Services who carry out consultations are often trying to reach the same people (residents and employees). Given how busy everyone is, it’s important that we do all possible to avoid consultation fatigue which will happen if we overload the same people with consultation requests.
To help avoid this, we have produced the Community Engagement app, which lists consultations and surveys that council services have already carried out with local communities, and information about what communities told us in response. It also lists engagement exercises that we know are planned in future. It can help you to find information from previous council engagement exercises that may be of use to you – reduce the work you have to do and plan the best timing for your consultation or survey, avoiding other services’ exercises. The Community Engagement App can be found here – Community Engagement App
The term ‘consultation’ should be used as a descriptor only when consulting under statutory obligation. This is because statutory obligations require public bodies to consult on specific issues to ensure fairness and transparency in decision-making. This ensures that the consultation process is conducted fairly and that the views of those affected are considered in the decision-making process.
‘Engagement’ is the term that should be used for non-statutory surveys.
If you are planning a consultation or an engagement just now please look on the council’s ‘Consultation‘ section of the website to get an idea of other consultations running.
Please register your upcoming consultation /engagement with the Comms Team – workingtogether@argyll-bute.gov.uk – so it can be added published to the consultation diary on the website.
We have developed a step-by-step guide to carrying out a consultation.
We’ve also developed a checklist to make sure you have taken all the necessary steps in carrying out a consultation.
So we can all do more of what works and less of what doesn’t, we have pulled together a list of good practice points, learned through experience.