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.
What you’ll be able to do State in writing what authority a co-design group holds, identify who is missing and what would have to change for them to take part, and design a report-back that says what changed, what did not, and who decided. Compare the responses to this question and explain your choice: What does the team owe the group, and what should the message say? Document a next step for Decision rights, who is missing, and the report-back: Write one authority sentence for a group you convene or attend, and one report-back commitment with a date attached. Send both to the group before the next session, and to the person who owns the decision before that. Say what the group can decide Ambiguity about authority is read as power. A group told it will help shape a decision will reasonably assume it can change that decision, and will discover otherwise at the moment when the discovery costs the most. The fix is a sentence, written before the first session and repeated at the top of every agenda.
There are only a few honest versions. This group advises; the division will bring questions while they are open and is not bound by the answers. This group recommends; every recommendation receives a written answer naming the decision maker and the reason. This group decides jointly on these specific points, listed here, and the division will not override them without coming back. Any of these can be right for a given piece of work. What is never right is leaving it unsaid and letting people infer.
The sentence does more than manage expectations. It tells you who should be in the group, how many hours are worth asking for, what the sessions should produce, and what the report-back will have to answer. A group with real authority over three narrow points is usually worth more to a division than a group with vague influence over everything, because the three points actually change.
Four authority sentences, and what each commits you to This group advises.
You will bring questions while they are still open, listen, and use what is useful. You are not bound by the advice. What you still owe: a written account of what was said and what you did with it.
This group recommends.
Recommendations are recorded, and each one receives a written answer naming the decision maker and the reason. You may decline a recommendation. You may not leave one unanswered.
This group decides jointly on these points.
A short, specific list: the wording of a notice, the questions in a review, the order of the steps. Inside the list the division does not override the group without returning to it. Outside the list, say so plainly and say where the line is.
This group can say not yet.
The strongest version, and the one to offer sparingly: the group can hold a release until a named condition is met. If you offer it, honor it the first time it is used, or you never offered it.
Who is usually missing, and the design choice that keeps them out People who do not live near the office Sessions held downtown during business hours select for people who live nearby and control their own schedule. A remote option helps and is not enough on its own: connection quality, device access and comfort with the format vary widely, and a person on a phone in a parking lot is not participating on equal terms. Ask what would work, budget for travel and for the hours travel takes, and hold some sessions where people already are.
People who use interpreters or communication supports Interpreting booked late, a different interpreter at every session, or a fast discussion with no pauses produces participation on the attendance list and very little of it in the room. Book early, keep the same interpreters, send them the materials in advance, and run the meeting at a pace that makes interpreting possible. The same applies to captioning, and to people who use communication devices, who need time the agenda has to actually contain.
People working shifts, caring, or managing a health condition Four consecutive weekly sessions at a fixed hour is a design that selects for stable schedules and predictable energy. Offer more than one way to contribute: a session, a phone conversation, written comments, a recorded response. Say clearly that missing one session does not remove someone from the work, and mean it.
People with a difficult history with the division The people with the sharpest information are often the ones most tired of giving it. An invitation from the same division that denied a request or closed a case is not neutral mail. Sometimes the useful route is through an organization that already holds the relationship, with that organization paid for the work of holding it — and with the division prepared to hear something blunt without treating it as a complaint to be processed.
Where a decision reaches Tribal Nations This is a distinct government-to-government relationship with its own requirements, and a division co-design group neither substitutes for it nor absorbs it. Bring it to the Office of Indian Affairs and to the Department of Human Services offices that handle tribal matters, and follow their direction on how and whether to proceed.
Close the loop in writing, with a date What you can change You control whether people who gave you their time find out what happened to it, and whether they hear it from you or discover it in a published document.
What to watch for Do not let a change of course reach the group as a finished product. A recommendation overtaken by a budget or a legal requirement is a completely different message than a recommendation that was rejected, and only one of them damages the relationship.
Your next step Pick one group you have taken input from recently and send the missing report-back: what changed, what did not, why, and who decided.
We told them the same thing three rounds running and never heard back. Then a new project asked us for a morning. Our board said no. It was not about the morning.
Composite community organization perspective, illustrative A private reflection, for you only and never collected: picture the last group you asked for input. Who was not in it, and which specific choice — the hour, the place, the format, the notice period, the wording of the invitation — kept them out? Nothing here is recorded.
Carry this forward Write the authority sentence before the first session: this group advises, or this group recommends and every recommendation receives a written answer, or this group decides jointly on these named points. Left unsaid, authority is assumed and then experienced as a broken promise.
Absence is a design result, not a preference. Meeting times, locations, formats, notice periods, the language of the materials and the wording of the invitation decide who is able to be there.
One person does not represent a community, and treating them as a representative is both a burden and an error. Say what you are asking of each person: their own experience, their organization's position, or their professional view on a specific question.
The report-back is the part most often skipped and the part people remember. What was adopted, what was not and why, who decided, and what is still open — sent to everyone who took part, in the formats they use, by a stated date.
A scenario about a recommendation overtaken by a budget decision, four authority sentences and what each commits the division to, and a knowledge check on what makes a report-back usable.
Write one authority sentence for a group you convene or attend, and one report-back commitment with a date attached. Send both to the group before the next session, and to the person who owns the decision before that.
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