Participation level:

Low (Information only)

Innovation level:

High (Innovative)

Facilitator skill level, and other support required:

Low (No special skills)

Can be used for:

Engage community
Discover community issues
Develop community capacity
Develop action plan
Build alliances, consensus

Number of people required to help organize:

Medium (2-12 people)
Individual

A prioritization matrix produces a community view of the priorities in relation to a community issue or proposal.

A prioritization matrix provides a measurable basis for determining the important issues for a community, for example, what priority they give to foreshore revegetation and/or continuing beachfront development.

Can assist in defining the most important issues in participation projects with many issues.
Provides a democratic and transparent device for determining priorities.
Can provide a focus for action.

Setting up criteria can be problematic, if the brainstorming process raises a large number of issues.
Some issues may not be considered because they are not raised by participants.

Organizing Prioritization Matrix

How many people to organize?

Time required:

Short (< 6 weeks)

Cost:

Low (< AUD$1,000)

Conduct a brainstorming session on issues that participants wish to explore in relation to a proposal, plan or community service. Go to the Brainstorming tool to learn how to conduct group brainstorming.
Fill out the Prioritization Matrix chart with the group: Issue/Frequency/Importance/Feasibility/Total Points
In the first column, write down the issues that were mentioned in the brainstorming session.
In the second to fourth columns, define your criteria. Examples of some typical criteria are:
Frequency: How frequently does/will this issue affect the participants? Does it occur often or only on rare occasions?
Importance: From the point of view of the users, what are the most important issue? Add the issues that the organising agency or group wants to address?
Feasibility: How realistic is it that you can find a way to address this issue? Will it be easy or difficult?
You can choose other criteria if they better fit the situation you are discussing. For example cost, environmental impact (high to low), number of affected persons can act as criteria; for a more quantitative comparison, you could use cost, amount of time, or other numerical indicators. It is also possible to use number values for each criteria and provide a rank out of 10 for each criteria. Collating total numbers for all criteria against issue can indicate the issues of highest priority.
Rank/Vote: Each participant now votes once in each of the boxes.Total all the votes together. The totals help you see clearly how to identify the priorities. (The Guide to Managing for Quality Copyright 1998 MSH and UNICEF).