Stakeholder engagement

Meaningful, honest, inclusive, iterative and proportionate engagement continues to be the cornerstone of our approach to working with stakeholders and using feedback to make positive change for the company and for customers.

Proactive, regular, meaningful two-way dialogue with wide ranging groups of people across our footprint, simply put, is just the way we do things.

We have created an industry first bespoke map for underreached consumer groups that goes beyond generic definitions such as ‘seldom heard’. This has given unparalleled granularity and clarity on who our underreached groups are and enabled us to spot gaps in our engagement that can be addressed via specific plans moving forward.

This has allowed us to improve how we:

• Prioritise who to engage with.
• Design engagement channels to overcome barriers faced by different groups.
• Monitor engagement to track participation among priority groups.
• Adapt our engagement plans to ensure all voices are heard.

We’re continually talking to our customers and stakeholders to find out what they expect from their gas distributor. Our annual customer perceptions research helps us to understand customer priorities and perceptions and how these are changing.

In addition, we regularly talk to stakeholders including businesses, local authorities and combined authorities and the voluntary and community sector, and hear about their priorities through meetings, focused workshops, research, and events such as our stakeholder conference.

We have continued to fine-tune our use of innovative engagement mechanisms, including our industry leading Citizens Panel and our Young Innovators Council.  These approaches allow us to challenge and test our thinking and ensure our actions continue to be relevant and meaningful.

Meet our Citizens Panel, a group of customers representative of the people we serve across our network

Find out more

Meet members of our Young Innovators Council, a powerful group of young people aged 14 – 19 who share valuable insights to ensure we keep future bill payers in mind with every investment decision we make

Find out more

Strong collaboration is at the heart of our engagement, tackling the challenges and opportunities faced in our region together by continuing to work closely with industry, energy stakeholders and our region’s electricity distribution and water companies, for the benefit of everyone in our Northern communities.

We’re continuing to work hard to find ways to create space for stakeholders to hear each other’s voices and work together to identify meaningful change and direction for our business, such as through our annual conference, our workshops, and open days.

We work with a wide range of partners, including charities, environmental groups, MPs, utilities, local authorities, schools, colleges and faith groups. We’re always looking to forge new partnerships, and to gather feedback on how we’re doing.

We believe that robust challenge is essential to ensure our investment meets our customers’ priorities while crucially delivering value for money.

The Independent Stakeholder Group (ISG) provides this challenge and scrutiny and holds us to account for our customer and stakeholder promises, ensuring that our stakeholders needs, preferences and priorities remain central to our decision making.

The group publishes regular reports on their findings and recommendations.