Tenant engagement - What if your organisations approach is mssing the real story?

Housing organisations rely heavily on surveys, KPIs and performance metrics, but do they truly capture the lived experiences of tenants and communities?

This briefing introduces our newest DINLab, which will explore whether a new, complexity-informed approach can unlock deeper insight, strengthen decision-making, and improve outcomes for customers and communities.

This briefing event will give you an overview of the project, answer any questions and hopefully you will want to sign your organsiation up to participate!

What is a DINLab?

A DINLab is our innovation platform to rapidly test, learn and evaluate new services and solutions with start-ups, early-stage growth and new market entrants.

For many organisations, being able to fully participate in prototyping and proof of concept trials with new products or solutions is not always possible on their own, either due to lack of resources, experience, or financial issues. DINLabs offers you the opportunity to collaborate as a group of providers to build, test and learn at speed from some of the very best new technologies and organisational design processes

So, if you would like to learn more about what this experiment will involve, the method, the resources, the data requirements and the costs then please reserve your place and we will do our best to answer your questions and see if this is the right approach for your organisation.

About this session

Starting this Autumn, hear more about our next year-long discovery programme that will test SenseMaker®, a fundamentally different way of listening to your tenants, combining narrative and data to reveal patterns that traditional engagement methods often miss.

Developed by The Cynefin Co and rooted in the internationally recognised Cynefin Framework, created by Dave Snowden, the session will explore whether Sensemaker can deliver richer insight that can genuinely transform how housing organisations understand and respond to tenant needs and make better strategic decisions.

Hosted by DIN associate director Caroline Gitsham, the webinar will give you an insight into how the DINLab will test whether SenseMaker® can:

• Reveal emerging themes, weak signals, and blind spots

• Enable organisations to move from reactive to pre-emptive decision-making

• Strengthen trust, service design, and community outcomes

What you can expect

• A practical introduction to SenseMaker®

• An overview of the opportunity to test and reflect on a new engagement approach

• An understanding of how the DINLab will co-design and test your own engagement project

• An explanation of how the DINLab will run and what’s involved
• An opprtunity to ask questions

Our speakers

Beth Smith – Programme Manager, Democratic Innovation, The Cynefin Company

Beth is a pioneer in citizen engagement and participatory innovation, with experience across government, educatio, and NGOs globally. She leads democratic innovation work at The Cynefin Company, applying complexity-based methods to collaboration, community development, and decision-making. Her work focuses on equality, diversity and new forms of democratic participation.

Caroline Gitsham – Associate Director, Disruptive Innovation Network

Caroline brings over 30 years’ experience in the public sector, including 15 years at executive level. She has led complex services, delivered innovative and award-winning programmes, and driven major corporate agendas. With deep expertise in partnerships and transformation, Caroline is passionate about improving customer outcomes and service delivery.

Who should attend

This DINLab is ideal for housing organisations looking to deepen their understanding of tenants and communities, including:

• Tenant and customer engagement professionals

• Data, insight and analytics teams

• Community development practitioners

• Service design and innovation leads

• Participation and co-production specialists

• Senior leaders shaping strategy and regulatory response