Feedback Labs.