Good engagement - why the kitchen table matters.
Good engagement - why the kitchen table matters.
The rise of social media and online platforms have, not unsurprisingly, found their way into stakeholder engagement practices. And, like everything new and shiny, their presence should be greeted with a big wide welcome and a healthy dose of pragmatism.
Whether it’s a mine, a windfarm, a road, a rail line, or any number of other significant projects – these developments herald change. Change brings economic, social, environmental and lifestyle uncertainty. There will be people who support your project and people who don’t. There will be people who want to be involved and people who won’t. How you reach your stakeholders, and how you sustain that engagement can play a critical role in a project’s success, its wider impacts and your corporate reputation.
The Opportunities
Increasingly, the boundaries between our ‘online’ and ‘offline’ worlds are blurring. Our stakeholders seek information from numerous channels, and they communicate and engage via various mediums.
The evolution of social media and a growing number of online platforms and tools means companies can reach more stakeholders faster. There are online tools that can be used to engage with stakeholders to seek input and feedback. Email lists, online surveys, social media posts being the most easily recognised.
There are also websites where stakeholder input on specific projects can be sought as part of voluntary or mandated consultation processes (Engage Victoria is one example) and there are a growing number of consultancies and programs designed to manage online engagement strategies and activities with a view to increasing civic engagement and public participation.
The potential for enhanced stakeholder engagement offered by this online world lies within the access and agency these platforms provide to stakeholders. However, caution should be taken not to regard these platforms as offering a quick fix to engagement challenges. Online tools can only enhance engagement if delivered under the banner of a clear, strategic engagement goal, and an adequate investment in the resources required to facilitate and manage the online engagement environment.
The Risks
Social media and online platforms provide different ways to reach and engage with a wide spectrum of stakeholders. However, we need to be mindful that we don’t filter out the emotion, the space and the time needed to build empathy and understanding.
Crickets and papaya salad, Thailand. Photo credit: Lisa Ritchie.
Crickets and papaya salad, Thailand. Photo credit: Lisa Ritchie.
This is why the kitchen table matters.
Each and every country and context has its ‘kitchen table and cup of tea’ equivalent– you may be seated on the ground with rice, or in a hut with milk, or in a designated community meeting place with kava or even a Coke. Or papaya salad and fried crickets, like those pictured.
The very act of being invited to sit at the ‘kitchen table’ indicates a willingness to share, and to listen. These experiences are difficult to replicate online.
I once sat with a husband and wife in the kitchen of what was their family home, where they had raised their children and farmed the land through the good and bad years.
They had received a handsome payout as the result of their property being compulsorarily acquired as part of a project development. They bought a waterfront property and retired. I’d heard talk in the community about how lucky this couple were. Others lamented that their properties had not been bought. But, there, sitting at that kitchen table in their former family home, the emotional toll on this couple was palpable. While they recognised they had been offered a good ‘financial deal’, they were struggling with the loss of their land, a loss of community connection and a loss of identity.
At that kitchen table the conversation was raw and honest. This conversation was one of a many similar conversations with other residents that prompted the company in question to review not only their approach to property acquisition, but to engagement more broadly. This could not have happened through online engagement mechanisms alone – where the emotion can be filtered, and the responses edited or ‘curated’ with a very wide, very public audience in mind. And without the emotion, empathy is reduced. Without empathy, the ability to understand is limited. And without understanding, change will not be instigated.
An eye needs to be kept on what can be lost as we celebrate all that we gain in terms of online stakeholder engagement. A pragmatic approach to the benefits and the constraints offered by online and social media platforms is critical.
Finding the Balance
No project, no company and no group of stakeholders will ever be the same. Understand your engagement objectives and understand your stakeholders. It is within the nexus of the engagement objectives and stakeholder needs and priorities that a tailored engagement strategy will emerge.
Multi-pronged, multi-faceted engagement ‘toolkit’. Your engagement ‘toolkit’ needs to include activities and approaches that address the real, the perceived and the possible. The best toolkits will have a mix of online and face-to-face engagement strategies and be tailored to the project, the context, the engagement objectives and the stakeholders.
Review, revisit and revise. Good stakeholder engagement is not something you can ‘set and forget’. Engagement needs will evolve with time, with project progress and with external factors beyond your control. Revisit and revise your strategy as much as you need. And don’t forget to involve your stakeholders as you do.
Ultimately, it would be unlikely that any modern-day engagement strategy would not employ a mix of online and ‘offline’ tools and approaches. The magic lies in navigating the intersection of our stakeholders’ online and offline worlds and, ultimately, in proactively reaching out to our stakeholders, whatever the mechanism.
References
Bosetti, L 2015 ‘Engaging Stakeholders through Facebook. The Case if Global Compact Lead Participants’, in K Cermakova (ed) Proceedings of the 2nd Business and Management Conference, Madrid, pp. 21-42, http://www.iises.net/proceedings/2nd-business-management-conference-madrid/table-of-content/detail?article=engaging-stakeholders-through-facebook-the-case-of-global-compact-lead-participants
Featured Image
Autumn kitchen table by eren {sea + prairie} CC BY 2.0