Digital Inclusion Partnership Pathway

Funding from the government’s Digital Inclusion Innovation Fund enabled us to partner with a local authority and VCSE partner in each of Barnsley, Cornwall and Middlesbrough to assess the strengths, gaps, and opportunities for digital inclusion partnership working in each place. Along with our What Works? Co-Lab report which shares the process we used, and the wider lessons we learned, we created the Digital Inclusion Partnership Pathway.

In a complex landscape of devolved powers and funding, we believe that strong partnerships in local places can be instrumental in ensuring people get support from people they trust, and in places they feel comfortable. Our hope is that local authorities, strategic place partnerships, and others from VCSE, public and private sectors will use the Digital Inclusion Partnership Pathway tool we’ve created to foster or strengthen collaborative working where they are to create the opportunities and provide people with the support they need to be digitally included.

Tips for using the tool

• Use Good Things Foundation’s Digital Inclusion Partnerships Pathway tool as a structured starting point to spark conversation, to identify system gaps, and to assess the strength of digital inclusion partnership working.
• Engage with local residents to ground strategic discussions in reality and build a shared understanding about digital exclusion. Allow time for planning and to feed back, use empowering storytelling, and offer incentives to thank people.  
• Use available datasets to identify and map clusters of risk and gaps in provision; always combine this with local stakeholder insights to interpret data. 
• Interview local stakeholders from different sectors, at different levels of seniority, and with different roles (strategic, operational).
• Bring local authorities, voluntary and community sector partners, and other partners together in cross-sector workshops to reflect on the findings. Use the Digital Inclusion Partnerships Pathway as a framework to identify priorities and next steps to strengthen digital inclusion partnership working.

If you use the tool or would like support, do get in touch at partnerships@goodthingsfoundation.org