Strategy Exchange

What is it?

The Strategy Exchange is a new public access website hosted by the National School of Government in partnership with the Strategy Unit in the Cabinet Office and the Horizon Scanning Centre at DIUS, designed to build the capacity for strategic working across the public sector.

It has five principal objectives:

• To provide a readily accessible, easily searchable resource of material of interest, relevance and use to those involved in strategy;
• To provide critical analysis of current strategy work;
• To commission and share thinking on issues of importance to strategists;
• To provide a platform for exchange and networking;
• To build appetite for strategic working by giving access to examples of successful strategic work and identifying its value.

The concept explained

The idea and theory behind The Strategy Exchange has emerged and developed over time from an ongoing research project conducted by the National School of Government’s Strategy Team, looking at strategy in government and the wider public sector. Interviews with nearly 100 leading practitioners and academics on the subject revealed much good practice and useful information. There was a strong desire to learn about complementary experiences, but the availability of a mechanism to share this knowledge was not evident. The role of the website is to provide a forum where this information, knowledge and experience can be exchanged.

What the site can offer

There are four components to The Strategy Exchange:

• Strategy ‘Live’ - this area hosts the most recent and relevant news related to the strategy community, including up to date case studies, interviews with leading practitioners, and flyers for upcoming workshops, seminars, conferences and other events.
• The library - this area will act as a managed repository for information related to strategy and strategic thinking in the public sector. A searchable document library will house strategy documents, futures-thinking work, presentations, case studies and relevant internet links, categorised by theme.
• The Members’ Community - Members of Strategy Exchange are able to: post and read feedback on all content featured in the document library; add announcements to the 'Strategy Live' noticeboard; advertise events on the event calendar; access specific sub-sites; view contact information of other members of the stategy community; and access the discussion forum.
• The National School of Government’s ‘offer’ on strategy - this area will host details of the National School of Government’s ongoing research project on strategy, including information about related training courses and consultancy, published papers and commissioned articles. There are also two e-learning packages available free of charge.

  The site is updated on a weekly basis. Visitors can sign up to a quarterly newsletter that summarises the key posts from the previous period.

Who is it for?

Anyone in government and the wider public sector involved in developing strategies, strategy work or with an interest in strategy. The bulk of the site is open access and free for all to view.

What YOU can do to help

The strategy team at the National School of Government will be continually populating the site with the material we collect during the research project. This includes strategies, futures-thinking work/scenarios, case studies and articles relevant at all levels - local/regional/national/international. Please can you help to populate the site and send ANY documents that you feel the strategy community could benefit from accessing easily to strategyexchange@nationalschool.gsi.gov.uk. The concept of strategy exchange relies entirely on core users sending in useful material, and we really would appreciate your help in supporting the development of the site in this way.

For more information

If you would like to find out more about the National School of Government’s research project, provide feedback or comments on the design and concept of the site, or be involved in trialling additions to the site, then please do get in touch with us at strategyexchange@nationalschool.gsi.gov.uk


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