Cultivate

The first stage is Cultivate.

Just like gardeners begin by cultivating their soil, health equity work begins with cultivating the environment inside your organization.

This includes creating a “container” for your equity work; building an internal infrastructure; and articulating a clear equity vision and commitment. Just like the gardener’s plants, public health practitioners’ strategies and practices need resources and nutrients to take root and thrive. These include allocating adequate funding and staffing; building a shared analysis of health equity and root causes of inequity; naming shared values; and developing shared leadership.

At this stage, laying the groundwork for relationships with communities and other agencies is crucial. Like pollinators, these relationships are essential for your strategies to have a meaningful impact in the community.

Cultivate Stage

Strategic Practices

Illustration of a long, rectangular container filled with various purple flowers, set against a textured background.

Step 1

Build Your Container

Set norms that embody health equity and racial justice in practice.

Image of a simple yellow barn with purple roof and double doors, placed in a rustic setting with tufts of grass around it.

Step 2

Build Internal Infrastructure and Capacity

Cultivate an organizational infrastructure capable of sustaining internal change work.

Illustration showing a purple magnifying glass focusing on a detailed yellow leaf.

Step 3

Develop a Shared Analysis

Develop shared analyses of root causes of health inequities, power, and the political landscape.

Illustration of a yellow sign planted in soil with small purple flowers around it, the sign contains lines suggesting text.

Step 4

Articulate Your Vision and Values

Articulate a clear vision and values that will guide your health equity and racial justice strategy.

Image of two hands holding a yellow pot with a purple plant sprouting from it.

Step 5

Develop Shared Leadership and Support Innovation

Develop shared leadership, support innovation, and take strategic risks to advance equity.

Note

This is the only stage organized in sequence. Each of these practices builds on the others and creates the foundation for other health equity strategies to take root. Starting with Building Your Container is essential to building relationships and an internal culture that supports individuals and groups in doing health equity and racial justice work.