resources

10 Question to Ask Before Starting a Public Consultation

Jason Diceman — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:08:13 -0600

Recently Joseph Peters (Partner at Ascentum) and Joe Goldman (Vice President of Citizen Engagement at AmericaSpeaks) published an excellent two page article called: Open Policy Making 101: 10 Questions To Ask Before Launching Your Online Public Consultation

While their well thought out list is focused on online consultation, the questions also apply to creating plans for effective offline public consultations.

Here are their 10 questions:

What do you want to know?
What is your commitment to participants?
Who needs to participate?
How hot is the issue?
What type of contribution are you looking for?
What type of data will you collect and analyze?
What are your timelines?
What resources are available to support the process?
How can participants stay involved?
Which online tools should you use?

Read the full article for concise explanations of each question.

Action Implementation Plan - a two page template

Jason Diceman — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 09:36:58 -0500

For BikeCamp TO I created a simple one page (two-sided) form to help small groups to document a plan to get something done.

Sections included in the form are:

Name for the plan
Desired results to be achieved and strategies to be used
Key strengths, challenges, opportunities and threats (aka a SWOT analysis)
Contact information for team members
Timeline of important tasks and major milestones

This simple template can help focus ad-hoc teams and give concrete outcomes to open space conferences. I hope you find it useful!

Download the Action Implementation Plan form (PDF)

Consensus Decision-Making Workshop Matierials

Jason Diceman — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 11:18:31 -0500

On September 29th 2009, my self and Simone Arsenault-May presented an evening workshop for parents at the Grove Community School, a new alternative school part of the Toronto District School Board.

This workshop focused on teaching the basics of a consensus process that uses cooperative dialogue. It also covered techniques for an efficient council and tools for effective community engagement.

A Public Involvement in Decision Making Toolkit

Jason Diceman — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 11:07:14 -0500

Back in 2000 Health Canada published an excellent resource called The Health Canada Policy Toolkit for Public Involvement in Decision Making.
It is a complete toolkit with guidelines, about 50 techniques described in concise details and with useful suggestions, and also case studies and references. I highly recommend it as a definitive reference on the various options for effective public engagement within the Canadian context. You can access other free resources in my links section.

Visualize information to make it accessible

Jason Diceman — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 13:36:50 -0600

Public consultation and engagement requires a two-way flow of communication between the proponent (the organization doing the consultation) and the public. The public needs to have information presented in a way that is easy to understand and this can be done, in part, by using good visuals. I recommend the booklet "Visualizing Information for Advocacy: An Introduction to Information Design" as a good resource to review before creating your public information materials. It's written for NGOs who do advocacy, but the suggestions apply just as well to public consultations.

A great guide to public consultation

Jason Diceman — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 14:11:50 -0600

I recently found this manual...

PUBLIC CONSULTATION GUIDE:
CHANGING THE REIATIONSHIP BETWEEN GOVERNMENT AND CANADIANS
By Peter Sterne with Sandra Zagon
http://dsp-psd.pwgsc.gc.ca/Collection/SC94-62-19-1997E.pdf

I am finding it very useful for planning public consultations required for environmental assements. The detailed Roadmap Model gives 51 key steps one should carry out to conduct a successful public participation process. Written in 1997 it's a bit out of date in terms of more conteporary approaches, such as the use of online tools, but it is still very worth while and insightful for consultants and government folks in Canada and beyond. Pass it on!

An excellent list of governance dialogue techniques

Jason Diceman — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 17:42:44 -0500

Thanks to Alice Byers of ISEALl Alliance for a link to quantumgovernance.ca, which lists a wide variety of descriptions and resources for planning and managing governance dialogue. Visit quantumgovernance.ca/QuantumManagerialToolkit

Below I have copied their links to various governance dialogue options...

Broad-based Stakeholder Advisory Panels

Centralized Enabling Agencies

Citizens' juries

Consensus conferences

Deliberative polls

E-rulemaking

Focus groups

Input accountability

National Issues Forums

Online Dialogue/Public Forums

Participatory Budgeting

Partnerships

Scenario Workshops

Town Meetings

Learning and Design Forum

CHAT

Q Methodology

Managerial Toolkit Inventory

I have added this link to my links section.

Collections of Engagement Techniques

Jason Diceman — Fri, 18 May 2007 17:29:22 -0500

Beyond the short list of techniques suggested in the Co-op Tools List, there are a wide array of popular and proven methods for engaging citizens in public policy development or members in organization change. Here are some of the best resource collections for learning more about the various approaches. All are free to access online, unless stated otherwise.

People & Participation Methods Database
Detailed descriptions of over 30 participatory methods including their strengths and weaknesses. (Involve, UK)

The Health Canada Policy Toolkit for Public Involvement in Decision Making
A complete toolkit with guidelines, about 50 techniques described in concise details and with useful suggestions and also case studies and references. An excellent free resource.

Quantum Governance Toolkit
Concise lists of descriptions and resources for planning and managing governance dialogue. (Institute of Public Administration of Canada's Centre for Governance Dialogue)

Urban Research Program / Citizen Science Toolbox
Over 60 community involvement tools, many case studies and with useful searching tools. (Coastal Cooperative Research Centre, Australia)

Dialogue and Deliberation Models and Techniques
Over 400 resources on about 25 different approaches. (National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation, USA)

Co-Intelligent Practices, Approaches, Processes and Organizations
Over 50 items listed with many links to related resources.

The Change Handbook
A textbook that summarizes and compares 60 of the most popular methods (for purchase).

Governance Links

Jason Diceman — Wed, 16 May 2007 13:00:58 -0500

Boards and committees, by-laws and policies: these are some of the core elements of traditional governance. Below are links to recommended resources that delve into this topic.

Institute On Governance: Learning Tools - From basics to assessment. Great explanations and examples. Start here.
BoardDevelopment.org - A great collection of guidance for boards and committees.
BoardSource.org - Excellent collection of nonprofit board Q & A.
Co-operative Governance Manual by the Co-operative Federation of Victoria, Australia.
Co-operative Governance Newsletter Archives from the Canadian Co-operative Association
jannicemoore.com - A policy governance specialist with excellent introductory resources.
Policy Governance® Defined - A complete and useful theory for how an organization and it's board can effectively conduct themselves based on the use of policies.
Free Toolkit for Boards of Directors - Large collection of links assembled by Carter McNamara, PhD.
Examples of policies from assorted Egalitarian Communities
Bylaws: How Strong Is Your Co-op's Foundation?- An article by Karen Zimbelman
Distribution of Powers between the Board of Directors and Members
Co-operative Corporations Act - from Lawyer Iler-Campbell

Sample By-laws http://www.iog.ca/publications/sample_bylaws.pdf

http://www.ilercampbell.com/files/GeneralByLawCoop.pdf - worker co-op

http://www.ilercampbell.com/files/GeneralByLawNonCoop.pdf - non-worker, non-housing co-op

Roberts Rules of Order

Although Co-op Tools recommends consensus decision-making, we realize that many organizations still use a Robert's Rules structured meetings and voting guidelines.

Robert's Rules of Order - Some Basics Edited by Carter McNamara, PhD

robertsrules.org

A Positive Review of "The Community Planning Handbook"

Jason Diceman — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 19:31:44 -0500

An excellent resource for conducting citizen consultation and engagement into neighbourhood development.

The Community Planning Handbook:
How people can shape their cities, town and villages in any part of the world.
by Nick Wates.
Published by Earthscan Publications Limited, 2000.

This book is the A-Z of community lead local planning. It includes 200 pages of concise and clearly explained principles, methods, example scenarios, forms, check lists, a glossary, contacts and other incredibly useful how-to resources. This manual is very useful for urban planning consultants, progressive municipal authorities and communities leaders that want to ensure the voice of the people who will be affected by local construction are part of the decision making process. Nick Wates writes from a perspective of real world experience with lots of practical tips for situations that vary from ideal community owned projects to last minute public consultation in a traditional city planing process.

This manual is designed to be easily searched for ideas and practical direction in planning and organizing events, managing processes and establishing organizations to involve and empower citizens to give informed direction to the designs and implementation of changes to the architecture in their communities. The text is written from a UK perspective although there is considerable effort made to include photos and context from other nations, especially from rural villages in places like China, India, Fiji, Kenya and the Philippines. Jeremy Brook's graphical design is very user friendly with hundreds of illustrative photos, diagrams, time lines and information boxes.

Although “The Community Planning Handbook” is written within a limited scope of physical planning and design for villages, towns and cities, many of the principles, methods and suggestions are still applicable to other situations of participatory planning, such as public policy and organizational change. If you want to help manage organization and community efforts that are bottom-up, buy this book and keep it on your desk.