community views | views.id

Traditional survey approaches are too expensive to deploy and less representative than ever. Community engagement activities are often hijacked by the noisy few whose views don't necessarily reflect the community's best interests.

The Living in Place questionnaire, survey method and views.id platform are a giant and much needed leap forward for Australian councils who want to truly represent the breadth and depth of their community's views in decision making.

Designed by leading social research consultancy Ipsos Public Affairs in 2014 to help bring the community's views to the burgeoning liveability conversation, the 16 critical liveability attributes deployed in the Living in Place survey were selected through a process that involved analysis of literature around the factors that contribute to a high quality of life, consultation and survey based trials.

Despite taking just eight weeks to deliver, our well-honed Design > Collect > Report approach considers each council's specific needs with regard to internal engagement, survey sample representativeness, communication of insights and support.

We efficiently manage the process for you from survey design and collection to clear and accessible reporting taking the work out of your hands.

Our affordable subscription model delivers above market value at below market costs.

Despite immense variation in size, composition and character, local governments share one common responsibility – to act in the best interests of the community they are entrusted to represent.

Living in Place and views.id help local government and other organisations put their residents' needs at the centre of their decision making.

The lack of credible national datasets make it difficult for councils to understand whether their community's views and needs are specific to them, or part of the broader context.
To solve this problem, Ipsos Public Affairs provides us with annually updated nationally representative benchmarks for all survey questions.

Despite committing to monitoring strategic plans annually, local government often don't know how the community feels they are progressing against the themes and goals within their major policies.

Living in Place and views.id have been optimised for annual updates, so councils can monitor their policy and meet their legislative requirements.

Historically, survey insights prepared for local government were delivered in dense and unapproachable formats that councils cannot efficiently use and simply do not want to share with their community.

The views.id platform has been created so that local government professionals get on with using their council specific insights, resources and data to create, monitor and evaluate resident-centric strategic planning and advocacy.

Living in Place and views.id are being used by a diverse range of councils to inform, monitor and evaluate all manner of strategic planning and advocacy activities.

Living in Place is an independent, robust and repeatable community survey that seeks to understand and advance the liveability of Australians' local areas.

Living in Place uses 16 critical liveability understand the community's values, local area experiences, the LGA's overall liveability and future needs. It can also measure community health & wellbeing, financial circumstances, concerns & ideas for improving quality of life.

We use our proven social research advertising methodology to survey a large and representative sample of the community, employing techniques to ensure that those who participate reflect the LGA's geographic and demographic composition.

Survey findings are published on the views.id reporting and exploratory platform. All clients receive a narrative based Views report and Insights workshop - tailored to reflect the client's local policy context.

It provides an evidence base to create, monitor and evaluate strategic planning and advocacy - informed by a deep and authentic understanding of residents’ values, experiences and needs.
It allows councils to explore how views and needs manifest spatially across (local areas), within (demography, life-stage) and compare beyond (external benchmarking) the LGA.

Living in Place is used and trusted by a growing number of councils to help bring a credible resident lens to strategic planning and advocacy. Current clients include the City of Ipswich, Sunshine Coast Regional Council, Strathfield Council, Huon Valley Council, the City of Gold Coast and Northern Beaches Council.