Seattle Emergency Hubs is an all-volunteer network that helps neighborhoods prepare to organize and support one another after a major disaster. We have many communications needs: recruiting and supporting Hub Captains and volunteers, helping residents understand what Hubs are, promoting events and trainings, creating consistent outreach materials, improving neighborhood communications, and strengthening our public presence.
Our challenge is not a lack of ideas; it is deciding where to focus first. With limited volunteer time and resources, we need an experienced communications professional to assess our current efforts, identify the audiences and outcomes that matter most, and determine which projects will have the greatest impact.
We are seeking strategic guidance rather than simply more materials. We need help deciding what should come first, second, and later; which audiences and channels deserve the most attention; what can be standardized across the network; and what we should stop, postpone, or simplify. A clear strategy would help us use volunteer capacity more effectively and build a coherent, sustainable communications program.
By the end of the project, we would like a practical communications roadmap that Seattle Emergency Hubs can realistically implement with volunteer capacity. The consultant would review our current communications activities, materials, audiences, channels, and organizational constraints, then help us establish priorities. Deliverables would include:
• A concise assessment of communications strengths, gaps, duplication, and opportunities.
• A prioritized roadmap showing what to address first, second, and later, based on impact, urgency, effort, and volunteer capacity.
• A simple audience and messaging framework identifying priority audiences and the action or understanding we want from each.
• Recommendations for the channels and tools we should emphasize, simplify, combine, or discontinue.
• A 90-day action plan with a manageable set of first steps, suggested owners/roles, and measures of success.
• Simple criteria volunteers can use to evaluate future communications ideas and decide whether they should be pursued.
Success would mean that our leadership and communications volunteers leave with a shared understanding of our highest priorities, a realistic sequence for tackling them, and a plan that reduces scattered effort while improving consistency and impact across the Emergency Hubs network.
