In Practice: Kickstarting a community-led vision in Wokingham

About the project
New Local supported Wokingham Borough Council to shape its Programme around Community and Partnerships. This involved assessing its current position, identifying future aspirations, and shaping the tools and strategies to support a more collaborative and community-powered way of working. We also provided support to kickstart a community visioning exercise. The work involved close collaboration with members, senior officers, partners organisations, businesses, and Town and Parish Councils throughout.
How we did it
- We held a series of interactive workshops with the Extended Corporate Leadership Team (ECLT) and partner organisations (including Towns and parish councils, business community, and VCSE sector.)
- We worked closely with the Leader of the Council (formerly Deputy Leader) and gave the opportunity to hold workshop sessions with Liberal Democrat, Labour and Conservative party members.
- We undertook a maturity assessment about community and partnership working in Wokingham.
- We drew on case study examples and inspiration from elsewhere and shared this with the Wokingham team.
- We brought together 60+ partners across two workshop sessions to design a collaborative engagement process for the development of a community-led vision and strategy for the borough, using creative approaches such as newspaper headlines, look back/move forward methodologies, and action planning.
- We produced summaries from each of the engagement sessions and a final report with a set of core principles to underpin community and partnership working and a roadmap for
What was achieved
Through our work together, Wokingham BC built a solid understanding of its current status in relation to community and partnership working, its aspirations for the future, and the steps it will take towards realising these aspirations. Wokingham BC has since launched a collaborative co-design process to develop a long-term community vision for the borough, working closely with its communities and partners to develop this.
Tools developed through the project, including a set of shared principles and a maturity model to guide community and partnership working, are now being used to support internal changes to organisational culture and staff development that will help this long-term vision to be realised.
