What we do

Our Mission

At Barber Associates, we believe that the way to achieve better outcomes is through better decisions. We care about those who are vulnerable economically, socially and/or culturally and want to be part of the solution to eliminate the system of poverty that keeps them trapped so they can be all they are meant to be.

To this end, we created “Better Decisions. Better Outcomes”, a proven 5-stage method that enables public leaders to take a holistic, systematic, relational approach to engage and think with key stakeholders how best to achieve vision for better public value. It produces a Portfolio Business case to inform initiatives that require investment and policy decisions.

Dr. Joe Flanagan-Joint Chief Examiner of the UK Better Business Case Programme, Architect of the 5 Case Model, and author of the HM Treasury Guides for the development of Programme and Project Business Cases-fully endorses BDBO approach to the development of Portfolio Business Cases.

One of the mistakes we most often see is that business cases are written as a compliance document to secure funding rather than a campaign to deliver public value. If you focus on the funding, you will miss your funding target. If you focus on thinking through public value, you’ll get the investor wanting to invest more. Engagement is key and is just one of the elements we assist with.

Key Benefits

There are 8 distinct advantages of the Barber Associates Engagement Model:

·         Capability- It delivers capability so less consultancy support is needed in future.

·         Clarity-It enables clarity of the dependencies between the initiatives enabling the leadership team to determine the overall value of the projects.

·         Confidence- It ensures the right initiatives are identified from the get-go.

·         Engagement- It engages stakeholders in the short and long term.

·         Fiscal -It helps prioritise with tight budgets.

·         Participation- It enables increased public participation.

·         Transparency- It provides rapid scenario planning with trade-offs between initiatives.

·         Vision-It better places the development of long-term planning.

Our 5 Stage Engagement Model

We have a tried and tested engagement model with a simple 5 stage approach, with a large associate base whilst maximising local people to enable public leaders to develop a place-based Portfolio Business Case in 5 months using the 5 Case Model.  As part of our unique approach, we assess and improve the quality of your decision making, and train and coach you in developing your business whilst maximising your internal capability.

BDBO addresses the why, what, when, how and who of decision making in the think phase.   The 5 BDBO stages carefully set out the importance of engaging the right people in the right way (who) to think together to develop a business case (what) to inform a startup decision (when) that gives confidence the vision can be achieved (why).