CREATING A ‘DEMOCRACY FOR EVERYONE’

METHODOLOGY
The findings and recommendations in this report are based on in-depth
qualitative research undertaken in four countries between 2014 and 2016 in two
stages as follows:

Case study analysis of the public communication and stakeholder
engagement of 36 organisations in Australia, the UK, and the USA in
2014–2015. This examined a range of organisational functions involved in
public communication and interaction including public relations, corporate
communication; government communication; political communication;
public consultation; customer relations; complaints processing;
correspondence; social media; and social and market research;
Participatory action research in which the lead researcher worked
intensively with staff in two major UK government organisations and in
close consultation with staff in 10 other UK government departments and
agencies over a six-month period to evaluate government communication
and engagement with citizens and to develop, trial, and test strategies for
improving communication and engagement.
This report focusses particularly on the second stage of research conducted in
2016, referred to as The Organisational Listening Project Stage 2, as the first
stage has been extensively reported.5
Furthermore, the participatory action research (PAR) conducted in Stage 2 of
the project was important in enabling this study to extend beyond identification
of breakdowns and failures in communication to development and testing of
proposed solutions.
The focus on listening emerged as a primary theme in this study, as explained
in the sections presenting the research findings (Stage 1 and Stage 2).
Sample
As the purpose of Stage 1 of The Organisational Listening Project was to examine
the public communication of various types of organisations, the sample included
corporate, government, and non-government organisations (NGOs) in Australia,
the UK, and the USA as shown in Table 1.
De-identification was provided to participating organisations as part of Human
Research Ethics Committee approval (HREC Ref. No. 2013000359), except
in the case of organisations that agreed to be identified.
5 This report should be read in conjunction with Macnamara, J. (2015, June). Creating
an ‘architecture of listening’ in organizations: The basis of engagement, trust,
ethics, healthy democracy, social equity, and business sustainability. Report of The
Organizational Listening Project. Sydney, NSW: University of Technology. Available at
http://www.uts.edu.au/node/134066
CREATING A ‘DEMOCRACY FOR EVERYONE’ 7
TABLE 1. SAMPLE OF ORGANISATIONS STUDIED IN STAGE 1 OF THE
ORGANISATIONAL LISTENING PROJECT.
ORGANISATION TYPE AUSTRALIA UK US TOTAL
Government 2 14 2 18
Corporate 3 3 8 14
NGO/Non-Profit 2 1 1 4
Totals 7 18 11 36
With an objective of conducting in-depth action research in organisations
with an identified need to improve communication with stakeholders and
citizens, Stage 2 of The Organisational Listening Project involved a purposive
sample based on (1) willingness to participate and (2) the social and
political environment.
The social and political environment in the UK in the period 2014 to 2016 was
characterised by increasing and unprecedented signs of citizen discontent with
the national government and major political institutions. This was evidenced in
the Scotland Referendum in 2014, which saw the highest voter turnout in any
UK election or referendum (84.6%) and which, while retaining UK unity, saw
44.7% of Scottish citizens vote to leave the UK. Furthermore, in June 2016,
Scotland’s First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, said that a second referendum on
Scottish independence was “highly likely”6.
Even more so, in the EU Referendum on 23 June 2016, UK citizens made an
historic decision to leave the European Union against the strong recommendation
and campaigning of the government. The decision, commonly referred to as
Brexit, shocked the government, leading to the resignation of the then Prime
Minister, David Cameron, and was unexpected even by the ‘Leave’ campaign
and its leading proponents including Boris Johnson, and against the predictions
of most polls and opinion surveys. For example, the 2016 British Social Attitudes
survey published just a few weeks before the referendum reported that 60%
of UK citizens were in favour of remaining a member of the EU and only 30%
supported Britain’s withdrawal from the EU.7
The UK Government Communication Service (GCS), headquartered in the
Cabinet Office and the Prime Minister’s Office, agreed to support Stage 2 of the
research by providing access to departments and agencies and funding towards
research costs. The UK Department of Health was nominated as a specific site
for research in addition to the Government Communication Service (GCS)
generally. Also, a number of other departments and agencies volunteered to
participate in the research as it evolved. Thus the sample for Stage 2 of the
research was as follows.
6 De Freytas-Tamura, K. (2016, June 24). Scotland says new vote on independence is ‘highly
likely’. The New York Times, Europe edition. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/
2016/06/25/world/europe/brexit-scotland-independence-referendum.html?_r=0
7 NatCen Social Research. (2016). British Social Attitudes study, No 33. Retrieved
from http://www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/latest-report/british-social-attitudes-33/
euroscepticism.aspx
8 CREATING A ‘DEMOCRACY FOR EVERYONE’
Methodology
Primary sites/participants:
The UK Government Communication Service (GCS), Cabinet Office, 70
Whitehall;
Department of Health, 79 Whitehall.
Secondary sites/participants:
Department for Exiting the EU (DExEU), Number 9, Downing Street;
Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs (HMRC), 100 Parliament Street;
Foreign & Commonwealth Office, King Charles St, Whitehall;
Department of Work & Pensions (DWP), Caxton House, Tothill Street, London;
Department of Transport, 33 Horseferry Road, London;
Department of Energy, Business and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), 3 Whitehall
Place;
NHS England, Skipton House, 80 London Road and 133 Waterloo Road;
Public Health England (PHE), Skipton House, 80 London Road and 133
Waterloo Road;
Scotland Office, Edinburgh, Scotland;
Scottish Government, Edinburgh, Scotland.
In addition, during Stage 2 of the study the Directorate-General for
Communication (DG-COM) of the European Commission (EC) invited review
and analysis of several aspects of its public communication and citizen
engagement. Several visits were made to Brussels for meetings and workshops
in 2016.
Research Questions
The overarching research question explored in the first stage of this research
was ‘how, and how well, do organizations listen to their stakeholders8 and
publics’9, noting that listening is a fundamental corollary of speaking to achieve
two-way communication, engagement, dialogue, and create and maintain
relationships as identified in communication literature.
8 The term ‘stakeholders’ refers to individuals or groups beyond stockholders or
shareholders on which an organisation depends or which depend on an organisation
in some way (e.g., employees, service delivery partners, affected communities, etc.).
See Freeman, R., & Reed, D. (1983). Stockholders and stakeholders: A new perspective
on corporate governance. California Management Review, 25(3), pp. 88–106.
9 ‘Publics’ refers to groups of people with whom communication is desirable
or necessary.
CREATING A ‘DEMOCRACY FOR EVERYONE’ 9
Methodology
10 CREATING A ‘DEMOCRACY FOR EVERYONE’
The research questions for Stage 2 of The Organisational Listening Project were: