Consult(ant)(ee)

Increasingly I find myself not only acting as a consultant - working to try and understand communities, places, and come up with viable and relevant strategies to help them evolve - but also being a consultee. Sometimes this is as a 'valued' or high status consultee - for example, due to being chair of Creative Colchester, the creative industries partnership board for Colchester; being a local business owner and investor in the city centre of Colchester. Sometimes it is simply as a resident, observing and commenting on upcoming plans. And sometimes it is due to my industry networks - being asked to provide some insight or help shape propositions for professional teams looking to work in our local area.

I have spent many hours over the last few years participating and engaging at various levels - wanting to have my voice heard on behalf of our business; the cultural sector more broadly; because I want to speak up on issues that matter to me personally; or because I think I do have something valuable to offer. Online, offline, surveys, interviews, stakeholder forums, focus groups. This has not been paid work and I can see what the 'deal' is seen to be - I raise my profile as a thought leader locally; I make new contacts and increase my networks; I hopefully get to shape the direction of travel for these strategies. But I am giving a lot of time and insight for free and as a consultee the level of feedback I have got from the organisations behind these various initiatives has been extremely limited. Often I have felt that what I've said has been disregarded - either partially or fully - because it did not fit in with a narrative. I have pointed out inaccuracies in data and found those errors recur in final documents. Simple basic accuracy around placenames, terminology of organisations, roles and job titles, has been lacking.

As consultants, we try very hard to avoid these pitfalls and to act with more respect and humility in relation to the expertise and local knowledge that comes from those we 'engage' with. But we have limited amounts of ability to influence and sometimes our clients drive simplification, a partial reading, or are dismissive of views from certain quarters. We push to give good feedback to consultees - to take the time to explain how their insights and contributions have influenced the shape of the strategy, and if they haven't, why - but we are not always given the opportunity to do this as transparently as we would like, nor in a timely manner. 

I know - as a consultant - that the way local community members, businesses, stakeholders see things is not always the answer. That ideas from outside - that new perspectives - can unlock tricky problems. That there's an important role for external experts in this. But as a consultee, I know that if those outside perspectives and ideas don't make sense to locals - whether 'high status' stakeholders or just regular residents - if your propositions can't be tested against their perceptions and their lived experience, and be found to be sound - then they are probably not sound at all. And if consultees feel they are constantly giving and not receiving anything back - even thanks or an answer to the questions they have raised - they quickly begin to distrust and resent being asked for more input.

As consultants, we are paid to talk to people, to listen, to analyse. Consultees give priceless expertise and insight for free. This must never be taken for granted.