Coproduction and service user involvement

Involving people who use services in the design and delivery of those services can increase your impact as an organisation.

Coproduction is where people who use services, and those that support them, work with professionals in an equal partnership towards shared goals (Social Care Institute for Excellence). This way of working may be especially relevant for organisations delivering public services, but coproduction can enhance the work of any organisation.

The term 'coproduction' refers specifically to work with people with lived experience of the service or policy in question, rather than any citizen. Coproduction in this sense is distinctive from general participation work or partnership working between organisations.

Co-creation or co-design, where people are just involved in coming up with ideas, is not full coproduction but may be a step on the road to embedding coproduction in your way of working.

The diagram below (developed by the New Economic Foundation) can help you to understand where other forms of involvement sit in relation to coproduction.

The idea of coproduction has been around since the 1970s. It has a number of origins including academics and thinkers, and the disabled people’s and mental health service user movements. There are also references to coproduction in NHS England’s Five Year Forward View, and guidance to the Care Act 2014.

The Social Care Institute of Excellence say that these four principles are crucial for coproduction to be done well. 

1. Equality: No one is more important than anyone else. Everyone has something to contribute.
2. Diversity: In coproduction approaches, it is important to proactively tackle underrepresentation and exclusion.
3. Access: Ensure everyone can take part equally and participate fully. Accessibility might be physical, but it could also be about ways of working. Everyone should have equal access to information. 
4. Reciprocity: Professionals or paid staff are rewarded for their input. When coproducing, people who use services are equal partners with professionals, so they should also get some sort of reward. Everyone should get something out for putting something in, building on a desire to feel needed and valued. Sometimes this could be payment or a gift, a payment in kind or an exchange.

Whether you provide publicly funded services or not, there are a range of benefits to embedding coproduction in the way you work.

According to a report by the New Economics Foundation, commissioned by Mind, involving people in this way can help you develop services that are more effective at meeting need and empowering people. If this is done well, the people who participate can experience wellbeing gains, particularly if they feel more connected and valued.

Valuing lived experience and expertise is increasingly expected by funders. For example, the National  Lottery Community Fund look for initiatives to be ‘people-led’. For them, ‘people-led means involving the people who will benefit in the design and delivery of projects.’ Involving people with lived expertise in a decision making and delivery capacity may also be a way of delivering and demonstrating social value. 

Coproduction is encouraged by procurement regulations (The Public Contracts Regulations 2015 – Regulation 76 (8)):

As charitable organisations, it is important that we make a positive difference in what we do and how we do it. Especially if your work involves improving the lives of people who are disempowered, you can really maximise your impact by ensuring the way you work gives these people power in your organisation or service.

• Co-production in social care: what it is and how to do it (Social Care Institute for Excellence). SCIE also offer training, consultancy support and examples of good practice which are not limited to social care.
• Co-production: A Manifesto for Growing the Core Economy (New Economics Foundation, 2008).
• People powered health coproduction catalogue (Nesta, NEF, Innovation Unit).
• Improving service user involvement (Shaping Our Lives, 2017).
• Clinks have developed a series of good practice resources to support coproduction in criminal justice.
• The value of lived experience in social change: the need for leadership and organisational development in the social sector (Baljeet Sandhu, July 2017).
• Make it count: why impact matters in user involvement (New Philanthropy Capital, 2018).
• Coproduction toolkit (Homeless Link).