Essential Ingredients

Co-production is more than a process and is fundamentally a "relational way of being". In her commentary on co-production, Lynn Laidlaw states that while academics want to know how to “do” co-production, it is as much about the “being,” which can be "messy, emotional and relies on soft skills" (Masterson & Laidlaw, 2024).

The landscape of co-production is crowded with hundreds of guides and toolkits which have the goal of guiding co-production with specific groups or in a specific context. The challenge is that any toolkit, no matter how well designed, can become a tickbox exercise with the wrong intentions.

Our intention is what determines the quality of the co-production, not the steps we follow. A simple reflective question from Sally Howe here is useful: what are you willing to change as a result of what you hear?

Meaningful co-production therefore depends on first establishing a clear, honest intention; without that foundation, no tool can substitute for the genuine conversations and collaborative values that drive the engagement. We can reflect on the available assets (our strenghts, not just resources) and set out what we can feasibly change and be transparent with that which we cannot.

The next essential ingredient is dialogue. The way you facilitate dialogue (and document it) can take many forms and there are many approaches to fit your specific context. A review of detailing the most common approaches is provided below, though there is no one set "recipe" to follow. Create the opportunity for dialogue and be prepared to agree ways of working together.

The Engagement, Alignment, and Agreement (EAA) Framework

The EAA framework (Masterson et al., 2024) offers a practical pathway to navigate the complexity of co-production by centering the process on three core themes: Engagement, Alignment, and Agreement. These are achieved through iterative interaction between six essential social mechanisms— intention, assets, dialogue, documentation, mutual interpretation and shared understanding. These take place in a contextual process which is likely to be different every time. As such, these can be considered "essential ingredients" rather a specific recipe to follow. You can decide what to cook or bake together.

By creating a conducive environment for these mechanisms to take place (or prepping the kitchen with the right ingredients), we can move beyond superficial "involvement" to achieve meaningful and reciprocal dialogue. By fostering transparent documentation of the dialogue, we can reach alignment on how we will work together; why we are working together; with whom; and what we will try to achieve.

For those planning, reporting or reflecting on the dialogic process, this framework offers a useful structure to guide the reporting of your own unique recipe. You can access the EAA framework for free here:

Masterson, D., Lindenfalk, B., Kjellström, S., Robert, G., & Ockander, M. (2024). Mechanisms for co-designing and co-producing health and social care: a realist synthesis. Research Involvement and Engagement, 10(1), 103. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s40900-024-00638-3