Our work

We work together on projects relating to equality, poverty, education, gender-based violence and more. We take an evidenced and participation-based approach with all of our research or project development commissions.

We have over 35 years combined experience working in Scotland as well as internationally, to tackle some of the biggest social problems of our time. 

Whether it's an evaluation of a large project, the development of a new strategy or research of a new participation framework, if you are looking for analysis and consultancy, we’re your team.

 Our approach is:

• Founded in feminism, equality and inclusion

• Evidence-based

• Analytical and diverse

• Participatory

• Built on expertise and knowledge from across a broad range of sectors in Scotland

Current and past projects:

Rape Crisis Scotland

Mansi and Ellie worked with the Rape Crisis Scotland National Advocacy Project to provide workshops and peer spaces for self care, community care and compassionate leadership. Kate and Ellie also worked with Rape Crisis Scotland to facilitate their away day in May. For this day, we created spaces for the team to reflect on values, vision and power.

NACCOM

Mansi and Ellie worked with the NACCOM network to provide workshops relating to self-care 101, self-care and community care for change makers and care within our teams for managers. These sessions took place between November 2022 and February 2023. We’ve since supported NACCOM to deliver self care activities as part of their hub work with member organisations.

Inclusive Peace

the collective team worked with Inclusive Peace to deliver a series of workshops around facilitation 101, feminist approaches to facilitation, creating safe, brave and inclusive spaces, understanding and responding to group conflict and facilitation for movement building. These five sessions took place between November 2022 and February 2023.

One Parent Families Scotland – Participation Framework.

 Talat and Iffat are working with One Parent Family Scotland to support them in reviewing their lived experience and single-parents participation work. They will be conducting focus groups and producing a framework to support the organisation to pursue good practice on participation and co-production across their different work streams and services.

Joseph Rowntree Foundation

Briana, Talat and Iffat worked with a lived experience panel focused on the experiences of employment, under-employment and support services for communities of colour and the impact of institutional racism. They found “a distressing picture of life at work and a disappointing one about the support to access work. The situation demands action from local and Scottish Government but also from employers. Kind words and strategy need to come off the page and start making a real impact.”You can read the report here

Health Improvement: Gender Friendly Nurseries Evaluation

Ellie, Nuzhat and Kate worked with the Gender Friendly Nursery Team within Health Improvement Glasgow to evaluate their programme. This piece of work involved working collaboratively with the team, strategic stakeholders and practitioners to explore where and what next for the programme.

Women’s Aid East and Midlothian: Feminist Leadership

Talat, Kate and Ellie recently finished working with the senior leadership team at Women’s Aid East and Midlothian to support a space to reflect on feminist leadership; exploring power, community, difficult conversations and transformational leadership.

Voluntary Action Angus, Angus Women’s Aid, Deaf Links, Relationship Scotland FM and Children’s Health Scotland: Consultation, Action, Transformation Project.

Heather, Iffat and Ellie worked with Voluntary Action Angus and partners to explore the impact of COVID-19 on communities in Angus, how services adapted to these needs and what can be maintained going forwards.

Scottish Government: Gender Equality Taskforce in Education and Learning

Ellie, Megan and Nuzhat were working with the Taskforce to develop a theory of change to help them meet their goals. This project involved hearing from the Taskforce about the vision and goals of change, as well as facilitating workshops. You can read more about the Taskforce and it’s remit by clicking here

Beyond Borders Scotland: Women in Conflict 1325 Fellowship

As part of this international fellowship programme on international gender, peace and security, Kate was facilitating sessions on intersectional gendered conflict analysis and women’s participation in peacebuilding, while Ellie and Mansi were facilitating sessions on self-care. You can read more about the Beyond Borders Fellowship here

John Smith Trust: Gender Equality Community of Practice

Kate and Ellie were working with alumni of the John Smith Fellowship networks in Wider Europe and Central Asia to help develop a gender equality and women’s empowerment community of practice, including collaboratively designing and running workshops on tackling harmful gender norms, engaging with men and boys, and self care.

Human Rights Consortium Scotland

Kate and Ellie were working with the Human Rights Consortium Scotland to support a capacity assessment of Scottish Civil Society around Human Rights. Through this we explored how the third sector in Scotland engages with human rights policy and law developments and uses human rights for change, identifying particular needs, challenges and gaps which can help inform the work of HRCS and others. You can read the report here.

Fife Gingerbread

Talat, Ellie and Kate worked with Fife Gingerbread to explore the impact of COVID-19 on lone parents and families in need, and what services need to do to support this in the Fife area. We undertook surveys and focus groups with stakeholders, staff, volunteers, and hosted creative participation workshops with parents, carers and young people to find out more.

One Parent Families Scotland
Talat and Iffat worked with One Parent Families Scotland and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation to conduct desk-based research and focus groups to analyse whether employment and employability programmes are working for low-income single parents. The work focuses on intersecting inequalities and the most marginalised single parents, and worked alongside experts by experience to identify what a responsive and equality-informed programme would include.

Corra Foundation

Talat, Ellie, Jessica and Iffat have worked with the Corra Foundation and other commissioning partners to learn from communities more about how they’ve responded to COVID-19 and how we can #BuildForwardBetter. The research worked alongside communities to understand how they have organised social action and how those furthest from power can be at the heart of shaping what comes next, and was based on the principles of intersectional feminism, participation and co-production. You can view the report and supporting video here

Zero Tolerance: What works in changing attitudes towards gender equality?

Talat, Ellie and Kate concluded a project with Zero Tolerance and partners in October 2020 to explore what works in changing attitudes and behaviours towards gender equality. This project has developed from the National Advisory Council on Women and Girls (NACWG) to the Scottish Government to develop a “What Works Gender Institute to identify and promote best practice”. We undertook a broad overview of what the literature tells us, and hosted online workshops with front line workers, academics, and strategic leads to hear what works in practice as well as theory, before offering three models of what such a body could look like and do in order to to promote gender equality across the country. The final report from our project, ‘We need this to do things differently’, can be found here.

Norwegian Church Aid: Self care and staff care for GBV workers in humanitarian contexts.

Kate, Ellie and Mansi designed a self-care and staff-care package for GBV workers in humanitarian contexts on behalf of NCA. This project is designed to enhance front line staff and partners well-being, using a feminist understanding of self-care, trauma, and living within crisis contexts; including conflict and public health emergencies such as COVID-19. We used a participatory approach in our overview of what works, speaking with staff across the globe about their experiences of self-care and staff-care, and exploring the challenges in taking care of ourselves during times of stress. This project concluded September 2020. You can download the literature review here and see the staff care and self care package here.

If you’d like to chat more about what we can offer, get in touch today.