Citizen Dialogue for municipal consultancies: the missing piece in your mandate

More than a survey: a dialogue with the whole community.

Your analyses are solid. So are your recommendations. What is often missing is proof that the population is on board, and sooner or later someone in the council asks for exactly that. In the Citizen Dialogue, residents write anonymously what they think about the questions in your mandate and weigh each other's contributions. Digital, without the noise of an assembly, under your name if you wish.

After 21 days the population stands behind your recommendation. With numbers.

Proven with more than 60 clients in business, public administration & politics. On average, our clients did not know 8 of the 10 strongest contributions.

What you deliver to your clients

1. Legitimacy through breadth: At town meetings the same 50 people often do the talking. Every time. The dialogue makes the silent majority visible, with numbers that hold up in the council.

2. Local knowledge: Rat runs, places people avoid at night, details nobody sees from a desk. You know them before the objections arrive.

3. A decision matrix: Priorities times consensus: your client sees where implementation will be easy and where resistance is waiting.

Your business case as a partner

• An edge when pitching: You deliver not just opinions but a ranking backed by an Insight Guarantee.

• Less analysis work: Hundreds of hours of manual analysis disappear, because we check and merge contributions and calculate the ranking with its statistical uncertainty, while your team focuses on what the municipality hired you for: analysis and recommendation.

• Protection against a project halt: You see resistance while changing course is still cheap.

How it works

• Strategy workshop: Three hours with you and the municipality. We arrive with a concept for your mandate.

• Launch: Within 48 hours the dialogue space is ready, in your design if you wish. We write the invitation, the municipality sends it.

• Dialogue: Three weeks, moderated daily. Every contribution is checked. You follow along live.

• Result: Report, segment analysis and a ready-to-send response to residents. You write the recommendation.

Why BrainE4 is different

• No competition: We don't advise your municipality. We give you the voice of the population as a basis, and you turn it into the recommendation.

• Weight, not volume: Organised groups gain nothing. The number of judgements per person is limited, weighting corrects imbalances.

• Freedom of information: What gets published is a checked ranking, not a comment section.

• Insight Guarantee: In the strategy workshop we record six assumptions per question: what you expect. We mix them covertly into the contributions. If on average at least five of the top 10 are new to you, your knowledge has doubled. Otherwise we refund the dialogue.

For whom

• Municipal consultancies: when you support municipalities on strategy, organisation or finances.

• Municipal mergers: when you need to know what unites both sides before the vote.

• Mission statement and legislative planning: when goals need broad support.

In practice

Municipality of Schwyz: As external project manager, Franz-Xaver Strüby didn't want a mood picture of individual groups but a sound basis for the council. With four questions, Schwyz reached 11.2% of the population, with 150 Idea Duels per person. Read the interview

«I would recommend BrainE4 to all municipalities and organisations that are willing to listen seriously and give an important topic broad support.» Franz-Xaver Strüby, Strüby Consulting AG

Besenbüren AG: 667 residents and an emotional topic: waste. Councillor Peter Ammann relied on the dialogue for the second time. It cleared up open questions and defused the controversy instead of fuelling it. Read the interview

«When emotions run high, BrainE4 is the ideal channel.» Peter Ammann, municipal councillor

Ideal for:

Municipal strategy · Merger assessment · Mission statement · Legislative goals · Task review · Location development

Frequently asked questions

Will BrainE4 take our mandate?
No. Weighing up and recommending stay with you. We provide the data and handle moderation and analysis, in the background and under your name if you wish.

How much work stays with us?
Three hours in the workshop and one approval of the communication. We handle moderation, checking every contribution and analysis.

Is the result robust enough for the council?
Every statement comes with its statistical uncertainty. Through weighting we derive representative statements, by characteristics such as age, gender or district. The configuration is disclosed in the report.

What does it cost?
Before the start you receive a quote with a binding cost ceiling. If we need less, your client pays less.

All questions and answers

See more

Video: The Citizen Dialogue in brief. Watch the video

Citizen Dialogue: From major projects to accountability. Learn more

Sample report: What a finished citizen dialogue report looks like. View the report

Your recommendation.
The whole community behind it.

braine4.com