The Stakeholder Engagement and Communications Working Group seeks YOUR feedback on our draft action plan. Please drop us a line at n15developmenttrust@gmail.com by Friday 5 February to let us know what you think, especially about the priorities we have identified for 2016. Have we missed anything? Got anything wrong?
Working Group 3) Stakeholder Engagement and Communications
Our role is to identify and develop productive relationships with our key stakeholders (including beneficiary communities, landowners and local public agencies) and to develop the Trust’s wider outreach and communication work.
The role of the Stakeholder Engagement and Communications Working Group is to identify and progress the actions needed to communicate the activities of the Trust and to develop productive and supportive relationships with key external individuals and organisations. This includes communication and engagement with the Trust’s beneficiary communities – market traders, local businesses, local residents and those who use the town centre – as well as broader promotional and outreach work, both of which are essential to building support for and developing the Trust and ultimately delivering the community plan for the Wards building. Stakeholder engagement is an equally important element of the Working Group’s role, in particular building productive and supportive relationships with the current owner of the Wards building, Transport for London, Haringey Council, the Greater London Authority, local community and business groups and potential development partners and funders.
Links with other Working Groups: Effective communications and stakeholder engagement underpins all aspects of the Trust’s work. They will be essential in building strong community support for and involvement in the Trust and in developing our capacity and resources to deliver the community plan. Indeed, the Stakeholder Engagement and Communications Working Group is already playing an important role in actively promoting the Trust’s First Steps project, contributing to the ability of the Working Groups to progress their work and ensuring good and diverse community participation in events and meetings. As such, Working Group 3 underpins the activities of all other Working Groups.
Our work so far: Small group discussions on Working Group 3 were held at the First Steps events on 28 September and 2 November. In addition, the Stakeholder Engagement and Communications Working Group has held regular weekly meetings at Seven Sisters Market since October, ensuring that new participants get to know the market and the traders and helping to build good links between the First Steps project and the market. So far, participation has included a mixture of local residents and traders and others who want to support the work of the Trust, including architecture students, media students and members of Latin Elephant. As well as developing this action plan, the Working Group has already begun to re-activate and develop the Trust’s main vehicles of communication – including the Twitter account, Facebook account and physical leafleting of the Wards Corner site (1000 flyers and 30 posters printed for each event) – and various individuals have taken on responsibility for these tasks. In addition, work continues through regular meetings of WCC and El Pueblito Paisa to communicate with market traders, local businesses and residents, keeping them up to date with the work of the Trust and the First Steps project. The Working Group has decided to use the £250 First Steps funding allocated to it to source, launch and manage a Trust noticeboard at Seven Sisters market. The noticeboard will improve communications between the Trust and market traders, who are busy, sometimes do not use email or social media and who speak many different languages.
Priority actions for 2016:
- Dec/Jan: Use the £250 First Steps funding assigned to this Working Group to source, launch and manage a Trust noticeboard at Seven Sisters market.
- Feb: Organise and promote a launch event for the First Steps Community Action Plan.
- By May: Arrange visits to Seven Sisters market for the main candidates for London Mayor and the London Assembly and secure their endorsement where possible.
- Produce and distribute a simple, short pamphlet outlining the history of the Wards Corner campaign and the aims and role of the Trust.
- Produce and distribute the first Trust newsletter, and thereafter on a monthly basis.
- Identify main stakeholders and how we need to work with them.
- Establish regular Trust meetings with key officials at Transport for London and Haringey Council.
- Start a campaign to encourage traders and customers to promote the market and area to others, by using common messages such as LovingTheSevenSisterAreaVibe, CatchTheVictoriaLineToLatinAmerica, etc.
- Meet media targets for Year 1 of 500 Twitter followers, 250 Faceboook followers, 12 YouTube videos and 12 published media stories.