Resource: Victorian Department of Sustainability, Effective Engagement toolkit

The Effective Engagement toolkit was developed by the Victorian Government Department of Sustainability and the Coastal Co-operative Research Centre. The toolkit outlines a wide selection of engagement tools.

Each tool listing includes a detailed description of the objectives, resources required, a discussion of their strengths and weakness, as well as references for further exploration.

The Department's website also includes a tool - Choosing the Right Tool - that is design to help you select the most appropriate tool(s) for your needs.

The selection criteria for selecting engagement tools include:

• Project context (i.e. project goals, objectives and anticipated outcomes)
• Community context within which your project sits (i.e. your community profile and the social and political context)
• Project parameters (including the project size, budget, timeline and resources allocated)
• Project teams (i.e. skills of team and availability of the members).

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This is a useful and fairly comprehensive collection of tools, and most of the tools could be effectively adapted to multiple situations as necessary. The Choosing the right tool checklist, based on the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) participation framework, also offers a quick and easy checklist for choosing a participation tool based on your projects requirements.