'Of all the work we do at OPM, it's those projects that focus on places that I find most interesting. Public services are vast and complex, but it’s in places – cities, towns, neighbourhoods – where all that complexity is boiled down to the core question of how people's lives are made better or worse, easier or more difficult, as a result of that myriad of interventions.
Against that backdrop, our work is often about helping public services to 'join the dots' – between strategy and frontline practice, between one activity and another, between the efforts that agencies are making and the outcomes they're seeking to achieve. It's that process of making the connections that really fascinates me about our work with local authorities, partnerships and national agencies, and which forms the basis of so much of our work to evaluate the impact of those services and how they are experienced by citizens.
The best thing about being at OPM is the calibre of people you get to work with, both colleagues and clients. There's a real sense that we feed off each other's ideas and interests, and for that reason, no project exists in a vacuum. I think our work is all the stronger for that.'