Christmas 2008
Season's Greetings
Goodbye 2008 and hello 2009! Instead of sending Christmas cards this year, we have made a donation to Oxfam's Unwrapped programme - it reduces our carbon footprint too!
It has been a tough year for the economy with more of the same predicted for 2009. Never has the time been so right for us all to look at how policy and practice can converge into delivering solutions to communities, business and individuals. We have been working on some exciting projects this year:
- supporting providers in developing their programmes around unemployment and in particular helping them think through how to take forward welfare to work approaches in a recession;
- creating effective ways to help practitioners exchange learning and knowledge to address key economic challenges; and,
- developing thinking and practice to help local authorities tell their story through better information, intelligence and working.
To the right of this we've highlighted some of our current projects and will keep you posted throughout 2009 on our progress and emerging thinking. For more info, please get in touch with Caroline Masundire.
What's Your New Year's Resolution?
We think 2009 will be a really challenging year for us all, but we know that little things can make a difference in the work that we do.
Tell us what your resolution is for Gordon Brown and we'll reward the most creative answer with £25 in gift vouchers to amazon.co.uk!
Please email responses to Andy Myers.
Latest News
Conferences and Workshops
Conference and workshop technology and techniques move on apace. Rocket Science have been taking forward new approaches in a number of our recent contracts.
Delivering as One Organisation
Natural England's 2008 staff conference, held in November, confirmed the successful and continuing progress of the organisation's transition programme since its formation two years ago.
As well as understanding the extent and geographical location of the financially excluded, we also started to explore and map financial capability. Our starting point was identifying proxies for financial capability and over-indebtedness; peoples' attitudes to savings and debt; and their use of sub-prime loans, mortgages and credit cards.
A groundbreaking event, the conference for almost 2,000 of Natural England's staff was staged at seven separate conference centres around England, connected as a single network on the web and by video conference. Using audience engagement technology - for the first time exclusively over the internet - this was a highly interactive conference facilitated by Rocket Science. All participants received discussion topics and voting questions at the same time and submitted responses which were then debated live, drawing in contributions and comment from executive directors and other senior managers located at venues throughout the network.
The combination of a carefully designed and interactive programme with strategic and relevant topics, big screen, high definition video conferencing and extensive use of audience engagement technology, ensured a high level of sustained staff engagement and enjoyment throughout the one day event. It also represented a milestone in the development of more sustainable events undertaken by public bodies.
Planned over a six month period, the concept was initiated and developed by a joint planning team, led by Natural England. Rocket Science contributed to the concept and was responsible throughout the development phase for advice and support on programme design, content development, mentoring senior staff responsible for presentations and, on the day, facilitation of all-network debates and voting. The Live Group also contributed to the concept and co-ordinated event management, the provision of high-end technology and the specialist teams required to deliver the 7-venue event.
As a result of the success of our involvement with Natural England, Rocket Science has been retained for the next 4 years to supply advice, practical assistance on design, development and facilitation of Natural England's developing programme of internal and external events: workshops, seminars and conferences.
Contact: David Pirnie
New Consultative Processes
Elsewhere we have been taking forward new consultative processes, exemplified by our work with the NHS. NHS Health Scotland (NHSHS) have been commissioned by government to review and sharpen performance management of actions to improve health outcomes and narrow health inequalities. Rocket Science worked with them to engage cross sector partners to discuss a health improvement performance management framework. This series of regional events indicated encouragement for the framework and NHSHS have subsequently developed a range of tools to support outcome-based planning for health improvement, including clarification of accountability for shared outcomes. Rocket Science were commissioned to design, facilitate and write up a two-day seminar with partners to assess and improve the utility of the tools. The target audience were those involved in local planning and performance reporting on shared outcomes in the context of local Single Outcome Agreements and HEAT targets.
Evaluation from the two-day event indicated that delegates were more informed and knowledgeable and many indicated a desire to immediately put the tools to good use. They also provided valuable feedback on development of the tools to ensure greater usability. There was also positive feedback for the format used "much better format than traditional conference format - Very focussed and constructive".
Contact: Debbie Adams
Skills and Employability Journeys
Scottish Government, SDS and Jobcentre Plus relied on a mix of the tried and tested and new approaches to capture current and future client journeys to help develop a framework for integrated skills and employability journeys. At this event participants drew journeys across the (wipeable!) walls of the Pensions Service Innovation Centre - these were then digitally photographed and projected back in the main workshop room for detailed discussion. We were then able to present back to the clients tidied up graphical versions of all these drawings as a basis for further discussion and refinement with other key partners. In January focused pilot journeys will be rolled out in close consultation with local partners and providers to test out different aspects of the journeys.
Contact: Richard Scothorne
Bringing Health and Employability Professionals Together
Jobcentre Plus with the Scottish Government launched the JCP Pathways Advisory Service during the Autumn with 8 conferences across Scotland which were facilitated by Rocket Science. These were all well attended and lively events, bringing together health and employability professionals to explore the practical and powerful approach of putting JCP Personal Advisors in GP practices. Highlights were confident and very moving contributions from people who had been long term IB and were now able to stand up in the daunting environment of a full conference room and tell us about their journey from ill health and worklessness to fulfilling and valuable jobs.
Contact: Richard Scothorne
Learning Networks and Websites
Learning networks are a rapidly growing phenomenon to support those working on new approaches and programmes and these are often complemented or supported by e-newsletters and websites.
City Strategy Learning Network
Rocket Science has been commissioned by the Department of Work and Pensions to develop and run the learning network for the 15 City Strategy Pathfinders in England, Scotland and Wales.
The Pathfinders were originally funded for two years, but this funding has now been extended to 2011, to pilot innovation in addressing worklessness. Our approach for delivering this network is to support pathfinders and key stakeholders in three key ways: the first is to provide engagement and communication through regular events, with regular bulletins and dedicated account management support; the second is providing bespoke support at the local level to help build capacity and support local learning; the third way is by creating environments where pathfinders, policymakers and stakeholders can connect with each other and influence strategy, policy and practice. Our first national event is taking place on 4th and 5th February attended by Tony McNulty Minister of State for Employment and Welfare Reform and Minister for London.
Contact: Mark Morrin
Support Websites
This year we have been designing two support websites - one for employability practitioners working with SMEs (site) and one for practitioners and managers in the employability field in Scotland. The latter, How to...Employability, will be launched in March 2009 and we will send you the link when it is live.
Contact: Richard Scothorne
Economic Assessments
Working with our partners Globe Regeneration, Rocket Science has won a contract with IDeA to develop sector led guidance for authorities to deliver their economic assessment. We are working with 10 different authorities across England as an Action Learning Set to develop thinking and guidance. Over the next five months we will be working closely with the group around the logical process of developing a framework: engaging stakeholders, developing a framework, gathering intelligence as well as evidencing, building capacity and commissioning, delivering the assessment and then monitoring it.
We are also developing a community of practice (COP) housed on the IDeA website so we can engage with a broader and more diverse audience of stakeholders, both at a policy and practitioner level. Work begins in January - but if you would like any further information or would like to join the COP then please contact: Caroline Masundire.
Building capability for delivering an economic assessment
Also with our partners Globe Regeneration, we are launching a capability and review consultancy service for local authorities who want to know how they are going to plan and deliver their economic assessment. The review comprises a short and sharp diagnostic which looks at culture, capacity, capability and collection of evidence culminating in an action plan and next steps report to help authorities work through what they need in place to meet their staturoty duties. The review takes between three and six days, working on-site and closely with your team. If you would ike further information on approach and costs, please contact: Caroline Masundire.
Partnership Proliferation and the Fate of the Third Sector
Between 2000/01 and 2005/06, the third sector's income from the public sector grew from £8 billion to £11 billion. At the same time, the profile of this income from the public sector changed dramatically. While grant levels have remained the same since 2000/01, contract income from the public sector has significantly increased. The proportion of public sector income now coming from contracts has risen from below 50% in 2000/01 to 62% in 2005/06.
[ The UK Civil Society Almanac, 2008 ]
s third sector organisations bid for more and bigger contracts, they increasingly need to work in partnership or within consortia. This was demonstrated during bidding for the Department for Work and Pensions' Pathways to Work contracts in September 2007, when charities found it difficult to compete with large private sector organisations and won only a handful of the contracts on offer. Whilst third sector figures criticised the contracting process at the time, there was also a recognition that third sector organisations needed to respond to the challenges of the public services market by developing their capacity to bid for contracts in partnerships or consortia. A study by the National Audit Office in 2007 found that local authorities claim that local third sector organisations "often do not have the capacity to deliver large public service contracts and have shown little inclination to join together in consortia".
There is clearly much more work needed in this area, both to look at how frontline groups are working in partnerships and consortia, and also to consider how these partnerships and consortia can be best enabled by "second tier" support providers. As part of the Capacitybuilders Improving Support programme on income generation, Rocket Science will be working with ACEVO (the Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations) to deliver a two-year programme of action research examining the success factors behind third sector organisations working collaboratively to deliver public services. ACEVO has asked that the research begins with up to 5 "live partnerships" and their support providers. These will encompass a range of service sectors (such as education, health and social care, welfare to work etc.), but also reflect the increasing variety of partnership/consortia types.
Contact: John Griffiths.