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Greta Brunskill has been appointed as a new Voluntary, Community, and Social Enterprise Sector (VCSE) Health and Wellbeing Research Partnerships Coordinator for our region. 

Her role is jointly funded for two years by NIHR organisations in the North East and North Cumbria and she is based at the Voluntary Organisations’ Network North East (VONNE), working closely with Cumbria CVS.

In this blog, she shares her reflections on her first nine months in post.

I can’t quite believe I am 9 months into my (not so new!) role as VCSE Health and Wellbeing Research Partnerships Coordinator for the region. The time has quite literally flown thanks to the wide range of individuals, organisations and opportunities I have had contact with, and the willingness across the VCSE and research sectors in the region to involve more communities in research.

Developed through a collaborative project in 2021 involving VCSE and research organisations from across the region, the VCSE Research Partnerships Coordinator role is based at the Voluntary Organisations’ Network North East (VONNE), funded for two years by National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) infrastructure organisations for the North East and North Cumbria.

Although involving public and community voices is now a well-established part of quality research, developing approaches that successfully engage the diverse range of people that health and wellbeing research aims to serve is very much a work in progress. Here in the North East and North Cumbria, we are keen to explore a more coordinated approach to making connections between VCSE organisations and health researchers, and supporting sustainable, mutually beneficial VCSE research partnerships through a dedicated role.

Since beginning the role in July 2022, I have been focusing on making connections between the research and VCSE sectors and building capacity for VCSE research partnerships through developing shared expectations, knowledge and skills.

In terms of connecting research projects and community organisations, the VONNE Health & Wellbeing network is a great vehicle for sharing a wide range of opportunities for communities to get involved in. I have also been raising awareness of a NIHR community engagement toolkit to support researchers looking to involve communities in their work.  It has also been fantastic to support VCSE organisations with their own research ideas to connect with researchers with the aim of developing these into collaborative projects; I look forward to continuing to support these partnerships as they develop.

In addition to helping make these connections, I have been collating and developing opportunities for the research and VCSE communities to share their expertise to support better collaborative working. Through conversations with people with different experiences, the need for a better sense of each other’s sector, including terminology and how things generally work in VCSE and research worlds, has been highlighted and is something I think this new role can facilitate.

On that note, over the summer months I’m looking forward to delivering a pilot ‘introduction to research’ session for VCSE organisations with researchers from the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration (ARC).

VONNE will be delivering events with NIHR partners in July to share and encourage the adoption of best practice in VCSE research partnerships – further details will be shared very soon!

I’m looking forward to continuing to support VCSE and research partners to develop relationships that help to serve both their aims – if you would like to have a conversation about the support available, please reach me at [email protected]