Overview
Despite our love of formal training, much of the evidence suggests that learning happens between people and is best facilitated by peers. Creating a learning environment is key to all our work and, although never directly funded, our focus during our work in Newsham Park was to create an enabling network. This meant that we worked hard to foster relationships between different groups within the local community.
These differences in ethnicity, age, and socio-economic status were only reinforced by the ways in which funding was targeted at particular groups or particular problems. To overcome that, we deliberately sought to keep all activities open to everyone, not only on paper but in spirit. We also sought to create a safe psychological environment that enabled people to connect across perceived differences and find common ground between them.
The evidence of the success of this informal network can be found in the number of ongoing friendships between former participants and the extent to which the network-enabled people to share resources, help, experience and advice in ways that did not encourage dependency or foster shame.
The Enabling Network
NEWSHAM PARK
The following organisations and initiatives Tree House is either working to support or aligns with their values around social prescribing, social wellbeing, mindfulness and connectivity.
The following organisations and initiatives Tree House is either working to support or aligns with their values around social prescribing, social wellbeing, mindfulness and connectivity.
SERVICES
About Tree House
Project Delivery
Strategic Interventions to liberate latent capacity
Those in leadership and management positions everywhere are struggling to fully engage their people. Whether in the workplace or in our communities, people feel increasingly disconnected from a sense of common purpose. This has real-world consequences. Productivity in the UK economy fell by 0.5% (ref) last year, continuing a long-term trend, In other spheres, there is increasing evidence that we do not feel connected to, or experience a shared sense of responsibility for, the environments within which we live and work. In short, many of us do not feel motivated to contribute to a collective good. From the workplace to the community, this can mean that well-intended investments can at best be wasted or, worse, backfire. Expensive initiatives to improve practice or outcomes can be given lip service or, worse, undermined.
Strategic Development
Tree House Liverpool has a proven track record of actively and positively engaging people to succeed together in delivering projects. This includes those in the hardest to reach groups within institutions (such as prisons and rehabilitation services) and local communities as well as workforces in the private, public and voluntary sectors. Our success is due to the fact that we work to liberate the latent potential of people by connecting them to a shared sense of purpose. In this work, we draw on a wide range of theories and practices. We are primarily influenced by the positive psychology movement and by engagement methodologies, such as open space technology and other appreciative practices. These enable us to explicitly use project development processes to actively build the culture of shared ownership, resilience and responsibility which will be a requisite for success and sustainability. As well as increasing your collective productivity by creating opportunities for your people to connect, learn, take notice, be active and contribute, we will measurably increase their individual and shared sense of wellbeing.
Our Experience
Gallery of Related Projects
Newsham Park
Since 2012, we have been facilitating our own projects and initiatives in Liverpool’s Tuebrook. Using Newsham Park as a focal point for our activities and using the natural environment as the basis for our activities, we have been successfully building connections with those around us to support and enrich lives.