In this moment in the early 21st century, this moment of #metoo, #oxfamsexscandal, Harvey Weinstein and a host of other issues which have put women’s lack of equality in the workplace and public life on the front page, it is refreshing to see the Scottish Government mandating that women are equally represented on Scotland’s public boards. I am, however, left with a question about what difference this change is intended to make … other than getting onto a front page?

Animating Assets was a research and learning project that explored what difference working in asset-based way made in communities and services.

How can we help leaders to work more inclusively and to develop more diverse workplaces? That was the question Jo from Animate and Oonagh from Down to Earth explored on a snowy day in February. What were the three things they identified? Read on to find out…

Animate partners Joette and Jo became Improvement Associates with Health Improvement Scotland last year. Here they reflect on their experiences and learning.

We’re sitting in the airport having a glass of wine before getting on the plane. We said goodbye to the sisters this afternoon during a beautiful closing ritual. It is great to go home, but it is hard to leave a community we have become part of over the last 3 weeks.

Duncan Wallace, one of our founding partners, is moving on. Duncan is forming Duncan Wallace Associates to enable him to pursue a wider range of interests.

Brazil may be hosting the olympics this summer, but Animate partners Jo and Joette have travelled to São Paulo on a very different mission. They’ll be facilitating forty nuns for three weeks whilst staying in one of the city’s favelas. Here they reflect on their experiences coordinating a group that speaks four languages but that is not afraid to speak from the heart.

Much of our time as Animate partners is spent understanding how people outside an organisation view it, and the staff team. It only seemed right, therefore, that we should put our own work under the microscope to see what our customers really think! Listening to how people think we are doing is an essential part of our commitment to quality assurance.

Many of you will have heard the Animate partners – Jo, Ian, Joette and Richard – speak of the value of gathering independent external feedback. Showing we practice what we preach, we’ve just started such a process. Richard explains why.

The Animate partners are strong advocates of an asset-based approach, where the focus is on the strengths and potential in people and communities, rather than their deficiencies. Here our partner Jo Kennedy tells us about an 18 month research programme she has been involved in looking at how such an asset-based approach can support community health and wellbeing:

Our partner Jo Kennedy is the Conference Director for The Bayswater Institute’s working conference ‘Leading in Complex Times’ which will be held in West Sussex on 25th – 29th January 2016. Here she outlines why the conference is just as important for today’s leaders as it was for those who have attended over its 50-year history.

Animate partner Richard Hamer was invited to perform the plenary speech at the Institute of Fundraising (IoF) Scotland’s Scottish Conference 2015 on 6th October. Here he reflects on the day.

The combination of reducing public funding and increasing demand for services has required charities to develop a wider variety of income streams. Whilst this response has been good for beneficiaries, there has been concern over the fundraising methods used by some charities.

What do you get when you mix personalised health and social care, a collaborative enquiry approach and practitioners from across the Lothians? The answer is the REAL programme, looking at a ‘Risk Enablement Approach in the Lothians’.

We’re proud to report that the 2014/15 Leading Edge programme, delivered for the Social Enterprise Academy and ACOSVO by Animate partner Joette Thomas, has had rave reviews!

We are facilitating a series of large and small group meetings for Scottish Government aimed at encouraging communities to participate in local and national democracy. These include supporting the setting up of the Scottish Massive Open Online Conversation (SMOOC) which begins in September 2015 and is being hosted by MIT. Watch the video below to find out more.