Conversation Caravan was engaged by Bayside City Council to facilitate a workshop with its senior leaders and staff interested and/or involved in advocacy across Council. The process, led by the Communications and Governance Department, required the support of all departments and was to be utilised to inform the development of Bayside City Council’s Advocacy Strategy.
Historically, advocacy planning and implementation has been the responsibility of everyone, no one had complete oversight and as a result, advocacy was neither planned or implemented strategically. This diluted both the effectiveness and the impact of Council’s efforts.
Following on from the recent success of a ‘pre-election’ Open House and a recognition of the increased importance of advocacy, Bayside City Council required a coordinated, collaborative and strategic approach to the planning, implementation and evaluation of its advocacy work.
As a result of this process Bayside City Council required a:
- Clear vision, goals and strategic objectives to base the Strategy.
- Framework to set the advocacy priorities (short term and medium term).
- Guide (implementation plan) to educate staff on ‘Advocacy at Bayside City Council’
- Process for ongoing monitoring and evaluation.
- Plan to embed advocacy across Council and into Council’s communication and political channels.
Assistance required from Conversation Caravan to support this process:
- Preparation and facilitation of an internal workshop with staff responsible and interested in advocacy within Bayside.
- Sense making of the data collected to input into the Advocacy Strategy and areas as relevant.