In 2012, I was the coordinated the Improving Pathways to Employment in Loughborough Junction project which was undertaken as a multi-stakeholder partnership with the local authority, the King’s College Hospital (largest local employer), Lambeth college and local resident groups. The Young Foundation was commissioned to lead the parnership to engage with a range of local stakeholders including residents, the Local Authority, Schools, local employers and resident groups to test the feasibitilty of creating a new institution which would address local unemployment. The first step was to understand and map existing pathways to employment (focussing on the local provision of education, skills training, and employment advice) and surfacing potential ideas to improve or create new pathways. We convened stakeholders and members of the partnership in workshops utilising service design techniques including user journey mapping to identify four ideas for improving pathways to employment in Loughborough Junction. These ideas - mapped out through a user journey process - were presented in a final partnership meeting in October. This project was undertaken in area where tensions were high between local residents and many of the local institutions. We needed to be very sensitive to these tensions as we were facilitating co-creation sessions that included a mix of local stakeholders.

My role as Thematic Expert with GeniUS! Open focused on leading the development of a co-produced, comprehensive, high-level outcome framework to highlight priorities and establish how progress will be measured. The framework was embedded in the programme evaluation process to facilitate a structured assessment of the distance travelled and (where possible) the social value (the non-financial impact of the programme for stakeholders) of each pilot and for the programme as a whole. The framework established a focus on outcomes while recognising that there are many interrelated factors in delivering these initiatives and that the indicators do not tell the whole story. In order to measure the implementation and effectiveness of GeniUS! Open pilot, data was be collected on each identified outcome and the associated indicators to find out what is or isn’t happening and why. The outcome indicators were not a set of targets; rather, they aimed to identify where good progress is being made and where more work needs to be done to further define the open innovation concept. We defined outcome as a change in a target population’s skills, attitudes, knowledge, behaviours, status, or life condition brought about by experiencing a programme, project or initiative. The indicators are measurable evidence of meeting the associated outcome. Indicators are visible signs that demonstrate that the outcomes have been achieved. Often, indicators can be counted (quantitative), but sometimes evidence will be something more descriptive (qualitative).

I am the Director of Applied Innovation at the Young Foundation managing portfolio of projects and programmes related to urban and social development. I chair the steering group on the Young Foundation’s Innovation in Cities and Places programme. I attend and contribute to seminars on urban development related topics. In February this year, I was the key note speaker at a seminar on Social Innovation and Youth Unemployment hosted by the City of Terrassa (Catalonia, Spain). I attend the URBACT Festival in Riga in May, 2015. I facilitated a number of sessions during this event and attended a ‘walk shop’ on the Future of Housing Estates in Europe as well as several sessions held by URBACT II city networks. I regularly attend events and seminars held by the Development Planning Unit (UCL), LSE, the Architecture Foundation and other institutions on socially sustainable urban development. I read relevant journals and articles (e.g. Urban Times, International Journal of Urban Sustainable Development, Cities Today, LSE Urban Age publications). I will be attending the Ecosystems for Social Innovation in Europe event to in June, 2015. A key part of the discussion wills be about new ways of working and changing cultures which are fundamental to the sustainable urban development agenda at both the EU and national level. March, 2015 I was on a panel of women leaders at the Women of the World Festival debating The Female City – what a more gender equal city might look like.