Intercultural Practice and Equity · Internal leadership

Co-design and Compensated Partnership

Asking people what they think of a finished plan is not co-design, and unpaid expertise is not a partnership. Four lessons on opening a decision early, paying for the work, sharing decision rights, and writing an engagement plan people can hold you to.

40–45 minutes · 4 lessons · Voluntary learning

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Course outline

What co-design actually changes
Inform, consult, involve, co-design. One question separates them, and mislabeling the level costs more trust than telling people plainly what is fixed.
11 minutes
Paying for expertise, and what the payment has to survive
Budget before you invite. The fee covers preparation and review as well as the meeting, and participation costs are the division's to carry, not a test of who can afford to help.
11 minutes
Decision rights, who is missing, and the report-back
Ambiguity about authority is read as power and then felt as its absence. Write the authority sentence, notice who your design keeps out, and close the loop in writing with a date on it.
11 minutes
Your co-design engagement plan
One page you would be willing to send to the people you are inviting: what is open, who shapes it, the terms, the decision rights, and how you will know it was real.
11 minutes

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What you’ll be able to do

Explore and practice

Tell the difference between informing, consulting, involving and co-designing a decision, and write down what is genuinely open and what is fixed before the first invitation goes out.
Plan compensation as part of the design of the work: the hours, the rate, the payment route, the timing, and the participation costs the division carries rather than expecting people to absorb.
State in writing what authority a co-design group holds — advises, recommends, or decides jointly on named points — and design the report-back that says what changed, what did not, and who decided.
Name who is missing from a table and the specific design choices that keep them out, and identify what would have to change for them to take part.
Draft a one-page co-design engagement plan for one real decision, including what is open, who shapes it, the terms of the work, decision rights and how you will know the engagement was real.

What you can take into your work

Four worked scenarios drawn from an advisory group invited after the framework was set, an invitation with no money behind it, a recommendation overtaken by a budget decision, and an engagement plan that cannot say what is open.
A knowledge check in every lesson with feedback that explains the usable answer.
Sorting practice that separates the fee for the work, the participation costs the division carries, and the things a payment cannot substitute for.
A completed one-page engagement plan with an open list, priced terms, decision rights, a report-back date and a test of whether the engagement was real.

Choose one decision your team owns that has not been framed yet. Write two short lists — what is genuinely open, and what is fixed and why. Price the engagement, including preparation, review, travel, care, interpreting and formats. Then take the one-page plan to the person who owns the decision, before any invitation is drafted.

Read the introduction

Most divisions already talk with people outside them. Public comment, advisory councils, listening sessions, a standing meeting with advocacy organizations. The work is real, and almost none of it is co-design. Co-design means the people most affected by a decision help set what the question is, what the options are, and what a good result would look like, before the division's own preferences have hardened — and it means paying them for that work the way any other expertise is paid for. This module covers the four levels of partnership and the single question that separates them, how to price and route compensation so an invitation is not a request for free labor, how to state what authority a group actually holds and close the loop when the division goes a different way, and how to put all of it on one page you would be willing to send to the people you are inviting.

Co-design and compensated partnership

One page for anyone who convenes, funds or depends on work with people outside the division

If you would not send the engagement plan to the people you are inviting, it is not finished.

Keep the four levels, the true cost of participation and the authority sentence in view while you plan, price, defend or repair an engagement with people outside the division.

The level of partnership is set by what can still change, not by what the engagement is called.
Budget before you invite. An unpriced invitation is a request for free work, whatever was intended.
Pay for preparation and review, and carry participation costs — travel, care, interpreting, captioning, formats — separately from the fee.
Write the authority sentence: advises, recommends, or decides jointly on these named points.
The report-back has a date, a named sender and an answer to every recommendation. It is the part people remember.
Reflections in this module are private and are never collected, and taking part in this learning is voluntary.

Fill in the one-page engagement plan for one decision your team owns, and take it to the person who owns that decision before any invitation is drafted.

Before you invite anyone

Write two lists: what is genuinely open, and what is fixed with the reason beside each item.
Put the open list in the invitation itself, not in a briefing people receive at the first session.
Choose the level deliberately — inform, consult, involve, co-design — and describe it accurately.
Get written confirmation of the open list from the person who owns the decision.

Paying for the work

Price the hours you are actually asking for, including reading, preparation and review between sessions.
Budget participation costs separately: travel and parking, care, interpreting and captioning, usable formats, technology support.
Start vendor setup at the invitation, explain what will be asked for, and offer help with it.
State the payment timing as it really is, and raise a long wait with the offices that own the process.
Contract with a community organization for staff time, space, translation or recruiting; do not take those for free.

Authority, absence and the report-back

Write one authority sentence and repeat it at the top of every agenda.
Say what you are asking of each person: their own experience, their organization's position, or a professional view on a specific question.
Name who is missing and the design choice keeping them out — the hour, the place, the format, the notice period, the wording.
Send the report-back before the decision is final: adopted, not adopted and why, who decided, what is still open.
Separate a rejection from a constraint. They are different messages and only one damages the relationship.

When you cannot do it properly

No budget: run a smaller paid engagement, or none this round, and plan the money into the next decision.
Decision already made: say so, describe honestly what can still change, and open the next one earlier.
People are exhausted: send the report-back you owe them before you send another invitation.

Who this helps

Policy and program staff, who frame most decisions and often decide, without noticing, how late anyone outside the division gets to see them.
Communications and training staff, who write the invitation, the materials and the report-back, and whose formats and lead times decide who can take part at all.
Data, research and evaluation staff, who hold much of the evidence about who is affected, and who can design the questions with people rather than about them.
Contracts, fiscal and procurement staff, who own the routes that make payment possible or impossible, and whose early answer changes what an engagement can be.
Supervisors and managers, who approve the hours, protect the timeline, and decide whether the report-back actually gets written.
Executive and senior leaders, who set what is open, grant decision rights and fund the work — a useful place to start.

Related modules

Leading a reflective DSD team
Equitable policy and procedure governance
Responsible data and evaluation
Inclusive learning and knowledge design
Resource allocation and equity

Participation and course completion in this program do not count toward DHS-required training credits unless management, a director, or DHS leadership expressly approves an exception.

Sources and further reading

W3C Web Accessibility Initiative, Involving users in web projects for better, easier accessibility
Guidance on bringing people with disabilities into a project early rather than at review, why late involvement produces repairs instead of design, and how to arrange and compensate that participation.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National CLAS Standards
National standards for culturally and linguistically appropriate services, including the governance, leadership and community-engagement standards on partnering with communities to design, implement and evaluate services.
Minnesota Office of Grants Management, policies, statutes and forms
The state's grants policies, statutes and forms — the practical route for paying a community organization for staff time, facilitation, translation or recruiting rather than asking for it unpaid.
Minnesota Management and Budget
The state's financial management agency, whose statewide financial and payment policies shape how payments to individuals and organizations are set up, routed and timed.
Minnesota Council on Disability
Minnesota's advisory council on disability policy, access and rights, and a standing route for connecting with disability-led organizations across the state.
ADA.gov, State and local governments (Title II)
U.S. Department of Justice guidance on what a state or local government must provide, including effective communication and accessible programs, services and activities — the floor an engagement has to meet before it can be called open.
PlainLanguage.gov, Federal plain language guidelines
Guidance on audience, organization and useful headings, applied here to invitations, session materials and the report-back that tells people what happened to their contribution.
Minnesota Framework for Universal Multicultural Instructional Design
The design reference for this curriculum: multiple ways to engage, culturally responsive materials, and accessible instruction that does not depend on one format or one pace.

All research and sources across the program

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Co-design and Compensated Partnership

40–45 minutes · 4 lessons · Voluntary learning

Course outline

What co-design actually changes

Inform, consult, involve, co-design. One question separates them, and mislabeling the level costs more trust than telling people plainly what is fixed.

11 minutes

Paying for expertise, and what the payment has to survive

Budget before you invite. The fee covers preparation and review as well as the meeting, and participation costs are the division's to carry, not a test of who can afford to help.

11 minutes

Decision rights, who is missing, and the report-back

Ambiguity about authority is read as power and then felt as its absence. Write the authority sentence, notice who your design keeps out, and close the loop in writing with a date on it.

11 minutes

Your co-design engagement plan

One page you would be willing to send to the people you are inviting: what is open, who shapes it, the terms, the decision rights, and how you will know it was real.

11 minutes

Sources and further reading

W3C Web Accessibility Initiative, Involving users in web projects for better, easier accessibility

Guidance on bringing people with disabilities into a project early rather than at review, why late involvement produces repairs instead of design, and how to arrange and compensate that participation.

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National CLAS Standards

National standards for culturally and linguistically appropriate services, including the governance, leadership and community-engagement standards on partnering with communities to design, implement and evaluate services.

Minnesota Office of Grants Management, policies, statutes and forms

The state's grants policies, statutes and forms — the practical route for paying a community organization for staff time, facilitation, translation or recruiting rather than asking for it unpaid.

Minnesota Management and Budget

The state's financial management agency, whose statewide financial and payment policies shape how payments to individuals and organizations are set up, routed and timed.

Minnesota Council on Disability

Minnesota's advisory council on disability policy, access and rights, and a standing route for connecting with disability-led organizations across the state.

ADA.gov, State and local governments (Title II)

U.S. Department of Justice guidance on what a state or local government must provide, including effective communication and accessible programs, services and activities — the floor an engagement has to meet before it can be called open.

PlainLanguage.gov, Federal plain language guidelines

Guidance on audience, organization and useful headings, applied here to invitations, session materials and the report-back that tells people what happened to their contribution.

Minnesota Framework for Universal Multicultural Instructional Design

The design reference for this curriculum: multiple ways to engage, culturally responsive materials, and accessible instruction that does not depend on one format or one pace.