Comprehensive community initiatives: The road ahead for research and practice

In this concluding article, we summarize the body of articles in this special issue to identify and explore themes for the next wave of research and practice in CCIs. We suggest that these articles reveal that while evaluation, data, and assessments are a powerful way to frame clear, actionable tactics within complex systems, any efforts to be data-driven in CCIs must be grounded in strong relationships built on trust between stakeholders. We propose that people who wish to use data more effectively in the work of CCIs should not take the position of the removed analyst, but rather that of an engaged, data-informed leader, taking responsibility for enabling members of the CCI to build and maintain the relationships and collective identity of the CCI. To explore this proposal, we articulate a vision for what data-informed CCI leadership could look like, based on theories of sense-making grounded in developmental science. We then examine how these theories play out in real-life using examples of how three CCI leaders have tried to engage in data-driven work. Finally, we propose implications of this conception of leadership for collaborative, community-based efforts in the future.