Understanding local priorities
Why use Picker Institute Europe's services?
We can help you engage with local people systematically and effectively. We know what works according to your audience, your service, your priorities and the topics you want to examine.
We can deliver the most appropriate techniques expertly and efficiently and then help you to understand and use the findings. Your findings will be reliable and actionable.
How we can help
Our range of services includes:
Identifying the issues: rapid appraisal
Determining priorities and trade-offs: population surveys
Ongoing engagement: user panels
Local consultation: focus groups, surveys and deliberative events
Identifying the issues: rapid appraisal
Quick-fire analysis of your current initiatives to engage local stakeholders can provide you with a rapid understanding of progress to date, and what you need to do to reach 'world class' standards.
This can include:
- face-to-face interviews with key local players
- desk analysis of documents and survey data
- structured discussion and debate with those associated with your organisation
- rapid research to get the views of stakeholder groups, for example by telephone survey.
Determining priorities and trade-offs: population surveys
True assessment of local needs and priorities requires a detailed picture of the geographical, community and socio-economic variations in people's views.
Well designed population surveys can test views on specific issues of local importance - for example a proposed service reconfiguration or local spending priorities and trade-offs.
Ongoing engagement: user panels
Recruiting a panel of members from your local community, committed to sharing their thoughts regularly, will give you an invaluable 'sounding board' for issues that require continuing public engagement.
The views of panel members can be sought using online, postal or face-to-face methods.
Local consultation: focus groups, surveys and deliberative events
Well managed public meetings and workshops can give you a broader, in-depth understanding of public views and their origins.
Special techniques can be used to help participants deliberate on an issue while listening to and taking account of a variety of different views on the topic.
These techniques, coupled with other engagement methods, for example focus groups and surveys, can give you a truly rounded picture of what local people think.
View examples
Learn about our service in action with clients