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Making an impact in policy

Professor Catherine Durose, Co-Director of the Heseltine Institute for Public Policy Practice and place, draws on her recent work on the use of design in government and policy to reflect on how to engage with policymakers to make maximum impact.

The UK is a leader in the use of design in government and policy, in our recent report, we demonstrate how this leading position could be enhanced through a more effective, cross-disciplinary evidence base about the use of design expertise in policy-making. 

This report has emerged from the AHRC-funded Design| Policy network, which brought together over 900 designers, researchers and policymakers to debate the future directions for research at the intersection of design and policymaking in the UK. The report has been endorsed by the cross-government Policy Design Community, and strongly welcomed by the AHRC’s Professor Christopher Smith, Executive Chair of the Arts and Humanities Research Council. I wrote a recent post on the UK Civil Service’s Policy Design blog to profile the report and the debate generated by its publication.

Subsequently, the civil service’s Policy Design Community has committed to facilitating the future of the network, and we have been invited to contributed to its Public Design Review, a milestone initiative to build further momentum and credibility for design in UK policy-making.

Reflecting on this activity, my wider experience of working with policy-makers, and role in convening the University’s ESRC IAA-funded Policy Impact training series, a few tips emerge:

  • Take the time to understand the needs of policy-makers
  • Work out how you can align your agenda with theirs
  • Invest in building relationships of trust over time
  • Draw on your wider networks to combine evidence and coordinate impact strategies
  • Work ‘back-stage’ informally to build a shared front-stage narrative

About the author

Catherine Durose is Professor of Public Policy, and Co-Director of the Heseltine Institute for Public Policy, Practice and Place at the University of Liverpool. She is recognised as a leading expert on urban governance and public policy, and has written widely on policy design and implementation, devolution, urban transformation, social and democratic innovation, and participation. Empirically, her work has been focused at urban, city-regional, local, and neighbourhood levels.