Associates

Since 1992 Andrew Acland has specialised in designing and facilitating dialogue in complex, multi-party, multi-issue contexts, often with environmental and/or social sustainability dimensions. He was a founding member of The Environment Council's innovative consensus-building and stakeholder dialogue programmes, and shared responsibility for developing its enormously successful and influential facilitator training programmes. He has worked with NGOs, government and business on issues such as the transport of nuclear waste, decommissioning of offshore installations; industrial development in environmentally sensitive areas; corporate social responsibility; genetic modification; sustainable agriculture; carbon sequestration; fuel poverty; marine exclusion zones and many others.

Rob has been the lead facilitator and process consultant for a range of clients to deliberately involve stakeholders in formulating environmental decisions or resolving conflicts. Examples include policy & strategy development for national government and the private sector on waste management, the decommissioning of nuclear power stations and precautionary measures for electromagnetic radiation; for regional public sector on flood alleviation schemes. He has also designed and run European wide e-consultations for WWF and run training courses for the public, private and community sectors on participation, facilitation and sustainable development.

Rhuari's interest in environmental decision-making stems from his professional training in Zoology (BSc) and Agricultural Economics (MSc), in particular the understanding that the quality of decisions often depends as much on socio-political factors as 'technical' factors. This led to him developing an interest in how people get engaged in the decisions that affect them. He spent 3 years working in international development in UK and Africa, focusing on how local communities improve their lives by influencing environmental decisions through active participation.

Recent projects include:

• Nuclear Decommissioning Authority: UK-wide stakeholder engagement, in collaboration with Dialogue by Design
• Committee On Radioactive Waste Management (CORWM)
• Ashdown Forest management - scoping study of stakeholder views
• Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP)
• Broads Authority National Park - Sedimentation Workshop

Jeff deliberately mixes research work with training with practical projects, each spinning productively off the other. He works regularly in partnership with other freelance specialists and organisations such as Dialogue by Design.

Jeff trained and practised originally as an architect. Without further training available at the time on community involvement etc. he developed these skills 'on the job'. He has however been a Visiting Professor in Engagement in New York and North Carolina and contributes regularly to international academic events and publications.

His project clients range from Government Departments and agencies to NGOs. Ian is a trustee or advisory committee member for a number of charities, including Involve, The Environment Foundation and WWF. Publications include Managing Sustainable Development (Earthscan, 2000, with Michael Carley) and From Here to Sustainability: politics in the real world (Earthscan, 2001, with Diane Warburton).

As a professional facilitator:

Since 1992, Lindsey has worked extensively with the public, private and voluntary sectors in the UK and world-wide, specialising in cross-sectoral dialogue and partnership working on complex issues: at 24, she built a voluntary network of more than 1,500 people working for sustainable development; she has run a national charity; she has worked in situations of extreme conflict; she has turned around a number of 'failing' processes to enable them to reach conclusion. Much of her work has involved working in bilingual and multi-cultural contexts, including work in the UK, Pakistan, Brussels, France, and Thailand.

As a pioneer and capacity builder:

Lindsey is founder of Lindsey Colbourne Associates, InterAct, InterAct Networks and Involve. These organisations are dedicated to building capacity for effective participation across the UK. She runs approximately 20 training and action learning events a year, as well as providing coaching and mentoring.

As a policy advisor:

Lindsey is working to promote participatory practice at a policy level, including as a member of a NICE Programme Development Group on the value of community engagement in delivering health outcomes and as Lead Commissioner for engagement and communications on the UK Sustainable Development Commission. Lindsey is also a Dialogue and Engagement Specialist for the Sciencewise Expert Resource Centre.

Also within national Government, Alison has worked since 2005 as an associate with Future Focus based in the department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, helping groups work together, from team building, strategy and other internal meetings to meetings with key stakeholders and wider groups.

Outside government Alison's work spans arts, environment and sustainable development work. She has also run small events, training and conferences for Agencies such as the Human Tissue Authority and often helps local community groups such as Transition Towns to work effectively together. Between 2001 and 2004 Alison lived and worked in South America working mainly with human rights and environment issues but also on special projects such as stakeholder dialogue for semi-uncontacted tribes on legal tenure and land-rights. Ongoing work with businesses focuses on mass behavioural systems and notions of happiness to inform work on sustainable consumption and climate change.

As Dialogue Development Manager at The Environment Council for 6 years in the 1990s Alison undertook pioneering work on environmental consensus-building and participatory working. With involvement in pivotal projects on nuclear, water, waste and contaminated land, she has worked with a broad spectrum of people from pressure groups, local and central government, business and directly with citizens.

Alison holds an MSc on in Mediation and Conflict resolution from the psychology department of Birkbeck College, London, qualifications in environmental science and a BA in Music.

Previously Phil was an Associate Director at Brook Lyndhurst and Head of Environmental Research for Ipsos MORI.

Phil holds a BSc degree in Environmental Science from the University of East Anglia.

Alison is a skilled project manager with an excellent track record of delivering on time, within budget, to the client's satisfaction. She is also an experienced and creative facilitator, trainer and public speaker, with excellent verbal and written communication skills.

Catrin spent ten years as a professional in the resource exploration, extraction and environmental remediation sector. She was Chief Geochemist of the Exploration and Acquisitions division, Codelco - Chile's national copper company for two years and later consulted on grassroots environmental resource developments in other international fora.

Since her return to the UK she has applied her management and evaluation skills to a number of successful and award winning social enterprise and community-led environmental projects.

Her wide experience of working with government officials, business leaders, academics, experts and communities informs her conviction that the quality of decisions and resulting actions, depends upon a thorough exploration of context, including socio-political factors as well as "technical issues".

Catrin is a fluent Welsh speaker.

She has undertaken a range of work with several multinational companies, including strategy drafting, peer reviews on performance and communication, sustainability report analysis, and coordination of an external stakeholder panel. She also has experience as a report writer, coordinator and support facilitator at large and small-scale stakeholder engagement projects across the public and private sectors. Her experience ranges from conducting one-on-one stakeholder interviews through to working closely with business directors on high-level strategy, from single workshop reports or articles through to large-scale analytical research projects.

Originally a zoologist by trade, Helen's focus on communications and stakeholder engagement stems from an interest in group dynamics and human interaction. As a musician, she believes in approaching all of her work with a sense of innovation and creativity, whilst at the same time delivering outputs that are both robust and useful.

Helen is an associate of 3KQ and also works regularly with Dialogue by Design, Shared Practice and Involve.

His knowledge of the resource management agenda extends from recycling systems and energy-from-waste, to producer responsibility and sustainable consumption and production. Justin has also been involved in the implementation of EU legislation in the UK and the development of domestic waste management policy. He is a member of the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management.

In addition to providing sustainability consulting, Justin is also a professional writer and technical editor working under the name Word to Dialogue. He writes for industry journals and works with organisations to improve the quality of their written communications.

Dominic has an engineering background with both B.Eng. and PhD. He has been developing data management and IT systems since 1993 when he wrote a finite elements engineering package to model the propagation of dynamic stress waves through semi-compressible materials. Subsequently he has developed many multi-tiered software applications concerned with the efficient management of high volume business data and information storage. His specialism is the integration of user-friendly presentation applications with performance data storage and interrogation.

Dominic has considerable IT skills and programs at an advanced level in several languages including; visual basic, java, javascript, ASP, JSP, SQL, XML and HTML.

Rebecca has particular experience in conflict resolution, consensus building and stakeholder dialogue, waste and recycling Energy efficiency (including more than four years intensively assisting the Energy Saving Trust develop and run the multi sectoral Energy Efficiency Partnership for Homes.

Richard's experience is "rooted" in the natural environment, in his early career he trained as an Arboriculturalist and worked in the UK and Australia as a contractor, consultant and local government officer.

During his time as Principal Environmental Development Officer for Bedford Borough Council in the early 1990's issues such as conflict management and processes of stakeholder engagement in decision-making, became a key focus and a developing professional interest. As a result, Richard left local government in 1997 to establish his own process design and facilitation practice and has since worked with a variety of clients across sectors and in a range of subject areas and levels of conflict. Richard has managed a number of strategic planning and development projects involving visioning, scenario working, strategic action planning and including both bespoke processes and also using Future Search, Search Conference and Open Space Technology methods, amongst others.

Recent projects include:

• Nuclear Decommissioning Authority: UK-wide stakeholder engagement, in collaboration with Dialogue by Design
• Committee On Radioactive Waste Management (CORWM)
• Vision for Kent, in collaboration with Dialogue by Design

Rowena has a background in education in schools and in community development. She spent many years developing partnership projects in Bristol involving health workers, librarians, schools, colleges, community workers and local parents to encourage Family Learning Projects - precursors of Sure Start Initiatives. During this time she became interested in the challenge of working towards sustainable solutions with groups of people from very different backgrounds and interests. Having been trained by Neighbourhood Initiatives Foundation in Planning for Real she realised that facilitation and mediation were the skills she needed to develop. The training and experience provided by The Environment Council in Stakeholder Dialogue provided a spur to becoming an independent consultant in 1999.

With 3KQ and Dialogue by Design, Rowena has been the lead facilitator for stakeholder workshops for the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. She has also led 2 community liaison groups looking at proposed Energy from Waste Facilities.

As an independent facilitator and trainer Rowena's clients have included The Environment Agency, The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, The Welsh Government, DEFRA, DECC, Shell, Land Securities, Nuffield Health, Book Trust and numerous local authorities and third sector organisations.

This year as part of her continuing professional development Rowena has undertaken a post graduate course on Sustainability and Systems Thinking with the Schumacher Institute and attended a 6 day course at the University of the West of England on Addressing Community Tensions.

Pippa was responsible for the design and running of a project to develop a community waste strategy in Hampshire in the early 1990's, one of the UK's earliest examples of a participatory approach to community consultation and involvement. Following that she led a team in the design and implementation of a pan-European project for Shell to find a solution to the Brent Spar disposal problem. She has worked on projects as diverse as international consultations around gas exploration projects in Peru, mining projects in Madagascar, the development of best practice guidelines for the renewable energy sector, community planning processes for local communities and strategic decision making workshops for corporations.

Since setting up Dialogue by Design Pippa has specialised in integrating face-to-face approaches to consultation and engagement with web-based tools.

Prior to becoming freelance, Hally built a track record in stakeholder engagement, issues management and corporate responsibility. She started her career with The Environment Council, where she was instrumental in setting up its dialogue service which she went onto manage. She then worked for the energy company Shell, where she held positions of External Affairs Advisor on Iran and Issues Manager for Shell Gas & Power.

As an independent consultant, Hally's work has focused on facilitation, stakeholder engagement, research and business support. Topics she has worked on include health, energy and culture. As well as being an associate of Dialogue by Design, Hally is the Business Development Manager for Hopkins Van Mil: Creative Connections.

Aisling has worked on major projects assessing social, environmental and other impacts of future technologies, some of which have involved public engagement. Examples include:

• Writer and analyst, WIST Programme (Wider Implications of Science and Technology): Assessing the social, environmental and ethical implications of future technologies
• Researcher, Delta Scan: A database of future trends in science and technology
• Writer, Sigma Scan: A synthesis of future trends across the public policy spectrum
• Writer, Meeting of Minds: A European deliberation on the implications of brain science

Aisling's other specialities are the environment and the developing world. She has lived and worked as a freelance journalist in both Africa and Southeast Asia, and has written two books as the result of her travels. She also worked as a writer and web-editor for Reuters Alertnet, a news, features and information service about international humanitarian issues.

She has a degree in Chemistry and a masters degree in History and Philosophy of Science.

Suzannah has facilitated at numerous workshops ranging from one to one conversations between stakeholders in conflict to workshops with over 100 participants. She has been involved in projects covering the spectrum from those with a high degree of contention or conflict through to visioning and strategy development work with business, government and NGOs. Issues covered have included, amongst others, genetic modification; nuclear decommissioning; sustainable mobility; oil field decommissioning; electro-magnetic fields; recycled aggregates; water directive implementation; and landscape strategy.

During this period at WWF he became increasingly interested in the process as well as the content of negotiation and policy work. An important element of his experience at WWF was participating in, and increasingly running, dialogue processes both within the WWF Network and with other governmental and non-governmental partners.

This led to the facilitation of large group discussions in both national and international settings on a range of policy issues. Since 2005 he has been working full time as a facilitator.

Recent clients include the BioRegional Development Group, DEFRA, DFID, the Environment Agency, the European Commission, the Health and Safety Executive, Knowsley Borough Council, Schumacher College, UK Power Networks and WWF.

She is a trained mediator, specialising in workplace mediation and in supported housing. She is also developing her coaching and mentoring work and enjoys providing this one to one support.

Past and current clients include:

• The Energy Saving Trust
• Environment Agency
• Government Departments - Defra, DTI/BERR
• Greater London Authority; Transport for London
• Government Offices (East and South West) and various Local Authorities
• City & Hackney PCT
• Age UK

His projects in 2012 include:

• Hen Harriers. With The Environment Council. Working with various stakeholders to identify solutions to the need to increase hen harrier numbers in England and maintain the economic viability of grouse moors.
• Nuclear Security and Safety. Design and facilitation of global workshops for the World Institute of Nuclear Security.
• Cumbria MRWS. With 3KQ. Design and facilitation of community and local stakeholder engagement events.
• Ecosystems Knowledge Network. Design and facilitation of network development.
• Environment Agency. With InterAct. Design and facilitation of communication skills and engagement planning workshops.
• Healthy Bees Plan. Chair of Communications Working Group. Review and oversight of range of communication and information processes.

Carl also trains people to mediate and facilitate.

Carl has associate arrangements with The Environment Council, 3KQ, Dialogue by Design and People Resolutions Group Ltd. and a contract as a Sciencewise Dialogue and Engagement Expert.

Sam was appointed as Commissioner for Commission of Integration and Cohesion, which reported to Ruth Kelly Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. The final report "Our Shared Future" was published in June 2007.

Clients include multi-national companies, world class educational institutions, environment and development NGOs, local national and international governmental and public service bodies, and other facilitators and sustainable development consultants.

She is an Chartered Environmentalist, a Full Member of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment (IEMA), and a Fellow of the Institute of Business Consultancy (formerly the Institute of Management Consultancy). She writes regularly on conversations, listening really well and behaviour change in the cause of sustainable development, including the 'engaging people' column in The Environmentalist. Her book, Change Management for Sustainable Development, was published by the IEMA in 2006, and she edited the sustainable development special edition of Organisations and People in November 2007.

She works regularly with a variety of specialist teams, including Dialogue by Design, 3KQ, Forum for the Future and the Cambridge Programme for Sustainability Leadership.

Penny Walker lives in North London with her family, where she is also the Chair of Growing Communities, a literally ground-breaking social enterprise creating an under-the-radar sustainable local food system in Hackney.

Examples of her recent work include:

• Evaluator for the Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform's major consultation on the future of civil nuclear power in the UK (2007 to date)
• Evaluator for Defra's public consultation on climate change (2007 to date)
• Evaluator for the Research Councils UK programme of public consultation on priorities for future energy research (2007 to date)
• Evaluator for the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority's programme of public consultation on the potential research use of hybrid and chimera embryos (2007 to date)
• Evaluator for the Academy of Medical Sciences programme of public dialogue and engagement on brain science, addiction and drugs (2006 to date)
• Consultant to WWF UK education team on community participation and local sustainable development programmes (1993 to date); currently including work on evaluating a community-led approach to sustainable consumption / lifestyles
• Lead consultant to the Environment Agency on several projects to develop and support a social policy framework for the Agency, and to produce guidance on working with communities and stakeholders (2001-2007)

Coming from a background in sustainable development and having worked extensively with public, private, voluntary sectors, Lynn's key motivator is helping organisations talk to each other and work together better.

Since 2010 she has worked within a number of full-service communications consultancies, providing stakeholder engagement and consultation advice within the broader communications setting. From 2011 to 2013 Hannah successfully set-up a dedicated engagement practice within a major international PR agency, advising on knowledge sharing, best practice and consultation delivery across the business. She has worked across many sectors including infrastructure, health, energy, equalities, community development and waste for clients in both local and national projects. She holds a BSc in Biology.