Issue: The Evaluation Task Force (ETF) is a joint Cabinet Office-HM Treasury unit providing specialist support to ensure evidence and evaluation sits at the heart of government spending decisions. The head of the ETF was looking to enhance the leadership effectiveness and personal impact of senior members of the Government Social Research (GSR) profession.

What we did: I worked with heads of GSR in 6 government departments across a series of two-hour group workshops and one-to-one coaching sessions to: identify the key barriers and challenges to improving personal effectiveness and impact; develop peer-to-peer mentoring relationships; and use those new relationships to help address challenges and build confidence, both in the group workshops and on an ongoing basis.

Outcome: The group quickly cohered, generating energy, ideas and mutual support. The group agreed to continue to meet on a regular basis, to act as a safe place to share and discuss experiences, challenges and opportunities; act as a forum for generating ideas/suggestions for what the wider GSR profession needs to do; and too own and deliver specific GSR improvement projects, such as a series of leadership masterclasses.

Feedback from the commisioner, head of the ETF, Catherine Hutchinson: “Michael did a great piece of bespoke work, helping social research senior leaders create an effective action learning set. This enabled not just progression for individuals, but also the profession. Everyone who took part got something from it, and the groupn has carried on after his input ended.”

Feedback from other participants:

• “I really saw the value of coming together with peers, rather than to try to do/solve everything alone”

• “It provided a safe testing ground for ideas about the development of my role and the GSR profession”

• “The coaching sessions provided time to think through my career path options and identify real motivations; was particularly helpful that we could flex in that session between coach and mentor approaches”