The Southern Homelessness Services Network's Lived/Living Experience Engagement Plan

The Southern Homelessness Services Network’s Lived/Living Experience Engagement Plan was a collaborative project involving people with lived/living experience of homelessness, Network specialists, and the Network’s managers group, facilitated by Constantly Learning.

This project required a consideration of the limited pre-existing knowledge in the Australian homelessness services sector about effective lived/living experience engagement and the entrenched and enduring power differences that exist between people who access services and those who provide them.

To work with these, this Plan was developed through multiple workshop sessions and additional supportive activities, intended to foster authentic collaboration and to increase the power and influence of the people with lived/living experience.

This project included:

A comprehensive review of the Network’s previous engagement activities and their Lived Experience Working Group’s work to date.
Meetings between the facilitator and the people with lived/living experience to develop rapport, increase the facilitator’s understanding of the lived/living experience priorities, and to create a shared approach to the collaborative processes.
An initial workshop session involving people with lived/living experience, specialists, and the managers group to create collaborative relationships and shared understandings of the principles and expectations of lived/living experience engagement across the Network.
Subsequent workshop sessions involving people with lived/living experience, specialists, and the managers group to develop and finalise the Plan’s content, using individual and collaborative reflective, creative, and critical practice activities.

The resultant Plan is ambitious but achievable, providing a clear direction for the Network to strengthen their inclusion of people with lived/living experiences of homelessness in all that they do, and for their ongoing work to be in collaboration with, and as led by, the developing experts of their Lived Experience Leadership Group.