Despite the potential, EBI use is not the norm in CBOs. The onus for finding, adapting, and implementing EBIs falls on practitioners, who typically do not have the necessary public health training or professional development opportunities to support this work. However, current capacity-building offerings fall short of practitioner need, both in terms of aligned goals, manner of presentation, and inclusion of practitioner expertise.  

The disconnects between externally developed solutions and the needs and requirements of CBOs working with marginalized communities limit the impact of existing EBIs. Participatory approaches to implementation science offer alternatives emphasizing iterative, ongoing engagement between researchers and stakeholders to co-produce high-impact solutions and address health inequities through practice and systems change. The wide range of collaborators for implementation science efforts (e.g., program recipients, implementing staff, institutional leaders, and policymakers) requires strategic selection of engagement goals and models. Meaningful community engagement to produce knowledge and action is still not widespread in implementation science.  

A challenge related to systems change is that high-impact capacity-building efforts require ongoing engagement of CBO staff, including with peers and those with context-relevant expertise. Since CBO capacity-building offerings tend to be short-term and delivered by outsiders, these supports must be found elsewhere. Our work shows that supporting local inter-organizational networks to deliver ongoing support and resources can increase the utilization of EBIs in marginalized communities. These interventions can be sustainable, given the partnerships and resource-sharing that drive community-level health promotion.  

Exciting new methods are being developed to collect and analyze data from diverse experts and galvanize necessary actors to support implementation efforts that advance health equity. We are actively engaged in developing new methods, while spotlighting and showcasing practice- and research-based innovations.