Back in September we were invited to facilitate an away day for managers and staff from Ashram Housing Association in Birmingham. The aim was to focus on neighbourhood working and the local level work that people are doing and provide a practical insight into neighbourhood profiling.
We ran a series of activities to give staff the opportunity to experience using Planning for Real (PFR) tools and understand how these tools lend themselves to neighbourhood working.
As an introductory exercise we did a rainbow exercise and asked staff to place post-it notes on a rainbow to represent where they would put themselves in terms of their current knowledge of neighbourhood working approaches and practices, and what they would need to more further across the rainbow. The three key themes which came of this were the need for more knowledge and understanding, more information and more time.
We then ran an intensive neighbourhood profiling exercise which involved staff focusing on three different neighbourhoods where Ashram has a strong presence.
Each group worked through four activities – the types of activities that local residents could work through alongside the ‘outside experts’ so that their voices are heard locally and they have a say in shaping their neighbourhoods and local decision making.
The first activity focused on mapping stakeholders. Using post it notes each group compiled a list of voluntary / community, statutory and private stakeholders who Ashram is already working with (and how) and also who Ashram should be working with (and why).
- The second activity involved creating a picture of who makes up each community – using background information provided and staff knowledge of the neighbourhoods to start to understand the demographics.
- The third activity was a map based exercise where groups considered the issues and concerns which based on their knowledge they thought would be raised by the three communities. Using option cards coloured by theme the completed maps provided an immediate overview of the key issues.
- The fourth activity drew on the information gathered and involved the groups identifying one quick win, one enterprise opportunity and one long term investment opportunity for the neighbourhood.
The activities demonstrated the benefits of team working and showed how much staff already know about the areas they work in. Going forward engaging with local residents would be beneficial in order to verify and add to the information generated and the mapping undertaken by staff.
Feedback from the day was excellent and the information generated will be valuable in informing the development of Ashram’s Neighbourhood Strategy.
“The day has provided a practical insight into neighbourhood planning, and kick started the mapping process for us. The PFR tools can be used going forward. They generate a wealth of information very quickly.”
“The mapping exercise demonstrated the benefits of working together. There was lots of energy in the room and we have learnt about what other teams are doing. This information needs to be filtered down through teams.”
“I like that we had Margaret Wilkinson facilitate some of the workshops as I find the work that she does very inspiring, it was great to learn from the work that she has been part of nationally.”