The Public Practice Pty Ltd is a social planning firm that seeks to improve the way professionals and volunteers work with communities. Our focus is on using consultation and demographic analysis to understand communities better.

We have worked for dozens of local Councils, government departments and community groups, as well as private firms. We specialise in demographic and policy analysis and community consultation.

Our Community Portraits and Interactive Tools have been developed to enable us to rapidly analyse common data sets such as the Census, saving you time by turning numbers into reports - complete with tables and charts. Most pages on this web site explain these Portraits and Tools.

We also provide consulting services, helping people design effective participatory processes that harness community energy to bring changes, or to investigate data on a particular concern.

Managing Director

Colin Menzies, B.Sc., B.Eng., M.T.C.P.

Colin became a social planner after intensive involvement with inner Sydney resident action groups in the 1970s. He worked on urban development planning for the NSW Department of Planning and Landcom before becoming Secretary General of the Australian Council of Social Services (ACOSS) in the 80s. After that, Colin started The Public Practice so he could continue to work in communities and analyse their issues. (want to know more? click here).

A chronicle of our Consultancies can be downloaded here.