What does Groundwork do?

Groundwork exists to improve the quality of life in the places that need it most. It came out of some quite interesting thinking in the late ’70s, early ’80s about how to improve the physical and social fabric of areas that were being impacted by areas of major economic restructuring at the time. It’s about making places visibly better so that people feel more proud of living in the places that they live. It’s about helping people improve their own prospects in those places, with skills and education training and jobs. But it’s also about imbuing the whole with a sense of environmental responsibility to make sure that those places are going to be sustainable and resilient and at the forefront of making sustainable communities.

How do you communicate about the organisation’s work?

There’s no substitute for being around, and being seen. This is one of those areas where we’ve known for years, and all of our work has shown, and all the evidence shows, that people everywhere have a passion to improve the place that they come from, the place that they feel proud of, the place that they live. And what they need generally is the support, the resources, the tools, the help, the money to make that kind of change happen. This kind of work involves a constant process of communication because if you’re involved in a process of change in an area then that can go wrong quickest if people don’t see it coming, don’t feel involved and don’t have any input in what actually happens. The process of communicating with all stakeholders is fundamentally important to everything that we do.

What do business partnerships with Groundwork entail?

There are a lot of ways in which businesses can and want to get involved in improving the quality of life in local communities. And that’s what we’ve been trying to do over the last couple of years is to make sure we can make their involvement as simple, straightforward and as varied and appropriate is as possible. There isn’t one model that businesses want to use to do this kind of thing...We have an ability to work alongside a business, looking for a social dimension to what they do in response to those contract opportunities, which is becoming more important as more and more commissioners are introducing social value clauses, looking at how they can generate additional benefit from a commercial contract that they’re letting.

What challenges does Groundwork face in this work?

The challenges generally come back to getting those relationships right from the outset. And making sure that what gets designed and delivered is genuinely done as a partnership endeavour. The biggest lesson we’ve learned over the years and the biggest thing that we try and ensure is that there is that sense of shared ownership and a shared vision about what needs to happen. How does this work benefit local stakeholders?

Everything that we’re doing and the whole of our strategy is geared toward improving wellbeing in one way or another. The biggest determinant of ill health is not having a job, so everything that we do to try and move people closer to the labour market is contributing to improved health. We know that open spaces, green spaces, access to nature, makes fundamental differences to people’s mental health.

What is the benefit of a strong partnership?

Just having a blend of ideas about how you do that is a starting point, as long as there’s a shared vision to how that’s going to unfold. Then the benefit of working alongside a not for profit organisation in that space, and one that has got deep roots into local communities is some of those services, some of those activities can be better informed by the needs and wishes of local communities.