Community Genogram

1. Introduction
A Genogram is a picture of a community's relationships and history. As you will learn below, a community genogram or a simple genogram goes beyond a traditional family tree that allows community members to visualize patterns and psychological factors that influence the relationships. Genograms, in general, were first developed in clinical psychology and family therapy settings, but over the years, they have been useful in academics as well as professional endeavors. These days, genograms are used by various groups of people in a variety of fields such as social work, genetic research, education, medicine, and more.
A Genogram is an important tool for helping understand the key people in a family or a community and multiple relationships within their lives. These Genograms can also help to see patterns within those relationships and generational patterns affecting their day-to-day activity. As per the below diagram, community genograms aid in putting a framework together that explains the reasons and circumstances of any actions. It can also help counselors or community members see the concerns that might affect the community as a whole in the future. As you will see in the diagram below, straight lines denote Harmonious people within the community, and wave-like lines will show those who have shown hostile nature in the past and others.

2. What is Community Genogram
The Community Genogram is considered a useful tool for gathering data from a community. The core aim of this methodology is to bring cultural issues to the forefront in the assessment process and focus more on the positive resources that come from evaluating the multiple components of one's cultural experiences. While creating the community genogram, the emphasis should be more on the narrative of strength and not on the problems. This strategy helps the person recollect the useful strategies they had relied upon when certain problems appeared in the past that they could implement in their current issues.
As the legend for Genogram suggests, the process of designing the community genogram follows two major steps -- clients should be instructed to develop a visual representation of the community. This step varies person-to-person as each person from the community will have more abstract or symbolic representations of their communities. Once the community is drawn, the next step is to have clients draw themselves within that community. This will help the counselor understand whether these members see themselves in the community. Here, clients are also asked to place the most influential people in their lives onto the community genogram and connect various groups to the client in such a way as to indicate which people have the most influence over the community.

3. How to Create a Gengoram
Creating a genogram using EdrawMax Online is a piece of cake since all the necessary options are readily available within the dashboard itself. All that is needed is your creativity and the right data to make the genogram for the project.

Step 1: Login EdrawMax Online
Log in EdrawMax Online using your registered email address. If this is your first time accessing the tool, you can create your personalized account from your personal or professional email address.

Step 2: Choose a template
EdrawMax Online comes with hundreds of free genogram templates. Based on your preference or need, select a pre-designed template from the product by cycling the "Education" on the left navigation pane. Alternatively, press "+" in EdrawMax Online canvas to create a Bowen Genogram from scratch.

Step 3: Customize the diagram
Customize your genogram by changing the symbols and shapes as required. With the easy drag-and-drop feature of EdrawMax Online, you can use all the relative elements from libraries.

Step 4: Export & Share
Once your genogram design is completed, you can share it amongst your colleagues or clients using the easy export and share option. You can export the genogram diagram in multiple formats, like Graphics, JPEG, PDF, or HTML. Also, you can share the genogram designs on different social media platforms, like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Line.

Step 5: Work on your research
While creating the Community Genogram, develop at least two more positive images and stories from different groups within the community. It is often useful to have one positive family image, one cultural image, and one spiritual image so that several areas of the community are included.

4. Key Takeaways
A Community Genogram is a powerful therapy tool that can be used within a society or a community. These Community Genograms are a great way to understand what people think of themselves when they think of their community. There are several ways to get creative while creating your community genograms, namely:
1) Introduce the exercise as a way to map out the relations
2) Guide the participants in drawing themselves in the center of the map
3) Illustrate different areas of the community
4) Draw connecting lines to each of the elements to map out important connections