Latest from the Blog
Moonshot
The death of public service began in the late 20th Century. First came a political disillusion that more money did not necessarily make for better outcomes. Then systems thinking confirmed what we already knew, that services for people are complex and our sense of control a fallacy. The economic crash of 2008 led to a…
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Community hubs
There’s a buzz about community hubs. Some places are rethinking children’s centres as Family Hubs, others are shifting NHS delivery to the community as part of their integrated care system reforms, and perhaps more are taking the opportunity to close central buildings and move staff to localities. But for all these drivers there’s a stronger…
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Stronger communities
When you work with families, it’s clear that some have challenging lives and need support from the state, whilst others with similar challenges are more resilient and able to deal with their own problems more readily. So what is it about the second group of families that we can learn about and apply to the…
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Transformation tips
The following tips are from conversation with a handful of transformation directors from across the country. These are not rules, but observations from their lived experience… Where to start Work in an equal partnership with voluntary, community and faith organisations and with well connected leaders in communities. Engage them well and early: they know more…
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Change management
Daniel Defoe should have added public sector change programmes, when he said the only certainties are death and taxes. Whether it’s a simple re-structure, the latest service model, or culture and organisational development, we all have first hand experience of change. Most of us, many times. We should be experts, so where does it go…
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Commissioning for outcomes
For commissioners, the outcome is King. It’s the discovery of outcomes that underpinned Every Child Matters, genuine co-production with families, and kindled the spark of systems thinking in children’s services. An outcome can be the tangible change or result for a child, young person or family. Or at the motherhood-and-apple-pie end of the spectrum, we…
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Mental Health is a wicked issue
There are some problems we can’t solve. For example, let’s take a big adaptive problem that needs lots of resource to solve, and coordinated national, local and community action. We call these problems wicked issues, and I think I’d put children’s mental health in this basket. Wicked So how do we solve a wicked issue?…
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Predictive analytics
You may have heard about predictive analytics – but what does this mean for those of us who are shaping or delivering services for vulnerable people? Let’s start with some definitions: The term ‘predictive analytics’ is used for assessing large quantities of information to see if there are trends. Those indicators can then be used…
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Richard Selwyn | Blog 