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About CWA and Consultations
Consultation
is now a permanent part of everyday life for councils and other public
sector organisations –and its importance in CPA and other aspects
of ‘oversight’ mean that quality has to be as much of a concern
as cost.
Our experience shows that
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Few
councils have developed an overall ‘thought through’
approach to their consultations beyond instigating measures designed
to limit the most visible expenditure |
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In
trying to ‘stretch’ their precious resources many try
to maximise what is done in-house – which often means that
some important consultations are done less well / achieve less than
might otherwise be the case simply because ‘multi-disciplined’
staff can’t bring to bear the same level of experience and
expertise as can specialists who have the opportunity to develop
and practice their skills over a large number projects |
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Even
the smallest council can have as many as 70 major and minor consultations
‘in progress’ across the whole of their activities –
with many taking an ‘ad hoc’ format in a way that most
other activities are not |
CWA
believe that there is considerable scope for councils and others to achieve
more without increasing overall spending by way of
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developing
an overall ‘objective led’ approach to consultation that
is designed to |
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achieve’
specific objectives |
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identify
the optimum mix of in-house resources and ‘bought in’
specialist skills |
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streamlining
the way ‘consultations’ are carried out with a view to |
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minimising
the overlap between different consultations |
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minimising
the ‘redundancy’ in each consultation |
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maximising
the way each consultation ‘fits’ with the corporate
self-interest |
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CWA
have developed a menu of services designed to meet the needs of those
councils and RSLs who can benefit from help to develop a more objective
approach to consultation and those other councils who simply need specialist
skills for specific parts of their consultations. Our 'one stop' shop
for consultation resources gives each client the chance to mix our unique
strengths and experience with their own - giving them the best opportunity
to achieve a higher quality than they can achieve 'in-house' without the
high costs associated with using one of the major consultancies.
Developing a Consultation Strategy
tailored around your needs - taking full account of your organisations
strengths and resources
Why do it?
Your organisation has already achieved benefits from streamlining your
approach to other activities. We can be sure that Consultation is here
to stay – and is likely to grow. CPA and other regimes require it.
Taking time to rationalise your consultation activities will produce ‘gains’
that recur each year!
A Consultation Strategy tailored to your organisation’s
strengths will
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Produce
more consistent and professional results |
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Make
better use of your resources (including staff time) |
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Save
you money on a ‘like for like’ basis |
We
will need to gather
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information
on all future consultation activities |
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current
consultation materials |
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information
on consultation skills & training |
We
will work with you to produce
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An
overall consultation diary |
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A
structure for grading each consultation |
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An
overview of budget setting and management oversight that takes into
account the different grades of consultation |
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A
list of appropriate consultation activities for each grade of consultation
together with guidance on whether best undertaken ‘in-house’
or ‘contracted out’ |
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An
overview of staff consultation training needs – maximising
control whilst minimising demands on the time of key senior managers |
Developing
a Consultation ‘toolkit’ for your managers to use
Why do it?
Without proper guidance & templates to follow different consultations
take different shapes – making them confusing to residents and service
users – and often lead to higher overall costs and poor methodology.
By producing a consultation ‘toolkit’ containing guidance
on the main activities you have decided to use together with appropriate
templates for the main consultation materials you can ensure that each
consultation is professionally carried out to agreed standards - and within
a budget!
We will work with you to produce the appropriate
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Guidance
notes for carrying out the main ‘in-house’ consultation
activities |
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Templates
for the main consultation materials |
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A listing
of main stakeholder groups |
Consultation
project management
We can put together and run a whole consultation for you e.g. (e.g a pre-ballot
consultation or a Local Development Framework consultation)
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The
overall Communications & Consultations strategy |
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Newsletters |
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Videos |
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Residents
Meetings |
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Surveys
to measure awareness and understanding of key issues |
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Facilitating
Public Meetings |
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Stakeholder
consultations |
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Special
Interest Forum newsletters & feedback |
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Collation
and reporting on feedback |
Focus
Group Discussions
Focus Groups are not new to councils and RSLs with many doing the facilitation
in-house. Sometimes this leads to a varying level of quality in the facilitation.
A professional facilitator will usually be more aware of how the nature
of the group discussions can be adversely affected and will take steps
to avoid this.
Focus Group Discussions
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commonly
involve groups of 8-12 selected participants (with each group usually
selected on the basis of a 'common interest' background) discussing
a series of previously agreed topics |
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are
often used to follow up surveys which have highlighted issues which
need further probing e.g. |
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possible
policies that residents think might tackle anti-social behaviour |
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what
services might the council charge for and which should it not |
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priorities
for development of services for the disabled |
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what
range of services might residents prefer to see at the local
housing office |
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ways
of dealing with the problems of the Housing Waiting list |
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by comparing
the ‘results’ across discussion groups its possible to |
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highlight
areas of common agreement |
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identify
issues where one or more subgroups ‘disagree’ |
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provide
in-depth insight to the concerns and priorities of participants |
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CWA
services include
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Joint
working with you to prepare the group discussions |
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Recruitment
of the participants |
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Facilitation
of the discussion groups |
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Reporting
on the discussions |
Deliberative
Workshops
Deliberative Wrokshops differ from Focus Discussion Groups in that participants
are asked to come to a 'decision', based on specific information and concerns
given to them, so that we can see what matters and what does not matter
when the relevant decisions are made
Deliberative Workshops are often used to resolve ‘controversial’
matters e.g. the balance to be achieved between raising council tax levels
and cuts in spending;
Quite often 2 deliberative workshops are held in order to ‘test’
whether there is any difference in the concerns and compromises of different
subgroups
CWA services include
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Joint
working with you to prepare the workshops |
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Recruitment
of the participants |
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Facilitation
of the deliberative workshops |
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Summarising
the deliberative discussions with appropriate recommendations |
In-depth
interviews
In-depth interviews involve individuals over a period of say 2 hours or
more during which it is possible to go much more deeply into topics and
experiences in order to gain a quality of insight not possible from normal
interviewing
Stakeholder
Consultations
Whilst not new to councils and RSLs, Stakeholder consultations are often
undertaken on an ‘ad hoc’ basis – often leading to a
much lower level of ‘achievement’. CWA believe there is the
potential for councils and RSLs to add significant ‘added value’
by putting their stakeholder consultations on a much more professional
footing.
Stakeholder Consultations are where partner agencies and others whom we
believe to have a ‘more than average interest' in the decisions
of a Council, RSL or other Public Sector body are given a channel to 'feedback'
their experiences, views, concerns and priorities.
CWA often find that
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there
is no agreed listing of stakeholder groups |
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different
stakeholder consultations are conducted on a random ‘ad hoc’
basis rather than to a framework / calendar that stakeholders can
relate to |
CWA
can work with you to
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draw
up a diary of proposed stakeholder consultations |
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agree
the make up of the core stakeholder groups |
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put
together the essentials for carrying out stakeholder consultation
via your consultation website making use of electronic newsletters
and ‘feedback’ sheets distributed to stakeholders |
CWA
services include
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Working
with you to prepare |
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A
list of stakeholder groups |
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A
diary of stakeholder consultations |
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Creating
stakeholder electronic newsletters |
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Creating
a stakeholder consultation website |
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Managing
the stakeholder consultation website |
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Sending
email reminders to non-responding stakeholders to a consultation |
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Collating
& reporting on stakeholder feedback |
User
Groups / Special Interest forums
User Forums and Stakeholder Forums are a much more fundamental part of
a council’s pro-active communications strategy than most councils
allow for.
The
average person is said to ‘influence’ the view of 5 adult
relatives and 5 adult friends. An ‘activist’ (someone with
an active interest’ in a particular aspect of a council’s
activities will influence (for better or worse) many times that number.
Making
sure that ‘activist’s are kept fully informed about and fully
involved in specific activities the council is engaged in will go a long
way to ensuring that the wider community are kept ‘in touch’
with:
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what
the council is doing – and achieving |
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what
the specific dilemmas are that the council faces |
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how
the council has consulted on specific issues |
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how
the council has come to key decisions |
User
/ Special Interest Forums are extremely cost-effective when carried out
using Electronic Newsletters and electronic feedback sheets. By extending
and maintaining 'membership' the level of 'informed' knowledge within
the wider community builds up substantially over time.
Developing,
managing or hosting your Consultation website
CWA can create or manage your consultation website - typical ‘pages’
can include
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Your
Consultation Principles |
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Your
Consultation diary |
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Results
of your previous consultations |
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Your
Residents panel |
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Stakeholder
Consultations |
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User
/ Special Interest Forums |
CWA can also manage those parts of your Consultation website where the
all the main consultation is ‘electronic’
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Stakeholder
Consultations |
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User
/ Special Interest Forums |
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