The Observatory and Local Authorities Research & Intelligence Association (LARIA) held a workshop for researchers from the West Midlands local authorities on 19th January 2010.
The workshop's purpose was to discuss how research practitioners in the region's local authorities can be better supported, particularly in light of several key policy developments.
Morning session
Discussions in the morning session (ppt, 2.5mb) centred around some of the key challenges facing local authorities at the moment.
These included short presentations on Comprehensive Area Assessments, local economic assessments, the 14-19 education and training reforms and growing interest in customer insight data (ppt, 2.3mb).
The discussions which followed also covered some of the more practical challenges researchers face. You can download the presentations:
Morning session presentations (ppt, 2.5mb)
Introduction to customer insight - Ross Simson (ppt, 2.3mb)
Afternoon session
The afternoon session (ppt, 4.5mb) focused on ways of supporting researchers.
There were presentations from:
Wide ranging discussion covered issues such as training and development, networking and communications.
Download the afternoon presentations (ppt, 4.5mb).
What's next?
Following the event, we'll be discussing the outcomes with colleagues from Local Authorities Research & Intelligence Association and Improvement & Efficiency West Midlands, and hope to be able to announce improved support arrangements in due course.