Shane Skinner, our Lead Member Inclusion Coordinator, demonstrates how this tool, along with personal interviews, ensures that our work goes beyond simply bringing people together—it actively cultivates belonging.
(Shane, they/them): We’ve been building belonging for over 30 years, but the science has really evolved during that time. We now have data on the process of belonging that gives us a way to prove our work in a way we’ve never been able to do before. For example, you could say 14 people came to bingo on Friday, but it doesn’t mean we’ve built any connections or belonging. Now we can show the real work we’re doing is improving people’s experiences, not just that they were here in this brick-and-mortar building.
Bringing in science means less room for bias about the efficacy of our work, and hopefully that focus brings us more visibility as well.
-Shane (STAFF)
Pairing quantitative and qualitative data to get the whole picture
Quantitative Assessment
The Belonging Barometer is a quantitative survey that lists 10 statements that participants answer if they agree or disagree using a scale. This gives us a score that indicates exclusion, ambiguity in the middle, and belongingness at the top.
Qualitative Assessment
In addition to the Belonging survey, we’re doing two qualitative assessments. We’re doing Member interviews that ask about Members’ experiences generally. And we’ve adapted a shorter survey from the study that I’m asking in person to give Members the opportunity to elaborate on their answers so we can learn more from them.
People are really scared of qualitative data, but that’s what we work in: people’s personal experiences.
What exactly are we measuring?
The study categorizes belonging into three areas: Social Connectivity, Psychological Safety, and Agency & Co-creation. Within each, there are three specific preconditions that must be fulfilled for an individual to truly experience a sense of belonging.
What do you hope comes out of this data-driven approach?
It’s multifaceted. First, I really hope that we can improve all of our programming to be very Member-centered and find our best practices in building spaces for belonging. Second, I hope it improves Member retention. There are certain communities within the Membership that have a harder time. For example, our trans and non-binary Members, and there’s a reason for that. So, we need to focus on that and look at what the data is telling us.
What are you finding so far?
We can look at the science, do all of the math, and write all the forms, and at the end of the day, we’re already doing the work.
Of course, there’s always room for growth. For example, after the first round, I took the overall scores on the Belonging Barometer and broke them down by question. We scored well overall, but I found that two of the questions were scoring below belongingness–in the ambiguity range. One of them was, “I feel like I’m treated as less than other Members of Maybelle,” which is a big red flag. So that gives us something to focus on improving with all the Members.
Sample Member reflections from the survey:
Q: WHICH MAYBELLE CENTER ACTIVITIES HAVE ADDED TO YOUR SENSE OF BELONGING?
“The Women’s Group is a good space for me to talk about my problems with my family and stuff and it feels like a safe space, where people can share about their experiences and relate. it is very healing.”
-Amy (MEMBER)
Q: IS MAYBELLE CENTER A PLACE WHERE YOU WANT TO BELONG?
“Yeah, because if I didn’t have Maybelle, I’d be bored! Id be just sitting in my apartment all the time and all I’d have to do is go to work and go back home and that’s kind of worrying.”
-Jenny (MEMBER)
Breaking Update!
Leading expert recognizes Maybelle Center for cutting-edge work in belonging science
Maybelle Center was featured in a global landscape analysis of belonging work! We were hand-selected as one of three organizations leading in the field, by the very social scientists behind the Belonging Barometer.
Stay tuned for more updates as our partnership continues.
