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Top tips for tenant involvement
Engaging with tenants is fundamental for all social landlords. Here’s why – and how – to do it
INNOVATION & IMPROVEMENT
Kathleen McKillion
Senior Associate, Campbell Tickell
Kathleen McKillion
Senior Associate, Campbell Tickell
Issue 74 | October 2024
Engaging with tenants and involving them in practical decisions – especially about the housing management and maintenance services they receive – should be a fundamental for all social landlords. It’s about helping people take ownership of their individual home and the community in which they live.
Positive tenant involvement will help improve an organisation’s governance and contribute to improving performance. It is also an expectation in a regulatory context: the Tenancy Management Standard set by the Approved Housing Bodies Regulatory Authority (AHBRA) is an integral part of the overall regulatory framework.
Involving tenants and getting feedback on whether and how you are delivering excellent customer journeys and experiences is key to improving overall performance. There are many examples we could draw upon. Here are two:
Improving customer experience
Some forward-thinking housing providers have demonstrated the impact of customer insight and engagement around how services and processes can be better designed to meet customer needs and aspirations.
One such example – featured in Campbell Tickell’s research report with Disruptive Innovators Network – is from Grand Union Housing, setting out how psychographic customer segmentation has enhanced understanding and communication with customers.
There is a lot that could be drawn from this example, not least the importance of good data and evidence to underpin service and process design that really makes a difference to people.
Resident influence at a governance level
Wythenshawe Community Housing has a customer experience committee, which has a majority of customer members, with strong links to other customer groups.
In a recent podcast, CT featured a discussion around how the committee had commissioned a tenant scrutiny review to understand lower than expected satisfaction with complaints through the tenant satisfaction measures (TSMs). The Regulator of Social Housing in England requires social landlords to collect and report on their TSMs performance.
This exercise led to a stronger understanding of how customers perceive complaints and how Wythenshawe Community Housing could better respond and improve as a result of complaints.
Top 10 tips for tenant engagment
Your tenants can be engaged in many ways. Here are my top 10 tips.
01
Focus: Put tenants consciously at the heart of the organisation to ensure you understand what they need, want and value most.
02
Monitor: Keep a check on your service delivery and performance – is it to the quality and standard you have set and expect?
03
Accountability: Use the intelligence gained from involving tenants to help hold staff to account for their customer service performance, as well as providing an opportunity to highlight respective tenant and landlord responsibilities.
04
Communicate: Remember tenant meetings – it’s always good to talk! Communicate and meet with tenants regularly. Hold in-person meetings in a local area at least annually. And don’t limit your engagement to meetings – not everybody wants or will be able to attend, and there are lots of other ways to reach people, for example by text or WhatsApp.
05
Support: Provide space, resources and support, and offer workshops and training sessions for tenants and community groups to meet and participate in decision making on matters that affect and interest them.
06
Consult: When planning a new development or a regeneration scheme, arrange for local tenants to meet development staff and the architect to provide input from their valuable lived experience into the costed housing plan.
07
Involve: Tenants have their own views on what will work in their homes and how to improve their communities, for example regarding the layout and communal areas. Make sure you involve them in identifying what works, and in planning new arrangements.
08
Influence: Ensure tenants can influence current and future service delivery, with choices of kitchen and bathroom finishes for example, wherever possible.
09
Inform: Provide pre-tenancy information in an easy-to-understand way. Ensure you cater for diverse needs and support requirements.
10
Governance: Consider a formal role for tenants in your governance structure, such as a customer committee that includes tenant members.
