Contents this month
Dialogue Designer
Designing public and stakeholder engagement processes is both
art and science. The art part comes from long experience and some
intuition about how people and processes tend to function.
The science part is more objective and based, like all science,
as much on knowing what does not work as what does. It boils
down to taking all the key variables -
What do you want from it?
Who should be involved?
How sensitive or complex are the issues?
How long have you got?
- computing the possible methods, rejecting those that will
not deliver, and then choosing between those that remain.
Sounds simple? It is, now, because we have developed Dialogue
Designer to do all the hard work for you.
We used to think the art part of process design was too complex
to reproduce in any meaningful way: all that staring at the ceiling
and endless mulling over the possibilities. But we know that
the art is based on some sound principles: knowing what type
of results you need; understanding the sort of responses you
get from different people; learning how to tackle complex issues
in sensitive situations; appreciating how long a task can take.
Dialogue Designer uses the principles of process design and
computes the results for you. It takes you through a sequence
of four questions and each time you respond gives you some sage
advice or points you to something you need to consider. When
you have answered the final question it tells you what methods
would work for you and tells you more about them.
There is one aspect of Dialogue Designer we regret. The fact
that it will probably make redundant all of us process artists.
Go to the website to use Dialogue Designer - FREE
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