As 2024 wraps up, our facilitation team is sharing their standout moments. From mysteriously missing catering and questionable gong skills to a surprise bush trek under the stars, 2024 had its fair share of laughs, twists, and unforgettable memories.
The City of Melbourne views affordable housing as crucial infrastructure for maintaining a liveable, inclusive, and prosperous city. With a projected shortfall of 23,200 affordable homes by 2036, immediate action is needed to address this long-standing issue. While there is broad community support for affordable housing, acceptance often wanes at the neighbourhood level. To tackle this, a People’s Panel of 39 diverse community members was established to represent local perspectives.
A support facilitator studying psychology, our first team member based in NSW and a brand new participant recruitment coordinator... meet the newest additions to the MosaicLab team: Polo, Polly and Gus! Learn more about this trio of terrific team members and gain some insights into who they REALLY are through their answers to our fast five questions!
How should we plan for the new energy future while providing affordable services that meet changing customer and community needs? Two representative ‘Voice of the Customer’ panels in Queensland answered this question. Randomly selected, everyday customers deliberated and agreed on recommendations that electricity distributors Ergon Energy Network and Energex used to prepare Regulatory Proposals for the Australian Energy Regulator (AER). Delve into a tale of two deliberative customer panels, and gain ideas and insights you can draw on for your next project.
We believe in supporting emerging and underserved people and communities to have deeper conversations that lead to stronger democracies. ML Giving is the new name of the not-for-profit part of MosaicLab - a banner for the work we do that gives back. We’re focussing on furthering community inclusion and action beyond just getting input and instead moving into enabling local decision-making. Explore the principles ML Giving will operate under, and the kind of projects and conversations we’re supporting.
To help local councils in Victoria navigate the deliberative engagement requirements in the new Local Government Act, MosaicLab has launched a free, short guide.
This e-book is specifically for local government staff and decision makers, and aims to provide assistance and information to help councils better understand deliberative engagement, its principles and how it can be implemented into council processes to meet the new requirements of the Act.
Since COVID-19 started impacting our engagement world, people have been telling us they’re worried about reaching and including those who aren’t online and/or those they believe are ‘hard to reach’.
Not only are we talking about two different issues or cohorts here, but we’re also exploring a topic that’s prone to myths and misconceptions. Often people we think are ‘beyond reach’ aren’t, and people who we label ‘hard to reach’ are simply waiting to be found.
It takes time, effort and resources to achieve best practice engagement at the best of times. And right now it’s not the best of times. We’re hearing from many that engaging at all (let alone engaging well) is difficult.
Your organisation may be grappling with how to respond to the crisis, facing reduced revenue and budget cuts, responding to increased demand for community support and services, and wondering how to sustain it all long term. Local government bodies are also working to comply with the enhanced engagement requirements set out in the Local Government Act.
So we’ve announced two new service options designed to help you engage robustly, cost-effectively and appropriately.
Take a peek at some of the online training sessions and workshops MosaicLab has been facilitating over the past few weeks. From community bushfire inquiry meetings to online sessions for the development of wildlife plans and internal training courses - we’ve been very busy in the digital space this past month.
This post tackles a big, scary dilemma – conflict, outrage and emotion. We’re often asked for advice around this topic, because it’s something that worries many people in the engagement space - even experienced practitioners and facilitators.
Partly, this fear is underpinned by a lack of ‘tools’ or skills. So, we’re going to give you some tips to help you prepare for and/or work with conflict, outrage and emotion in a meaningful way.
Because it’s a big, difficult topic, we’re going to address it in two parts: Part one (this post) is about how to plan for it, and in part two (next month) we’ll talk about what to do if you walk into it unexpectedly.
Deliberation can be refer to either a micro-process (something you can build into part of a session or engagement process) or a full deliberative democracy process (such as a citizens’ jury).
Deliberative engagement has a lot of potential benefits - these processes can lead to new solutions to challenging problems, improve policy outcomes and engender trust between citizens and decision makers.
So, is deliberation always the right answer/process? The short answer is no.
We’re kicking off our 2019 #MonthlyMyth series by addressing a topic we’re often asked about. We’ve noticed that it’s an issue that makes organisations nervous. There’s a fear that (where a randomly selected panel or jury is involved) stakeholder and interest groups will be cut out of the conversation and oppose the process or decision.
Luckily, not only is it important to incorporate these groups in a deliberative process, there’s also lots of ways they can be involved. Today we’re exploring why it’s a good idea to do so, and giving you seven ways to bring them on your deliberative journey.
This month’s myth addresses mistaken assumption that offering people less influence over a decision translates to the organisation having increased control over the process and outcomes.
Some engagement processes lend themselves to a lower level of influence than others, However, if the intention is to reduce influence in an attempt to ‘manage’ the process, control outcomes, cut corners or minimise time and resources, organisations can find themselves in hot water.
Read on for 6 key questions you can ask to determine the right level of influence and a list of helpful reading and resources.
Want to get the best possible value out of the consultant or facilitator you engage? Hoping to minimise wasted time, money and resources? Seeking to deliver an engagement process that’s as effective as possible? Our tip: don’t develop a detailed engagement methodology before you appoint your consultant.
This month’s myth explores the potential consequences of this all too common error and provides 4 steps to achieving the best possible return on your consultant investment and delivering an effective process.
