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The purpose of this paper is to describe the work between statutory sector partners in Staffordshire to establish a transformational rather than transactional health and well being board and its approach to resource allocation.

The paper describes the principles and process of achieving a shared ambition for Staffordshire, and the practical and strategic considerations of taking a broader and more ambitious approach than current guidance recommends.

Supporting individual organisations to achieve their statutory requirements within the context of the shared vision, and using customer insight intelligently to influence the decision‐making process, are critical to success. The challenge of moving resources in times of financial hardship and organisational flux should not be underestimated.

The process of moving resources into prevention and early intervention cannot be done in a “one size fits all” way and has to be considered as part of a differentiated approach. In addition, organisations must be willing to cede influence and resources to support the vision, thus challenging culture and traditional organisational boundaries and structures.

The process described in the paper is designed to improve health and well being for citizens in Staffordshire, tackling inequality in an integrated, targeted and proportionate way.

This is an emerging example of “whole system” integration.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the use of ebrary's e‐books at Staffordshire University.

Details are provided of the history of Staffordshire's involvement with ebrary as a supplier of e‐books as well as methods of searching for information in the ebrary collection as well as other e‐book collections used by Staffordshire University.

In a split‐site university such as Staffordshire, and with many students never visiting campus libraries, the provision of course material and readings in e‐format is essential. ebrary provides an “instant library” solution, and the possibility of adding individual texts to this core collection strengthens this provision. The ability for students and researchers to search across the full content of 30,000 e‐books in one “go” and then capture that information quickly and easily is also very valuable.

The paper provides information based on some years of practical experience in providing access to e‐book collections.

Staffordshire's Welfare to Work Joint Investment Plan is an inter‐agency approach to improving job opportunities for disabled people and carers, emphasising the need for their participation in this process. A partnership with Staffordshire University has enabled disabled people to acquire research skills and survey the views of other disabled people on barriers to employment and strategies to overcome them. The article shares this innovative approach to participation and welfare to work.

This paper presents the findings from an evaluation of a direct payment pilot project for parents of disabled children in Staffordshire. The study found that, for a variety of reasons, parents accessing direct payments did not report any greater benefits than those using traditional services.

This paper considers recent guidance on social care for deafblind adults and children issued to local authorities in March 2001 by the Department of Health under Section 7 of the Local Authority Social Services Act 1970. It uses Staffordshire Social Services Department's response to the guidance as a case study to identify areas of good practice and make practical suggestions for implementation. The guidance places the responsibility for improving provision to deafblind people squarely on social services, rather than including other agencies such as health and education. The paper argues that this may be hindering the development of integrated services.

With confidence in the British Political system in decline, it is more important than ever that the top-down approach to decision-making and service strategy in public services is challenged. In this chapter, we examine how coproduction of services can be achieved using Get Talking, an approach to participatory action research that utilizes creative consultation techniques to engage with publics. We explain how the approach enabled Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) to involve young people in the development of a Children and Young People’s Strategy. The case study approach, building on qualitative methods including focus groups and semi-structured interviews, demonstrates how creative approaches were used by public sector staff to engage young people and partners in strategy development. Creative consultation techniques were used to facilitate the focus group activity. While using Get Talking as an approach to policy development required a resource investment in terms of staff time, it provided SFRS with insight into the needs of service users. This resulted in a more relevant strategy being developed and a cultural shift in how the organization works with young people. Engagement with the Get Talking process had a positive effect on staff, providing them with a sense of ownership over the resulting strategy, enhanced the reputation of SFRS with partners, and improved relationships with young people through demonstrating that they were valued partners in coproduction. While the approach was well received by all parties, challenges of using Get Talking in a public service setting resulted in pragmatic adaptations to a traditional PAR approach.

This paper aims to present the findings of research commissioned by a Primary Care Trust in the UK to assess the implementation of a new pilot Human Givens mental health service (HGS) within primary care.

Participating General Practitioners practices were designated as either “Human givens” or “Control” practices. The study focused on service users with mild to moderate depressed mood measured using HADS. The well-being of these participants was examined at the point of referral, and after four, eight and 12 months using three well-being questionnaires.

The results revealed that emotional well-being significantly improved during the first four months following referral for both groups and this improvement was maintained up to and including one year post referral. Compared to the Control group Human givens therapy was found to be of shorter duration, lasting one or two sessions compared to standard treatment which lasted on average four sessions.

Apart from the psychological insight and emotional support, it is suggested that Human givens therapy might help the client to better function in society and maintain a sense of social integration. This has benefits to other providers of social care.

This paper explores the advertising strategy of crockery importers and dealers in relationship to their origins and backgrounds. This is a departure from earlier ceramic-history literature which tended to focus on the Staffordshire producers, with limited awareness on how the identity of importers and dealers influenced what products were sold, and their individual approaches to marketing.

Within a context of historical marketing research, this paper analyses newspaper advertising and commentary. It combines an examination of marketing practices with a wider consideration of the cultural identities of ceramic importers and dealers. The digitalization of historical records, combined with sophisticated search engines, makes it more feasible to examine a broader range of sources. Thus, modern research methods can enhance our understanding of production and demand and reveal how marketing strategy was diverse.

Awareness on how advertising was influenced by the backgrounds and socio-political views of importers and dealers demonstrates ways in which Anglo-American ceramic trade could be far more market-led. More significantly, marketing approaches were not necessarily responding to American demand, but rather that importers could engage in commissioning goods which reflected their own views on politics, religion or slavery.

Examining the advertising of importers demonstrates the complex relationship between production and ceramic demand. This paper opens up debates as to how far the advertising of other merchandise in the USA shows evidence of taking a more individual approach by the 19th century.

This paper aims to describe the work of Staffordshire University in engaging with local employers and local further education colleges in the development of a Foundation Degree in Applied Technology.

Following an outline of current government policy in employer engagement, the paper identifies – from the literature and recent quality reviews of provision – some issues for higher education institutions in developing a work‐based learning curriculum with industry. It then outlines a case study of the Foundation Degree in Applied Technology – a collaborative venture between Staffordshire University (the awarding body), Burton College (the deliverer of the award) and JCB (the employer). In conclusion, the paper evaluates the case study.

Evaluation of the case study suggests that the Foundation Degree in Applied Technology, as designed by Staffordshire University and delivered at JCB by Burton College, is a model of good practice in employer engagement.

The value of this paper is that the case study illustrates key success factors, for higher education institutions and further education partnerships, in engaging with industry to design and deliver a foundation degree for a major manufacturing employer in the private sector.

Many local authorities have responsibility for maintaining a part of the national heritage, which may be in danger of serious depreciation because of inadequacies in the funding process. The “major cities” in particular played a unique role in Britain’s industrial development which almost inevitably led to the accumulation of a wealth of local heritage. These authorities pay heavily in terms of the financing of that heritage conservation. Attention is focused on two sectors of local authority spending where heritage is a particularly important determinant of cost and where the necessary resources are restrained by funding arrangements. The sectors concerned are: parks and public open spaces and museums and art galleries. The paper reviews the funding system and tests its appropriateness to meet resource needs. There is at least a strong suggestion that the disproportionate spending by the major cities in certain areas derives to a greater or lesser extent from industrial heritage. The major cities may have a greater share of responsibility for maintaining the national heritage derived from their industrial history. The current system of grant allocation makes no allowance for these factors. If these can be identified and measured more precisely then there is the potential for including them in the grant allocation process. This would result in a grant allocation more closely related to authorities’ needs and in consequence help to ensure that sufficient resources are available to them.