Integrating Motivational Interviewing into Community Coalition Technical Assistance: The Coalition Check-Up

Community coalitions often form as vehicles to support inclusive community change. Yet, community coalition work is complex, and intensive technical assistance (TA) is potentially cost- prohibitive to sustain. A comprehensive review suggests a data-informed approach with “just-enough” contact between coalition partners and technical assistance providers that integrates Motivational Interviewing into interactions may be effective. As a result, we developed and tested the Coalition Check-Up (CoCU), a cyclical 4-step TA model to support all kinds of community coalitions. The current study examines implementation fidelity of the CoCU TA model, including its dosage, adherence to utilizing the data-informed tools, and quality by investigating the degree to which Motivational Interviewing skills were integrated into TA provider–coalition leader interactions. Thirty-two coalitions participated in this study. All coalitions received CoCU TA. Data from meeting recordings was coded with the MITI and data reported by TA providers that described TA provider interactions with coalition leaders and coalitions were used in this study. We found that coalitions received a high dosage of the CoCU TA model. The data tools were used with a high level of adherence, and MI behaviors were integrated at a modest to strong level. This novel study suggests applicability of MI in additional non-therapeutic contexts.