Understanding Stakeholder Perspectives
Tools for mapping stakeholder perspectives in restoration landscapes.
Restoration projects bring together people with different values, expectations and relationships to the landscape. These perspectives shape how restoration is understood, supported or challenged. Yet they are often poorly captured within formal monitoring and evaluation processes.
This project developed a practical toolkit to help restoration practitioners systematically explore stakeholder perspectives, identify areas of alignment and tension, and use this insight to inform more inclusive and effective restoration planning.
What the project did
The project created the Restoration Partnership Development Toolkit, a set of accessible digital and written resources that help stakeholders map values, discuss key issues and strengthen cooperation in complex restoration settings.
Piloted in Eastern Cumbria and the Welsh Borders, the toolkit combines social research methods with participatory exercises, allowing users to explore how people perceive restoration in their landscape. A detailed training manual, instructional videos and two complementary apps guide users through survey design, data collection and analysis.
Using the toolkit
Learn how it works
A short 2.5-minute video introduces the toolkit and how it supports effective partnership development.
Introductory video: Understanding stakeholder perspectives
Use the toolkit: Step-by-step support
Comprehensive guide explaining how to use the toolkit to understand stakeholder perspectives and improve collaboration.
Understanding stakeholder perspectives: Partnership development toolkit
Survey design, delivery, and analysis
Survey Generator App
An application for constructing a bespoke Likert-based survey using pre-developed statement banks or tailored statements relevant to the restoration context.
Survey Analysis App
An analytical tool for visualising survey results, including consensus index scores, and identifying areas of alignment and contention among stakeholders. These outputs are designed to inform subsequent workshop discussions.
Partnership development toolkit: Survey generator app
How to use the survey generator app
Partnership development toolkit: Survey analysis app
How to use the survey analysis app
Facilitate deliberative workshops
Template slides and structured guidance support the planning and delivery of stakeholder workshops informed by survey findings.
Partnership development toolkit: PowerPoint example
The toolkit in use
Survey instruments developed and tested in Cumbria and the Welsh Borders, demonstrating how the toolkit can be adapted to different restoration contexts.
Understanding stakeholder perspectives: Cumbria survey example
Understanding stakeholder perspectives: Welsh Borders survey example
Queries
For more information about the Restoration Partnership Development Toolkit, contact:
Janet Fisher – janet.fisher@ed.ac.uk
Annette Green – ag912@cam.ac.uk
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