User involvement
Co-design: Making it real and doing it well
Done well, co-design can unlock positive outcomes for participants, organisations and communities. Designing services and strategies with people rather than to people can build solutions that better address their needs.
How to plan effective co-design
At Christmastime many charities will be campaigning for action on loneliness. Many projects are using co-design to involve people directly in improving community spaces. What are we learning about what works?
How to engage young people in arts and culture
The artistic landscape is shifting. Across the country, budgetary pressures and the demands of career-focussed choices mean we may be facing a generation of young people who have never experienced art at school or anywhere else. Philanthropists have an opportunity to change this.
NPC Ignites: People, Impact, Purpose
What can you expect from our annual conference NPC Ignites 2019?
Learning to involve stakeholders in your charity’s work
What practical steps should charities take to to involve users in an ethical way?
Snapshots of the sector 2019: Involvement
Some charities are expert in involving their users in their work, but is the whole sector up to speed.
Why we need to do user involvement right
User involvement is in the spotlight, and while participatory and influencing practices are nothing new, they are now making it to the mainstream. But are they being used as well as they could be? Rosie McLeod, Deputy Head of Measurement and Evaluation explores her new research.
Make it count: Why impact matters in user involvement
Involving users in shaping services and strategies is increasingly considered to be both the right and most effective way for the social sector and charities to work. This paper argues for a greater focus in the social sector on what user involvement aims to achieve and evidencing its effectiveness.
4 insights from working with ‘experts by experience’
We talk a lot about the need for charities to involve the intended user when designing services. But we also know that it’s easier said than done. So we decided to have a go at doing. Here are four things we learned from mapping young people's experiences in Camden.
Built with grit (not the snow kind): Co-designed tools to support your impact management
Charities and social enterprises need real support with their impact management. Announcing a new co-designed online platform to help with just that, Chair of the Impact Management Programme Sally Higham talks through these tools and celebrates the hard work that went into creating them.
User mapping techniques: A guide for the social sector
This guide outlines how user mapping techniques can be used to better understand people's lived experiences and drive impact.
Our work must be person-led, not systems-led
Pat McArdle, CEO, Mayday Trust
Our system for supporting people when they become homeless is failing, says Mayday Trust’s Pat McArdle. That’s because we fixate on problems rather than on people. Pat realised this when the charity decided to consult people experiencing homelessness about how that system was working for them. This sparked a radical change in the organisation, one that sought to focus on leading with people’s strengths and not their issues. Here she tells the story of this transformation.
