Supporting strategic change with Glasgow City Council’s Economic Development team 

In 2024 GALLANT undertook a mapping exercise to identify how well current economic and climate policy actions align with the Thriving Definitions, including analysis of Glasgow’s Economic Strategy. This work was conducted by University of Glasgow Senior Honours Economics student Erin Miria John, who talks about her experience as a GALLANT Research Assistant intern in this blog post. 

Following on from this initial work, throughout May and June 2025 researchers from Gallant’s Systems Transformation team hosted a series of workshops for the Economic Development division at Glasgow City Council. We drew from soft systems methods to support participants to develop shared understanding of their goals and actionable priorities in the process of developing their next Economic Strategy. 

The workshops were instigated when the Economic Development team had a two-year lead in period to develop a new Economic Strategy. This represented a critical juncture in reflecting on the current system and clarifying future goals.  

The workshops began by asking participants to create a rich picture and system problem statement to develop shared understanding and highlight priorities.  Next, we encouraged holistic consideration of interconnected stakeholders’ positions through a perspective diagram, worked through enablers and inhibitors of achieving system goals, and drew from the spheres of influence model to consider implications for collaboration.  

The workshops crystalised the team’s desire to shift away from capturing data exclusively for performance management towards more meaningful data-informed narratives around the impact that council actions have, not just on the economy, but on communities and people’s lives.  

Insights captured at the workshops have helped the Economic Development team as they finalise their next economic Strategy, including informing a prototype of a Data Hub which is geared towards more meaningful, citizen-centred data practices. 

First published: 13 November 2024

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