Evolving to support our focus on change

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Earlier this year we launched our new strategy, Focus on Change, which sets out our priorities for the next 18 months:

It has already been a busy first few months for the new strategy, including:

working to ensure the Children (Care, Care Experience and Services Planning) (Scotland) Bill does all it can to keep the promise
engaging partners to develop route maps
supporting the workforce with Plan 24-30
working with Scotland’s political parties ahead of the next election
starting to develop the mechanisms for answering the Promise Story of Progress question on the extent to which the care community is feeling the impact of the promise.

Alongside that we have been working to make sure all our resources, including our team, are best positioned to support those working to keep the promise and deliver our strategy. And with that we have made some changes.

New and Improved Website

We have a new and improved website to ensure that everyone who cares about keeping the promise knows how The Promise Scotland can help them. The website is now organised around the areas we are working towards and aims to reflect what everyone needs to know from us.

You can see what has changed and how you can help us continue to improve here.

Our Team

As well as the website, we have also changed the structure of our team to focus on delivering our priorities, which include those set for us in the latest report from The Oversight Board for the promise.

Our Head of Improvement, Claire Burns, will be leading on developing the Promise Story of Progress and our Head of Partnerships and Policy, Claire Stuart, will be focused on developing the Plan 24-30 route maps through the end of this year and beyond. The team has been arranged to support these priorities. Morag Burnett, our Head of Governance and Strategy, will continue to oversee the running of the organisation and the secretariat for The Oversight Board.

There have also been other changes to the team. Our Head of Support Alison Sutherland has moved on from her role at the end of her fixed term contract. Many of you will have worked with Alison over the past two years and know the energy and enthusiasm she brought to The Promise Scotland. We are grateful for all her contributions to our work and to keeping the promise and wish her the best of luck in her next chapter.

Local Support

The Promise Scotland’s support for the workforce continues alongside helping to make the changes required to keep the promise in local communities. To make sure this can be as effective as possible, we have listened to feedback, reviewed how it has worked over the last few years, and are making improvements to how we provide support through the Promise Delivery Partners (PDPs).

Given the breadth of the promise and the work still to do, it is more important than ever that all organisations and groups with a role to play are engaging with each other. So, the support offer starts with this collaboration in mind.

There will be five regional promise networks covering all areas of Scotland, which will be facilitated by our local area link PDPs, Laura Sharpe and Louise Bouchier-Hayes. The changes have been put in place to provide a consistent and equitable support offer across all areas, ensuring alignment with strategic goals and local needs. The networks are:

Central West
Northern
Central East
Central & North East
South

Alongside this, we will continue to support you to keep the promise by providing opportunities to collaborate at events, tools, and courses to help you find innovative solutions to challenges, and new ways of thinking about data and monitoring whether change is having a real impact.

Thank you for your ongoing commitment to keeping the promise by 2030. We will continue to play our part in ensuring that all of Scotland's children grow up loved, safe, and respected and we look forward to working with you to make this a reality.

About the author

Photo credit: Sarah Maclean

Fraser McKinlay

Chief Executive

Fraser has been Chief Executive of The Promise Scotland since September 2022. Prior to that, he spent 16 years working for Audit Scotland, including ten years as Controller of Audit and Director of Performance Audit and Best Value.

Before joining Audit Scotland, Fraser was a public services consultant in Edinburgh and London. He specialised in leadership, change management, facilitation and process improvement.

Fraser is committed to systems change, focusing on how public money is spent more effectively to enable better lives for children, young people, care experienced adults, families, and communities.