Podcast: Collaboration and Community Voice with Rachel Nixseaman

Victoria

Hello everyone, Victoria here, Learning and Development Manager at Befriending Networks and I am joined by Rachel Nixseaman, Co-founder and Director of Deciding Matters. I have personally known Rachel for almost 10 years. We first met in 2016 as work colleagues when youth workers in Edinburgh. Today, however, Rachel is joining us in her current capacity. Rachel, can you please introduce Deciding Matters, how it formed and why?

Rachel

Yeah, hi Victoria. So Deciding Matters is a small deliberative democracy organisation based in Scotland. So there’s two full-time employees and we work with a range of fantastic associates as well with a range of different skills and experience. So Annie and myself are the two full-time employees and directors. We were both previously staff at the Democratic Society, which was another deliberative democracy organisation. It unfortunately had to close its UK operations as a result of Brexit. And when it did, it left a little bit of a gap, especially in Scotland. There are definitely other organisations that do similar work to ours, but Annie and I found that we were quite quickly being approached with requests for freelance, and that quite quickly escalated into us being in the fantastic position of being able to create our own business. which has been up and running for a few years now, which is really exciting. So we both come from this world of community voice, deliberation and participation and we’re just in this really lucky place now where we get to decide the projects we work on for ourselves.

Victoria

Brilliant. And it has been really interesting being on the sidelines, obviously seeing the two of you grow from contract to contract to website design to everything. As anyone will find who looks up Deciding Matters, there is a strong message or ethos for supporting those engaged in your work to rethink power and to be provided the opportunity to, if not feel empowered to, advocate for themselves and shape the decisions that will impact them. Can you tell us some examples of the work Deciding Matters has carried out since being established?

Rachel

Yeah, so as I mentioned, we’re really in a lucky position where we can choose our own work and we are able to work on a huge breadth of topics because our real thread that flows through them is community voice and that doesn’t really matter with regards to the context. We just want to make sure people are being heard. So some of the projects we’ve worked on was the development of a community inclusion standard through the FERNS programme funded by NatureScot and National Lottery Heritage Fund. That was a really big project that started in 2023 and finished up in 2025. We led a consortium of partners, including the Scottish Land Commission, University of Strathclyde, Soil Association Certification, NFCA, huge number of partners and working on multiple strands to co-design a best practice guide, looking at how nature-based projects in particular can engage with their communities.

We then translated that into an auditable framework so that people could show through certification that they are following best practice, that they are engaging with the people that live on and around the estates that they work on and manage. And we also developed an accompanying route map for community benefits delivery to support people working through that process. That was all tested across eight place-based sites across the UK. So that was a really big piece of work for us. And that’s now sitting with British Standards Institute, who are using our work as the foundation of their new standard as part of the FLEX programme.

We’ve also just finished up a piece of work with Scottish Government on tackling stigma for drug and alcohol. So we were specifically working with experts by experience and supporting these people to build relationships and trust in public sector and policy makers. We were exploring how public services can remove stigma against those with experience of addiction, whether that is direct or indirect experience, with the intention that eventually everybody has equal access to similar and appropriate levels of support, as a lot of people don’t feel or see that at the moment. So that report is currently sitting with Scottish Government, and we’re really looking forward to it being published, hopefully in the very near future.

And another piece just to kind of demonstrate the breadth of things that we do is we also work really closely with the AI Alliance. And this is a much more flexible relationship because we offer quite a lot of different support as an organisation. So sometimes we support them with design, sometimes it’s as facilitators, and sometimes we’ll help with their report writing as well. So we’ve recently been involved in some citizens assembly, sorry, citizens panel sessions with them looking at the intersection of AI and health.

Victoria

That would be really interesting, I think, even for someone like myself to access. Intersectionality is such a big topic and can go in so many different directions, no pun intended. But I think definitely even talking about like stigma. Though there’s definitely some befriending projects in our network even that are based in Scotland that do befriending for people with substance abuse or who are affected by that, I’m sure will be really interested to see what comes of that piece of work as well. So in your line of work, you are working hard to create a safe space, a productive space, where opinions are shared, listened to, and action plans or developmental suggestions are formed. This could naturally mean that conflict can arise through opposing opinions. How would you recommend anyone approach collaborative work in their community where they may find conflict?

Rachel

So not always, but I think conflict can often be identified and somewhat mitigated in advance. I think often you go into a project knowing whether you are working on a particularly divisive topic or whether you are working on something where people do have incredibly passionate views that they may not want to deviate from, or whether you are working with groups who maybe have a strained history when it comes to collaboration. And so I think a lot of these things can be identified and planned for before the project kicks off. So whether that is doing an emphasis on the relationship building and trust building, I think also having a very strictly defined scope and remit for the project. So what exactly questions are you asking and what exactly are you looking for in the answers? Not putting answers into people’s mouths, but just being really clear about what the deliberation is intended to achieve, what are your objectives, and ensuring then that you stick within that framework.

Another thing that we find really useful, and it sounds so obvious, but I think it often gets missed in a lot of these conversations because it is really obvious, is setting those conversation guidelines. And we do that at the start of every single session, even if we’ve been working with the same group for a year and had multiple workshops, we start every session by saying, “Here’s our conversation guidelines,” and that includes listening to everyone and also we argue with a point but never the person. So there can be disagreement but you cannot necessarily disagree with somebody else’s insights and experience. You can disagree with an idea or a direction of travel, but that really helps as well.

And the final thing that we try to do is make sure that everybody feels comfortable answering awkward questions, and that includes the people that are holding power. Often we find that people really don’t want to say if they don’t know the answer to something, especially if you are in a tense, high conflict project. Nobody wants to be the one that’s maybe letting down the side or seeming like they don’t know enough about a certain policy or whatever it is. So actually, it’s fine to say when you don’t know and to take those questions and to go away and then come back with a fully formed response. And so trying to make sure that everybody does feel comfortable to own that as well and have those awkward conversations. So I suppose really it’s about that relationship and making sure everybody feels comfortable, but also knows why they’re in the room together.

Victoria

Yeah, no, that’s a really good part, like very proactive to do list. But I think you’re right, whether people are sitting boundaries with someone, whether they are delegating to someone, any kind of like collaborative working, people want to know the why, like otherwise questions might seem like, where’s that coming from? Or why is that useful? Might get people’s back up like instantly. But yeah, no, some really good examples. I think also, I completely agree from a trainer-facilitator point of view. I always recommend it’s better to just admit when you don’t know rather than try to like fib it and potentially make a fool of yourself or give out some wrong or potentially dangerous advice or anything like that. So always better to say, I don’t know, but let me look into it and I’ll get back to you.

Rachel

Yeah, I think especially we’re trying to stumble through an answer could actually result in unrealistic expectations or a skewed perception of the scope and parameters. It can be really, like you said, it’s quite dangerous actually to forge forward when you’re not sure. So always safer to just make sure everybody’s on exactly the same page.

Victoria

Yes. Yeah, it helped to build that trust as well. I think, so way back now, it seems it’s now currently 2025. It was back in 2021. that I decided to do my Masters and I purposely picked the research topic of collaboration and co-design and looking at same sector and cross-sector collaboration partly because even at that time we had discussions of charity funding and competitive nature and how best to like support communities and things and I found across the range of roles and responsibilities within befriending services, from volunteer coordinator to a governance board, participants felt collaboration was best when entered through an informal conversation to sense that suitability, followed by a clear contract with clarifying like who was doing what, timelines and the key objective of the partnership. As it is now four years later, Rachel, I am curious whether that research is still relevant or from the work you and Annie have been carrying out, has the landscape evolved and are there new recommendations that should be made for collaborative working?

Rachel

I think that was a really exciting piece of research to hear about. I can’t believe it’s been four years since you did that. I think that’s definitely still very relevant. I think actually those kind of light touch informal conversations are really, really important because I think it’s easy to assume from reading somebody’s objectives or company aims to assume that you are very well aligned. And then actually when you start having a conversation, you realize that there are maybe different intentions or different kind of sub-goals. And that’s great, but that doesn’t always mean full alignment. So just having those chats in advance definitely helps.

I think some of the things that we would maybe add to your recommendations is, and I mentioned it before about conflict, is having a really, really clear scope. So why exactly are you doing this project and why are you engaging other people? I think sometimes we found that partnerships or collaborative opportunities are set up because they sound really nice and because they tick a box and maybe there’s going to be some great photos and building relationships. But then actually, once you have everyone in the room, there’s not a clear idea of, well, what is the purpose of having this particular experience or insight or knowledge? So really, really having real clarity over what exactly everybody is bringing to that partnership.

And the other thing that we would say is having an upfront, quite awkward conversation around power and decision-making, because you will have a lot of people in the room. And I think especially when you’re talking about charities where people wear a lot of hats or somebody might be looking over fundraising and volunteering, or one person’s looking after training and safeguarding, for example. People will be working with it in lots of decision-making frameworks, and they might not always have the final power, or there might be somebody in a more senior position that has power of veto or could bring a project in an entirely different direction. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s just that we need to be upfront where somebody who isn’t in the room maybe does have that level of power. So that people who are in the room know whether they are making a final decision or whether they are making a recommendation. And they know what that mechanism is that they’re outputs will be reviewed and then how that final decision will be made and how it will be fed back to them. So it’s really closing that feedback loop and understanding where your collaboration sits in the wider machine of that charity or that piece of work.

Victoria

Amazing. Thank you, Rachel. It’s definitely, I think that transparency does make a huge difference. I think especially some people can be quite nervous about collaborating. So it is, I think, like you say, especially in charities, people do have many hats on. So there’s that level of they want efficiency, but they also want that confidence that their time is being well used and just kind of having it upfront and fully understanding what it entails.

I personally love collaboration and have been learning about some amazing examples of co-design and collaboration within our network, some of which will be celebrated during our annual conference and befriending week as collaboration and partnership is our theme of 2025. I can see so many strengths from cohesion, from inclusion and representation, to accessing knowledge and skills that they may not have otherwise. From your experience with Deciding Matters or other experience as well, because you’re not brand new to community work, what do you think is the key advantage of collaborative working and why would you recommend it?

Rachel

I think change and evolution can never happen in isolation. So I think if you want a project, an organisation, or even to just personally be able to reflect and develop and grow, you do have to engage beyond your insular island, whatever that looks like. So I think you have to share resources, and that includes access to people as well as it includes access to kind of items, whether that’s kind of libraries of knowledge, thinking about different insights that you can collect from elsewhere and thinking about different levels of support as well, because I think especially the funding landscape has been really challenging for the last decade. And it’s not getting easier anytime soon. And actually, we are all wearing more hats than we probably like and pushing for change. So I think actually one of the biggest things as well is being able to lean on people with the same goals and objectives so you can really support each other and all work towards that positive change. I think also collaboration is really required on every level.

So I mean, even thinking about within Deciding Matters, there’s only two of us, Annie and myself. But we came into this with very, very different skill sets. Annie is incredibly creative and arts driven, and I thrive on numbers and a good spreadsheet. But you need both of those skillsets and you need those different perspectives. And it can be really hard to problem solve without those different insights. So I think that works on a really kind of micro scale, but also on the macro. So the more we can all share our learning and our support for each other, the more likely we are to actually have success across the sector.

Victoria

Nice. I think definitely we can back that up at Befriending Networks from what we have heard from our network, what we’ve seen. with our network. The amount of teams that are small teams, perhaps maybe not quite as small as just you and Annie, but small teams. And it is something that we hear a lot that people really value, even just having a conversation with someone who might understand the challenges that they’re up against, but even more so if they also from that conversation get a new resource or idea or content or something that can lead. So sometimes it’s that lower level collaboration of just sharing. And sometimes it is that bigger scale of creating something together that is quite unique, but always happy to see it. So with Deciding Matters, Rachel, what is next for you and Annie?

Rachel

So we’re in quite an exciting position at the moment. We have a couple of new projects kicking off. So I can’t say a huge amount about them because nothing’s been published yet. We’re working on a really exciting project with Edinburgh University, specifically with regards to the Old College building. So thinking about the building and the artworks within it and its accessibility.

And we have also just started a new project with Scottish Government looking at council tax reform and we’re going to be recruiting for public workshops on that soon. And yeah, I think sometimes these conversations that initially sound a bit dry actually end up being the most interesting because they affect absolutely everybody and people don’t think they’re particularly opinionated on council tax. But I suspect there’s going to be a lot of very passionate conversations on the go. So I’m looking forward to getting started with that.

And then as always, we’re doing lots of exciting bits and pieces of facilitation and design work and things in the background. So yeah.

Victoria

Amazing. And I can ditto it because I remember being at one of your events a few years ago with talking about farming or agriculture. Although I am from the countryside and things, there was a lot of information I did not know about. But it was a really fascinating conversation. I was like, oh, I didn’t know this was happening. So yeah, really, like you say, once you peel it back, it could affect everybody. So it sounds like you’ve got some great projects on the works. For anyone engaging with this podcast and wanting to get in contact with Deciding Matters, please share how to do this, Rachel.

Rachel

So check us out. Our website is decidingmatters.co.uk and then you can find contact details and e-mail address and fill in a little form. That’s where you can also find all of our reports and information about some more of our projects. And like I said, we’ll be recruiting soon. So lots of opportunities to get involved in the work with us across Scotland.

Victoria

Thank you so much for your time today, Rachel. It’s been fantastic to talk to you and gather your insights and experience on collaboration and partnerships at Deciding Matters. I’m particularly grateful to your recommendations on how we could all approach and engage in future collaborations and help to shape change.

Rachel

Thanks so much.