Collaboration Academy
The Collaboration Academy supports individuals, teams and places to develop the skills, knowledge, mindsets and behaviours to be effective collaborators.
We have developed our leadership practice over the course of many years. Since 2016 we have delivered the SOLACE Ignite programme, supporting nine cohorts of Local Authority Chief Executives. Since 2019 we have facilitated Leading Greater Essex, a year-long systems leadership programme for cross-sector cohorts of 80 people from Greater Essex. And in 2023 we took our first cohort through the London Leadership Programme, London Council’s flagship development programme investing in the next generation of senior leaders in London.
We also provide specific support to commissioners across the public sector, recognising the important role they play in creating the conditions for collaboration. In 2023 we launched the Commissioning with Communities to support commissioners to step into their role as enablers for social change.
Scroll down to see the training opportunities on offer and sign-up to our mailing list to hear about new programmes.
Leading Change Together: a collaborative leadership development programme
The most pressing challenges we face are beyond the reach and responsibility of any one organisation, programme or project. Tackling them requires collaborative leadership — people who can look up and out beyond their own roles to mobilise change across systems.
This transformative programme is for people who believe in the power of collaboration for social change, who are striving to make progress on difficult or long standing problems, and who want to develop the skills and understanding that make it possible.
This is not a traditional training programme; you’ll join a learning community where you commit to supporting your own and other people’s learning and explore and develop together.
Our next cohort starts in autumn 2024 and is open to sign up now. If you’d like a bespoke programme for your place or cause, please contact [email protected].
Commissioning with Communities: a development programme for commissioners
A practical and participatory development programme for commissioners who want to develop their practice to make resources work better for communities. This programme is designed for commissioners from a range of backgrounds including health, local authorities and police and crime commissioners, who want to stretch and develop their practice, including through a focus on co-production, collaborative commissioning (including alliance contracting) and Human Learning Systems.
This training programme is for you if you’re fed up with approaches that don’t reflect the complex realities of the issues you’re trying to address, approaches that encourage siloed working and competition over collaboration, that prioritise process over people. Come and join us to explore what different can look like and gain support on putting this into practice in your own work.
The programme is designed and delivered in partnership with our colleagues at Co-Production Collective and Ideas Alliance.
Our spring/summer 2024 cross-place commissioning programme is now in progress. We are open to expressions of interest for future training programmes, and bespoke programmes for specific teams/places.