Placement Fellowship with Strategy Unit
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Leicester
Department Name: Health Sciences
Abstract
Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.
Publications
Natalie Armstrong (Author)
(2011)
Seeing it from the other side : reflections on a knowledge transfer placement
| Description | Dr Armstrong's contribution during her placement made a significant impact and contribution to the Health Team's work. She worked on a variety of projects with the key pieces being as follows: • Researching and developing a proposal on reforming the treatment of minor ailments. • Researching policy options to create a more personalised and preventive service for people with, or who may be at risk of developing, chronic disease in the UK. This work fed into the Department of Health's recently published document "NHS 2010-2015: from good to great. Preventative, people-centred, productive". • The bulk of Dr Armstrong's time was spent working as part of a small team developing a vision for 21st century maternity and early years care, in collaboration with the Department of Health and the Department for Children, Schools and Families. This work was published in 2010. In all three of these pieces of work the Strategy Unit valued Dr Armstrong's methodical and rigorous approach to developing evidence-based policy options, and the particular set of skills and expertise she brought to the Health Team from her academic work. In addition to these specific pieces of work, Dr Armstrong contributed to the general work of the Strategy Unit by, for example: • Participating in seminars • Contributing to briefing documents for No 10 • Taking part in challenge sessions to feedback on the work of other teams within the Strategy Unit. |
| Exploitation Route | This placement represented an excellent opportunity to be involved in policy research and development, and gave me an amazing opportunity to see at first-hand how the policy-making process works. I was lucky enough to spend time talking to Civil Servants across a range of Government Departments and begin to understand how they view and approach academic research, and how they go about incorporating this evidence into their work. I certainly now have a much better understanding of how to summarise and communicate academic research to a policy audience, and the important ways in which this differs from writing for an academic audience. I also feel that I have learnt a lot from the Strategy Unit training courses I was encouraged to participate in, for example in relation to project management, stakeholder management skills, and top-down thinking to structure arguments and documents more effectively. |
| Sectors | Healthcare |
| Description | This was a secondment and did not produce findings as such. The impacts were predominantly at the level of my personal and professional development. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2009 |