Beyond the Book: Conversations with Authors, a podcast from the Engagement Institute. 

Episode 2: The Secret Life of Pop Ups with Engagement Institute CEO Marion Short and author Cindy Plowman. 

Recorded August 2025. 

We sit down with leading authors and thinkers in the engagement space to dive deeper, beyond the pages, beyond the theory, to explore the messy, meaningful, and often surprising realities behind great engagement practice.   

Thanks for listening to Beyond the Book: Conversations with Authors. If you enjoyed today’s episode, don’t forget to subscribe and share.   

For more insights, events, and opportunities to connect with the engagement community, head to engagementinstitute.org.au.   

Beyond the Book: Conversations with Authors, a podcast from the Engagement Institute. 

Episode 1: The Underbelly of Engagement - The Unspoken Realities of Community Engagement with guests Max Hardy and Sally Hussey. 

Recorded August 2025. 

We sit down with leading authors and thinkers in the engagement space to dive deeper, beyond the pages, beyond the theory, to explore the messy, meaningful, and often surprising realities behind great engagement practice.   

Thanks for listening to Beyond the Book: Conversations with Authors. If you enjoyed today’s episode, don’t forget to subscribe and share.   

For more insights, events, and opportunities to connect with the engagement community, head to engagementinstitute.org.au.   

Discover invaluable insights, gain expert perspectives, and delve into the world of influencing political decision-makers.

Panel: Sally Hussey (author of our new thought leadership paper), Louise Crossman, Director at Counsel House, Aimee Brock, National Engagement & Business Improvement Manager at Waka Kotahi New Zealand Transport Agency, Alistair Kingston, Executive General Manager, RPS and our CEO, Marion Short.

This was a webinar presentation held live on 27 July 2023.

Desley Renton, Past IAP2A President and member of our former IAP2A Ambassador program and Nicola Mendleson, IAP2A Trainer, were joined by speakers from three different councils – inner city, regional and outer-urban growth -  to share the different challenges they faced as they developed their community visions and council plans.

This was a webinar presentation held live on 10 December 2021.

IAP2 Australasia

Leading the national conversation on authentic community and stakeholder engagement (public participation).

IAP2 Australasia is proud to be recognised as an affiliate of the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2).

We are a member association incorporating individuals, governments, institutions and other entities that affect the public interest throughout the world.

As a not-for-profit organisation, our aim is to advance the education of the community by teaching and communicating the principles of public participation and how to achieve effective community and stakeholder engagement.

Engagers share...learnings from the pandemic.

This was Part 1 of a webinar presentation held in November 2021.

Desley Renton, Past IAP2A President and member of our former IAP2A Ambassador program and Nicola Mendleson, IAP2A Trainer, were joined by engagement leads from the Australian health sector - Nina Fromhold, from the Victorian Public Service; Amanda Stephinson from NSW Health and Vienna Richards from the Aboriginal Medical Services Alliance of Northern Territory.

Together, they shared what they have learned, and how they overcame engagement challenges experienced during the pandemic.

Community engagement leaders struggle with how to:

• Involve people who are ‘hardly reached’.
• Appeal to young people.
• Engage authentically with people whose first language is not English.
• Extend the conversation with people who weren’t ‘in the room’ but who are keen to contribute.
• Overcome constraints of face-to-face engagement in a COVID world.

Jacinta Cubis and Cindy Lenferna de la Motte, Head of Customer and Community at Harvest, are excited to share a process that helps people to share their lived experience through photography. We don’t just have to ask people what they think, but instead, ask them to share photos that show what they think.

Listen in to their conversation which was held on Friday, 19 March 2021 about Show What Matters™. It uses phones, photos and a digital platform to help organisations engage more broadly and deeply with their communities.

Is it Your Time to Shine? Tips for the Core Values Awards 2021

Are you preparing an entry for the IAP2 Australasia Core Values Awards this year? You won’t want to miss this webinar presented by last year’s judges Anne Pattillo, Clare Murrell and Leisa Prowse, along with winner Alicia Pickering from Melbourne Water. Plus Emanuela Savini from the IAP2A Research Working Group will step you through the Case Study Template which forms the new entry template for those entering Project of the Year.

Aimed at members preparing submissions for the Core Values Award, topics will include:
• Overview of the submission and judging process
• The new Case Study Template
• Common pitfalls to avoid
• What makes a winning entry stand out
• What sort of evidence to include
• Tips and tricks from our past winners

Guest presenter Suzy Jacobs joined us for a special edition personal and professional development webinar for IAP2 members and friends in November 2020.

As well as being a professional speaker, Suzy is an in-demand coach, and in this webinar she shared her strategies on how to move from feeling stuck and disillusioned to empowered and unstoppable.

Suzy takes us through:
-Identifying the intellectual, emotional & physical barriers to creating harmony with self, others and the planet.
-Exploring the paradox of choice and unpacking the assumptions that keep people unhappy, unfulfilled and under-performing.
-Understanding the mechanics of constructing a world view and how to reconstruct it to produce better outcomes.
-Choosing a universally applicable, self-first process for creating responsible, accountable communication.

About Suzy Jacobs
A charismatic entrepreneur and coach with energy and heart, Suzy Jacobs connects with the world as an MC, Keynote Speaker and an inspiring member of our global community.

Suzy Jacobs is the driving force behind Activator Academy, a successful entrepreneur, an experienced business mentor and coach. She has spent more than 20 years working across business and franchise ventures, including leading start-ups and producing global events such as She Business, Athena and Fearless.

Suzy specialises in working with business leaders, helping them move from being stuck and disillusioned, to empowered and unstoppable.

This webinar, Part 2 of our Deliberative Engagement series, recorded 27 August 2020, provides practical information about deliberative engagement and how to adapt your approach to engagement to satisfy the new Victorian Local Government Act 2020.

Topics
-What is deliberative engagement
-What makes deliberative engagement different from engagement?
-Deliberative engagement in the context of the Victorian Local Government Act
-How to achieve deliberative engagement with lower budgets
-Building capacity for deliberative engagement in councils
-Insights from the field
-Key tips from the thought leaders/experts

Panellists
-Max Hardy, Director, Max Hardy Consulting
-Emanuela Savini, Doctoral Student and Industry Fellow, Institute for Public Policy and Governance, UTS
-Georgie Meyer, Team Leader Community Engagement and Partnerships, City of Melbourne
Moderated by Amy Hubbard – Capire Consulting Group and IAP2 Australasia Director.

This webinar, recorded 11 August 2020, discussed practical information about deliberative engagement and how to adapt your approach to engagement to satisfy the new Victorian Local Government Act 2020.

Panellists
-Hannah Duncan-Jones, Director Responsible for the Implementation of the Local Government Act 2020, Local Government and Suburban Development Group, Department of Jobs, Precincts and Regions
-Sharon Redmond, Project Manager, Legislation Implementation, Local Government Victoria, Local Government and Suburban Development Group, Department of Jobs, Precincts and Regions
-Moderated by Amy Hubbard – Capire Consulting Group and IAP2 Australasia Director.

 
Topics

• An overview of the relevant changes to the Victorian Local Government Act
• What the new legislation is aiming to achieve
• Where to find out more