Go Vocal’s blog—get insights, advice, and all the latest information on trends to help you foster meaningful engagement.
Governments are strategically combining multiple tools and techniques to achieve a 10x improvement across operations, service delivery, customer experience, and mission outcomes. In this article, we'll explore what GovTech is, its benefits, how to implement it, and what the future holds for this exciting field.
Governments are strategically combining multiple tools and techniques to achieve a 10x improvement across operations, service delivery, customer experience, and mission outcomes. In this article, we'll explore what GovTech is, its benefits, how to implement it, and what the future holds for this exciting field.
Participatory democracy is a form of government that has gained significant traction over the past years, making government more responsive and decisions more equitable. This article explores the principles, benefits, and challenges of participatory democracy, comparing it to other forms of democratic governance.
For governments at all levels seeking ways to engage their constituents in decision-making and agenda setting, proposals are a powerful, generative tool that help close the gap between top-down measures and bottom-up movements.
Building a community where residents trust their government requires a strategic and intentional approach to engagement. To ensure your initiatives are successful, it's essential to establish a strong community engagement strategy based on the following six pillars.
Climate change, social equity, affordable housing, and sustainable mobility top the list of priorities for local governments. To address these effectively, there's an urgent need for better planning tools to meaningfully engage residents in the decision-making process. That’s why we’ve recently released a significant upgrade of our platform's interactive Mapping suite, turning it into a powerful toolbox for local governments and planners to harness collective wisdom and foster collaborative problem-solving.
Ensuring equal participation in decision-making processes for all community members is paramount. Digital accessibility stands at the forefront of this inclusive approach. By embracing accessibility, we help you unlock the potential for diverse voices to contribute, fostering a more representative and dynamic democratic process.
Summer, with its promise of warm weather and vacations, naturally draws people outdoors to explore and enjoy their surroundings more than any other season, making residents experience their community spaces in new and different ways compared to the colder, darker months. That's why summer's an ideal moment to tap into the collective intelligence of your community and learn about ideas for improvement if you ask us!
Engaging the public on the complex topic of local planning poses significant challenges. To explore how a well-crafted communications strategy can help overcome these hurdles, we sat down with Mark Prichard, the Head of Communications for West Oxfordshire, Cotswold, and Forest of Dean Councils (UK) to talk about their recent success.
One of our Public Square podcast episodes takes us to the bustling metropolis of New York City, where the Public Engagement Unit (PEU), under the leadership of Adrienne Lever has developed an innovative approach to community engagement. Our conversation with her unveiled key insights and actionable strategies from their work, offering a blueprint for UK councils and organisations aiming to enhance community engagement and public service effectiveness.
In 2023, we launched our updated Events feature and have already seen it help boost engagement: 54% of event attendees had never contributed to their city’s consultation before. And our early results tell us that events are the perfect introduction to the world of participation – they have a strong ability to attract residents who are early in their participation journeys. In fact, 46% of event attendees contribute to other projects!
Harnessing the full power of your community engagement platform requires effective moderation. This ensures vibrant, inclusive dialogue, and boosts trust. Dive into best practices to enhance the quality and productivity of the conversations on your platform.
Whether you’re looking to launch a project, are already running one, or have reached the report-out phase, a strong communications plan will help drive the success of your efforts. In this article, we discuss the five basic principles of a good communications plan for your community engagement efforts.
As one of Go Vocal's co-founders, current Regional Director and previous Head of Government Success and Commercial Director, Aline Muylaert has extensive experience working with local governments to develop and implement successful community engagement initiatives. We sat down for an interview with Aline to discuss the importance of leadership buy-in and ambition in building a culture of engagement.
Traditionally, community engagement has been compartmentalized into offline and online methods, often treated as distinct and separate elements. However, the evolving needs and preferences of the public call for a paradigm shift. It’s time to blend these worlds, for instance by using digital engagement platforms as enhancers of offline community engagement. This integration promises to streamline processes and enrich the quality of participation.
More and more local governments are engaging their communities in decision-making. Whether it’s to increase trust or create more inclusive policies, community engagement has become a central part of local government and we’ve found that digital engagement with CitizenLab leads to 12x more participation on average. To help local governments keep up, engagement teams are being formed in cities all across the country.
So, you’ve engaged your community. You’ve asked residents and stakeholders to share ideas, cast votes, or take part in a survey. You might’ve even asked them to allocate budgets or invited them to an online workshop. And now, your community engagement results are in.
Over the last few years, there’s been a shift from top-down governance to more horizontally organised types of government. This new political current includes all the stakeholders of public policy projects, such as public organisations, businesses and citizens, into the decision-making process.
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From costly expenses to loss of control, several misconceptions about community engagement can hinder local governments from unlocking the full potential of participatory democracy to this day. In this blog post, we’ll explore five of the most-heard myths and why they’re not true.
Citizen initiatives – also known as community proposals – are often seen as a potential antidote to growing political disaffection in many parts of the world. However, not all proposal programs are the same. We have identified four key success factors.
We hear it often: you want to reach more of your community, and go beyond the same 10 loudest voices in the room. You want your process to be more inclusive so that everyone has the tools necessary to fully participate. However, some groups are harder to reach than others. So how do you reach beyond your usual audience?
Every local government and organisation that has launched a community engagement project knows the challenge: How do you reach underrepresented groups? In this article, we’ll cover some of the good practices for inclusive community engagement so that you’ll be ready to broaden your participation and activate even hard-to-reach target groups.
Placemaking is a people-centered approach to urban planning that focuses on transforming public spaces in a way that brings communities together and creates beautiful, accessible, and interactive cities. Leading with the goal to meet the needs of their residents and create more authentic and welcoming spaces, local governments have been turning to community engagement methods, including digital platforms, in their placemaking initiatives. Community participation allows councils to directly connect with residents and gather fresh ideas and information on how public spaces should be used and improved. This allows communities to grow and adapt according to the needs of the people who live in them.
While the full participation ladder is made up of various methods for community engagement, sometimes local government projects simply necessitate a fast and decisive turnaround when consulting residents and other stakeholders. And that goes two ways, with residents also wanting options to engage with fellow community members’ ideas and see a more direct line of influence on local decision-making.
Public spaces should be equitably distributed, open to everyone, and inclusively designed. It’s no wonder that many urban planning processes now focus on placemaking, the people-centered approach to planning and design of public spaces. More than ever before, there is recognition of the importance of neighbourhoods and the significance of factors such as walkability, public transportation, access to jobs, and diverse housing options. And even beyond their immediate neighbourhoods, people’s expectations of the public realm have changed.
Open government is one of the most closely watched trends in GovTech. While the idea that governments should be more transparent and collaborative isn’t new, it has been gaining momentum in recent years. The growth of public-private partnerships and the development of increasingly complex algorithms behind democratic tools have also reinforced the calls for accountability and openness.
“Young people are the future.” When it comes to engaging and involving our youth, this quote is often mindlessly tossed about and hailed as a key motivator. Of course, empowering our youngest will serve us well for years to come, but young people are very much already here and ready to part in the public debate. That’s why we spoke with Emily and Justin, two inspiring young residents who are both actively involved in youth engagement programmes linked to North Ayrshire Council in Scotland.
