Wakefield Council are training about 100 of their Wakefield district staff, local councillors, young people and community champions, in Appreciative Inquiry, which is all about finding the positive things people want rather than prompting them to tell you what’s bad in their lives.

They want to create meaningful conversation rather than rely on consultation; encouraging a more open-ended dialogue where our people are trained to listen rather than lead. From April – August 2022 over 1000 conversations took place  in local communities; they then bring back the content of those conversations and create themes out of them to use in three ways as part of a 5-10 year plan:

1. To build long-term strategy for the district

2. To develop local responses to local demand

3. To respond immediately to needs where we can.