How much time should be allowed for involvement during a project?
Each project is different and the time spend on involvement depends on your individual involvement plan. Plan involvement into your research design and timeline so appropriate time and provisions are allocated to the tasks. You may need to amend this plan during the study if more involvement is required to address issues, e.g. recruitment problems.
Plan the time around your contributors’ availability as well as your own. Try to plan meetings with public contributors in advance as they might have busy calendars and are not available on short notice. Additionally, keep the local school holidays in mind as your public contributors might be less flexible due to (grand)child care.