The Stakeholder Engagement Manual Volume 2 - AccountAbility

Engage with your stakeholders in ways that work
P15: DESIGNING THE ENGAGEMENT PROCESS
Logistics
Where and when will the engagement take place? Will it be a ‘one-off ’,
or a series of events? Take into account the needs of participants: Is the venue
comfortable, accessible, neutral? Is the location convenient and accessible
by public and private transportation? Does the timing fi t in with stakeholders’
other commitments and concerns e.g. work, childcare, harvest time, safety,
religious festival. Provide food, lodging and transportation as necessary. If it is an
international event, will some stakeholders be jet lagged or overwhelmed by the
foreign environment?
If you are planning an online engagement process make sure it is accessible from
diff erent platforms and to people without broadband or the latest browsers and
plug-ins.
Make sure you have enough room for planned activities (e.g. break-outs), ensure
that acoustics and lighting are good. Plan the seating arrangements to support
your objectives (e.g. semi-circular or round formats for discussions rather than
podium and audience, tables or fl ipcharts for writing on).
Record keeping and assurance
Make plans for keeping a record of who attended, proceedings, outcomes and
any commitments made during the engagement, which will need to be followed
up. How will this record be assured (for example by circulating to all present for
comment/sign-off or through the involvement of an external facilitator/assurance
provider – see Stage 5 for further details on assurance).
How will the proceedings and outcomes of the engagement be communicated
and to whom? What records need to be kept for your audit trail? Do you need
to assure participants of complete confi dentiality or complete openness – or
something in between (e.g. Chatham house rule)?
Do you need to directly record the proceedings using video or audio recording
or photography? Make sure participants know and don’t mind being recorded.
What are you going to do with the recording?
Signals of success
Consider how you will judge whether the process has been successful. Set
targets for input, output and outcome indicators of success such as, engagement
going to plan, participant numbers, participant feedback, media coverage,
consensus reached.
Plan methods for participants to provide feedback about their satisfaction with
the process itself. Th e case box below provides a good example of how this can
be done.