A Co-pro Guide for Scotland
Next steps and your co-pro examples 

This learning event was a chance to come together with network members and explore the next steps of a new ‘Guide for Co-production’ during Co-production Week Scotland 2023.  

As part of Co-production Week Scotland 2023, we brought together more than 50 SCN network members to explore what's next as we develop a new guide for co-pro, and hear from each other's examples and case studies.

Since our in-person learning event in September, we’ve been working to bring together all of the comments, ideas and suggestions about what a new co-pro guide could look like.

Following that session we developed this one-pager to highlight our thinking about how the guide will be organised and shared this with event attendees.

Examples

During the session, we heard from co-pro colleagues about their co-produtive work. Each outlined their approaches and how they were using co-production at different stages, and in different ways.

You can download more about each below - and a big thanks to our presenters for sharing their work!

What we heard during the event

A key part of any SCN event is a chance for participative discussion. During our breakouts, we asked attendees to reflect on what they'd heard from our examples, and the important things for us to consider as we continue to develop the guide.

We're still working through all the responses, but these are just some of the things that have come through from an early look:

• The guide should set out why co-production is such a powerful way of working

• Give people the chance to learn from when things don't go well, but also give them the tools to be able to say 'no'.

• Make sure we define co-production (and also co-creation etc) well.

• Highlight co-production at different levels, showing that it doesn't need to be perfect every time

• The importance of relationships and how contextual co-production is - it's a process that needs to be flexible and support people so they're not overburdened.

• Bring in the voices of lived experience to underpin how we work and the value of capacity building

• The value of practitioner skill to be able to work in this way and bring people together in a supportive environment.

• Ensure we articulate co-production not just as a method, but a way to achieve transformational change with decision makers, funders and others.

• The importance of addressing remuneration and reward, with people's time being properly valued

• That we present it in a varied way, with videos and web-based content which people can drop in and out of

You can read the Jamboard from the day here.

Next steps

Following our in-person event in September, and a chance to meet online during Co-pro Week, we're now going to focus on developing the guide and begin the writing process. With all this valuable knowledge and great ideas from the network, it's our job to bring this all together and come back to the network with a draft.

Like any co-productive process, we don't know exactly where we're going, but these chances to work with network members has been invaluable in giving us a steer.

Want to get involved with the development of the guide? Get in touch.