Reimagining public service.
Renewing community agency.
Rebuilding the connection.
Reimagining public service.
Renewing community agency.
Rebuilding the connection.
About me
With purpose
After many years experience in leadership and governance across the private, public and community sectors, I’ve discovered what it means to work with purpose.
I’ve had incredible opportunities to learn, try and share across sectors, countries, cultures and with colleagues and partners from the widest fields of expertise. I've understood the design and delivery of big services, contrasted by individual and place-led needs that aren't always served by that approach. My purpose is to join people, communities and public service for better outcomes.
Start with building trusted relationships and we’ll go far.
The mission
I’m bringing all of my life and work experience to play my part in creating the change we want to see. Whether being part of local and national policy and decision making, service and system design, connecting with different people and cultures, or experiences bringing up children in rural Scotland.
Scotland has big ambitions; tackling poverty and inequity, a great childhood, improving population health and reforming public service.
My mission is to work with public bodies to realise these ambitions by rebuilding the important connection between public service and community power and agency. This means reimagining public service, not just reorganising. It means returning agency and resources directly to people and communities. It means collaboration and shared leadership, not just consultation.
It will take time, but we must make the time.
Key policies framing my work
Public Service Reform Strategy
Health and Social Care Service Renewal
Public Service Reform Strategy
The Public Service Reform Strategy sets out commitments to change the system of public services - to be preventative, to better join up and to be efficient - in order to better deliver for people. It sets out how we will tackle systemic barriers to change.
Population Health Framework
Health and Social Care Service Renewal
Public Service Reform Strategy
The Population Health Framework sets out Scottish Government's and COSLA’s long-term collective approach to improving Scotland’s health and reducing health inequalities for the next decade.
Health and Social Care Service Renewal
Health and Social Care Service Renewal
Health and Social Care Service Renewal
The Health and Social Care Service Renewal Framework provides a high-level guide for change, to ensure the sustainability, efficiency, quality, and accessibility of health and social care services in Scotland.
Approach to Preventative Spending
Health and Social Care Service Renewal
Health and Social Care Service Renewal
In the Scottish Spending Review 2026, the Scottish Government set out plans to develop a system for identifying and tracking preventative spend across the Scottish Budget by Summer 2026, with a view to integrating this into ongoing budgeting by December 2026.
Key principles
Place Led
As part of long-standing change programmes, many public sector services have been focussed on being based where people are (place-based), decentralising as much possible. When public finances are strained, there is usually a push for centralisation for efficiency, but we know that can drive more inequity. However, the real transformation will come when public services are place-led, to mean that they are designed and shaped by people and communities in a sustainable way, complementing strengths with investment in resources, rather than one service model for all. This way, we can use public resources to best effect and ensure we are focussed on outcomes and impact, not just on service performance.
Community Power and Agency
As public finances have become more strained, we have focussed on resourcing our big public sector service models which, in turn, has meant a reduction in direct community investment and resources. From all I've read and experienced, you could describe public service models as demand-creating, often because we remove other sustainable sources of agency, help and support to maintain them. In line with the Christie Commission recommendations, we now need to make the move to ensure communities can decide on "needs, aspirations, capacities and skills, and work to build up their autonomy and resilience". This approach may also call for a revisiting of key legislation and guidance, over a decade on from the Community Empowerment Act and Community Planning arrangements which focus so much on consultation and participation in practice.
Collaboration and Collective Leadership
Creating spaces to bring public service leaders, communities and those with lived experience together is the first step. The next is to build the trusted relationships that are needed to share the leadership of change. This means giving up and sharing power, demonstrating an understanding and agreeing a shared way of doing things best. We must recognise that consultation is not community leadership and that pre-designing options to present to communities is not collaboration. Whilst this may sound easy, many experiences from across Scotland show that this process takes time, albeit there is a need to make the change to improve lives as soon as we can. You can see different examples in Clackmannanshire, Edinburgh and Dumfries and Galloway and from wider across the UK in Wigan and Barking and Dagenham.
Engagement
I love to discuss all things reform, population health, community agency and power, reimagining public service and place-led working, so please do get in touch.
Fixed Term and Interim
Sometimes it makes sense for big programmes of change to be lead and managed as part of your team, so I'm open to employed options if that best suits your needs. This can often help where you need to increase your leadership capacity or when public bodies need to build trust and relationships with communities and stakeholders.
Commissioned
I'm also available for direct ad-hoc projects or to work with you on a reserved commissioned basis. This is most helpful when you'd like additional experience and capacity, but involvement is less integrated into your wider change programmes.
Advice, speaking and facilitation
At times, especially when getting started, it's helpful to work with teams, partners and communities to build energy and momentum. I'm open to speaking on your behalf about your transformation work, or bringing my experiences into your organisation, group, sector or partnership spaces through facilitated workshops or speaking engagements.