Industry Leadership Groups review

Theme 3 - Communication and Engagement

Our Findings

• Those ILGs with close involvement of trade bodies and member organisations had deeper reach into their sectors and offer an excellent route to broad and deep engagement.
• There were ILGs without this trade or membership organisation who could demonstrate positive practice, for example the Scottish Forestry and Timber Technology ILG's front-line engagement activities.
• ILGs have the potential to reach businesses not currently touched by the usual Government and agency routes
• In many sectors, there is a crowded landscape with numerous potential routes to engage on a sectoral basis therefore ILGs must occupy a specific niche.
• ILG Chairs used to be brought together for an annual event. There is merit in bringing together ILGs around cross-cutting issues, particularly sharing practice and learning - and facilitating cross-sectoral collaboration.

Building on mapping work undertaken by Scottish Enterprise we can see that there are numerous industry bodies operating in Scotland; including in the same sectors as ILGs.

This mapping is not exhaustive but indicates a crowded landscape.

It is therefore important that any future ILGs occupy a specific niche, as outlined in this report.

For full analysis see Annex E (Figure 1)

In Future:

• All ILGs should make efforts to reach out widely and connect with their sector. This is fundamental to the future role of ILGs around facilitating innovation and bid consortium assembly. A functional ILG would be known and visible to the sector;
• There is a really important role for ILGs in communication to- and from- Government and agencies and this should be prioritised; There should be clarity on channels of communication and interaction with government and government bodies.
• There is more to be done to consider how ILGs could connect into the Enterprise and Skills Strategic Board, and to one another, in order to facilitate collaboration.