Engagement Journey

Public engagement to obtain input can be vital towards advancing a new initiative, project, service, or plan. But common missteps can result in public engagement that is extractive, opaque, or one-sided in nature, heightening participation fatigue and mistrust between communities and the institutions that represent or serve them. The Engagement Journey is a tool for mapping the experience of an engagement process from the perspective of a participant. This tool helps practitioners adhere to values of information symmetry, transparency, authenticity, and equitable access and representation by thinking through the tactics of how input gathered from engagement is applied or factored into decision-making and how different stakeholders’ barriers to engagement are accounted for.