Our Services
Social Action Solutions acts as a catalyst for learning, development and change. We act as a companion by getting alongside you and your organisation. We work with you to create and implement your own solutions. Using social action principles and process and over thirty years experience we design solutions with you to transform your practice and organisation.
Co-creating change requires a transparency in the power relationships between organisations, practitioners and communities. It needs humility and inquisitiveness on behalf of practitioners. It challenges us to confront our own privilege and ignorance. It demands we recognize the need for mutuality and reciprocity in relationships and the recognition that we have as much (and often more) to learn from communities, community members and services users as we have to offer them.
What we know is that people value practice that starts from and respects lived experience – their views of their issues and concerns. The best outcomes and value for money are achieved when the community members are facilitated and enabled to find solutions for themselves. Empowerment is achieved through people and communities overcoming difficulties and challenges for themselves. Professional practice reaches its high points where it enables this to happen, where it acts as the catalyst for learning, development and change.
Social Action Solutions embeds this approach in our practice and services.
Consultancy
Our consultancy begins with a conversation scoping the nature of the challenges facing you and your organisation. From this initial contact a bespoke approach and plan will be developed and agreed. Often this will involve conversations with all stakeholders to understand the range of issues to be tackled in order to design an approach and solutions that are both appropriate and effective. It will be solution focussed so it is cost effective and efficient. Our consultancy will be alongside you helping you create change for yourselves – a companion in the true sense of the word.
Training
In order to embed a change of culture in organisation practices a social action training programme is needed. This will be designed to fit the particular circumstances in your organisation. Social action training is spread over a period of time and focuses on changing practices. It supports participants to understand and test out in a supportive environment the social action approach. Social action models the approach in a training setting so that practitioners get to experience the social action process and methods themselves before implementing it for themselves in their work setting.
Research
Social action research engages community members as researchers to explore and understand the needs of their communities. This approach builds skills and social capital in communities and acts as a vehicle for real community development and change. Ownership of the research process stays with the community from beginning to end. They decide what needs to be researched, who from the community should do it, how it should be done, community members carry out the enquiry and then analyse the results and produce the findings and recommendations. The community of researchers, including subjects decide how it should be presented and disseminated. The key is active involvement throughout the process. This builds knowledge, skills and capacity. This approach to research activates communities and because it is owned by the community it creates lasting changes that are sustainable and have impacts long after the research process itself have ended.
