Working Collaboratively
Actively involving stakeholders in projects is quite different from simply informing them about what is going on. There are lots of ways you can engage people with your project. A few suggestions are given below. The JISC infoNet Social Software infoKit has lots more good ideas on how to make use of freely available and easy-to-use technologies to encourage collaboration.
Social events - to develop buy-in, team spirit and to spread positive messages. Bring people together to look at plans, architectural drawings, presentations from those who have done it before etc. A glass of wine and a few nibbles are inexpensive and can help persuade people to stay half an hour after normal office hours.
Workshops and training events - good for collaborative approaches as well as for imparting skills and information. Stakeholders feel less threatened at being asked to attend a staff development event than a meeting or an interview. By keeping the number of delegates down to around 15-20 you can stimulate lots of interaction with delegates. People feel engaged and valued if you allow them a say or want them to give an opinion.
FAQ or Q&A - can be an effective tool which can be designed with responses targeted for particular stakeholder groups. Helps build engagement and makes people feel involved. You may be tempted to make up the questions you feel people might want to ask but if possible build in as many real questions as possible, as those who ask them will recognise them and spread the word on your behalf. You could create a specific email account for FAQ questions.
Wikis - are one way of letting people collaborate either with or within the project. The use of a wiki for the project team is well worth thinking about, particularly if the project is a collaborative project with many organisational partners. It provides a platform for sharing documents, images, plans and logs of what might happen, what needs to happen and what has happened. It can have pages where the content is locked, pages that anyone can add to or amend and the facility for members to create their own new pages.
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