Find information about
How we work
Related documents
Guide to How We Regulate
(17/11/2008)
Guide to how we regulate page more...
Governance Matters
(01/09/2008)
Governance Matters Report (PDF) more...
Performance Standards
(14/03/2008)
Performance Standards page more...
Section 2 Key principles of quality in research and consultation
2.01 Develop a strategic framework for service user consultation
To improve services, social housing organisations need to make the best use of information they have already on quality of services and they need to regularly collect and use feedback from service users.
To achieve this, it is essential for organisations to develop a clearly articulated research and consultation strategy. This should underpin a programme of service user feedback that serves organisational objectives and priorities and delivers high quality, useful and timely information that can be acted upon by the organisation. It should engage service users in the process of developing the framework.
A research and consultation strategy should dovetail with the Tenant Participation strategy and with other relevant frameworks such as Best Value. It might be an element of the Tenant Participation strategy. The strategy needs to be proportionate and suited to the operating context of the organisation and resources available to different social landlords. This is not intended to be an additional bureaucratic burden on landlords and it doesn’t need to be a long or complicated document. However, without explicit, strategic consideration of the operating environment, the purpose and use of the consultation, the resources available and how research and consultation is conducted and communicated, the value of service user consultation is likely to be undermined, even in the smallest organisations.
Figure 2.1 A strategic framework for service user consultation
Key requirements | |
Operating environment |
• An understanding of the broader operating and regulatory environment and any statutory obligations or more informal expectations. • An overview of the wider organisational operating climate and any linkages or synergies between different departmental needs or those of peer organisations. |
Purpose & use |
• A clear vision of what is expected to be achieved through research and consultation with service users. • Clear links between research and consultation and action planning and implementation. • Clear links between the organisation’s strategic objectives and individual research and consultation exercises. • A long-term perspective and clear rationale for identifying and prioritising needs for research and consultation. • Collection of feedback on a routine, regular basis, as well as more occasional specific research and consultation exercises. • The ability to identify specific gaps in knowledge, prior to gathering new information. • A utilisation-focused research approach; an applied and practical use for individual research and consultation exercises. |
Resources |
• A full assessment of resources required to deliver the research and consultation strategy. • Full use of existing management information. • Awareness of other relevant strategies, standards and frameworks such as Tenant Participation, Community Engagement and Best Value. • Full use of existing contacts with service users such as registers of interested tenants or user groups and opportunities to gather information from staff. • Appropriate IT systems available to capture and analyse data. • Recognition of realistic timescales for individual research and consultation exercises. |
Conduct |
• Adoption of key principles of quality in the conduct of the research and consultation. • Awareness of alternative feasible options for research design and use of diversity of approaches to reach different groups of service users. • Awareness of the potential burden of participation in research and consultation exercises and avoidance of ‘over-researching’ a particular topic or group. |
Communication |
• Good quality communication about the purpose and intended use of the information sought. • Feedback to service users, members of staff, committee members or councillors about what has happened as a result of the research and consultation. |
