Winnipeg's North End Wellbeing Measure: Using Social Innovation to Drive Community Measurements

The Winnipeg Boldness Project, a social innovation initiative addressing early childhood outcomes in the underserved community of Point Douglas, worked alongside the community to develop a meaningful measurement tool, the North End Wellbeing Measure (NEWM). This article describes the context, the research and pilot, and the lessons learned.

To develop a community-based tool called the NEWM, which evaluates what is important to Point Douglas families.

We used community-based participatory research methods and surveys for data collection.

We learned that 1) the language used in relation to notions of well-being and satisfaction could be more precise, 2) our assumptions about strengths-based measurement did not always align with community perspectives, 3) hiring Indigenous people as data collectors is essential, and 4) we need to remain vigilant in our attention to respecting the participants' lived experiences. We also learned that, given the opportunity, the community has a desire to participate in research involving their experiences and well-being and greatly benefit from self-voicing and agency in research development.

The pilot NEWM demonstrates the benefits and challenges of Indigenous social innovation and will benefit future iterations of the measure, as well as other community-based well-being measures.