ENABLING PEOPLE AND ORGANISATIONS TO SOLVE THEIR OWN PROBLEMS AND MAKE ROBUST DECISIONS TOGETHER
If your communities and stakeholders agreed on the best shared way forward, and signed up to doing their part to make it happen, what would that mean for your work and impact?
I am a facilitator and engagement expert with a firm belief communities and stakeholders will find the best way forward together if given the chance to listen and be heard and if provided with the tools and processes to progress from the problem space to an agreed solution.
I design end-to-end engagement processes and run highly interactive in-person and virtual workshops at the trickiest points of a project, borrowing from design thinking, systems thinking, program logic, behaviour change, deliberative democracy and other frameworks.
I love variety. I've completed projects across strategic/spatial planning, housing, energy, water, transport, health, agriculture, education, regulatory services, video gaming, community resilience, internal strategy, change management and more.
I've also worked with everyone from executives and board members to subject matter experts and end users/ communities, and often join forces with other firms to ensure we have the right suite of skills to get a job done.
I'm most interested in projects that deliver tangible benefits for the 'more-than-human' (Earth's animals and environment) and for the most vulnerable humans among us.
Scott Lappan-Newton | Director, Gauge
KEY SERVICES
DEVELOPING ENGAGEMENT STRATEGIES
Co-designing communication, engagement and business strategies with clients who have decisions to make, projects/programs to deliver or new business to secure
DESIGNING AND FACILITATING WORKSHOPS
Co-designing workshops with clients and providing expert face-to-face and online facilitation for internal, external, Executive and grassroots stakeholders
BUILDING STAKEHOLDER RELATIONSHIPS
Directly engaging stakeholders or advising clients how to build their own strong relationships on sensitive and aspirational projects using an ecosystem mindset
DELIVERING ENGAGEMENT
Implementing communications and engagement strategies, including reliable project coordination, content production and running of engagement activities
REPORTING AND EVALUATING
Helping clients make sense of and apply engagement insights and work with stakeholders to evaluate and update their future engagement approaches
DESIGNING & DELIVERING TRAINING
Designing bespoke, highly-interactive virtual and in-person modules using client content or Gauge's own content on engagement, facilitation and problem-solving
EXAMPLE PROJECTS
INFRASTRUCTURE NSW
Classification: State Government / Stakeholder Engagement / Strategy Design / Facilitation / Virtual
Objective: Work with government and community partners to develop an engagement strategy for flood preparedness in the Hawkesbury-Nepean Valley that genuinely put community at the centre
Summary: Gauge designed and ran engagement with community organisations and state agencies to understand opportunities for improving the Community Resilience Program. Scott then worked with the program team and bd Infrastructure and Clear Horizon to co-design a program logic that strategically targets INSW's resources and an engagement strategy with innovative mechanisms for genuinely putting community at the centre of decision-making and action on flood preparedness.
AUSGRID
Classification: Private Sector / Internal Engagement / Co-Design / Facilitation / Virtual
Objective: Receive Reset Consumer Panel endorsement of a co-designed engagement framework for Ausgrid’s Regulatory Reset 2024 - 2029.
Summary: Gauge led the design and facilitation of an extensive co-design process with key Ausgrid staff and the Reset Consumer Panel to inform the regulatory reset engagement approach being developed by bd Infrastructure. Scott made use of virtual workshopping tools and consensus-building approaches to reach agreement on engagement objectives, stakeholders, topics and approaches. Ausgrid has since employed Gauge to co-deliver the framework's deliberative core, as well as stakeholder forums on hot Reset issues.
SHOALHAVEN CITY COUNCIL
Classification: Local Government / Community Engagement / Design & Mediation / Virtual & In-Person
Objective: Overcome polarised stakeholder sentiment to arrive at whole-of-community guidance and insights to guide Council’s policy development
Summary: In 2021, Council kicked off extensive engagement with the formation of a 120-person community advisory group. Gauge designed a whole-of-project, iterative engagement approach based on flushing out needs and interests, developing a shared criteria for success, gathering suggestions and exploring trade-offs. The approach included both deep (via focus groups) and wide engagement (via a survey that received 1396 responses), all of which Gauge synthesised into 39 key findings in a public report.
COMMON EQUITY
Classification: Non-Profit Sector / Vulnerable Stakeholder Engagement / Facilitation / In-Person
Objective: Deliver an inclusive and engaging forum with co-op members to gather their input into challenges that affect the sector and their co-ops
Summary: Gauge designed a highly-interactive whole-day in-person workshop that enabled CALD and elderly co-op members to express their concerns, take shared ownership over challenges and workshop solutions. Participants created sculptures to identify problems in the system, stood along a continuum to discuss and vote on options and brainstormed actions they can take to address priority issues. Scott drove the group towards 17 endorsed items for Common Equity's Action Plan.
WESTERN SYDNEY UNIVERSITY
Classification: Education Sector / Customer Engagement / Citizens Panel / In-Person
Objective: Employ an innovative deliberative process to develop student recommendations on how their voice could be supported at Western Sydney University
Summary: Gauge brought Western Sydney University and deliberative democracy experts newDemocracy together to help the University address systemic issues of lower student engagement. Scott co-developed the Panel's briefing documents and designed and ran four full-day workshops that enabled the 32 panellists to reach consensus on the root causes of the problem and collaboratively write their own recommendations report, which the Vice-Chancellor committed to implementing.
Click here to see the workshops in action
DELOITTE
Classification: Private Sector / Internal Training / Structured Problem Solving / Virtual
Objective: Design and deliver engaging ‘structured problem solving’ training junior and senior staff
Summary: Gauge was approached by Deloitte off the back of Scott’s lecturing in design thinking (UTS) and systems thinking (UNSW) to re-design one of Deloitte’s most popular internal courses. Scott designed delivered a highly-practical course that provides staff with a logical roadmap for tackling complex problems - from unpacking the brief and identifying root causes to generating and prioritising solutions and leveraging client and stakeholder input throughout the journey. He trained Deloitte staff to deliver the course themselves and has since designed additional modules on project management, data insights, communicating persuasively and stakeholder engagement.
CONTACT GAUGE
Gauge Consulting acknowledges the Dharawal People as the traditional owners of the land on which it operates
Reach out to Director & Facilitator Scott Lappan-Newton for a coffee, collaboration or free proposal
+61 457 730 030
