As part of the Herefordshire Engagement Project (HEP) 2022, West Mercia Women’s Aid is consulting with local people to bring the voices of stakeholders to Herefordshire Council, helping them understand how to best support and engage survivors of domestic abuse.
As a specialist domestic abuse agency WMWA is in a unique position to be a trusted representative for those with lived experience of domestic abuse, whilst simultaneously supporting the development of trust and engagement between stakeholder and local authority. The objective is to increase participation and open up further avenues of engagement and support offered by Herefordshire Council.
Kristine Jensen is our Project Officer for HEP 2022, she tells us what a typical day entails…
A day in the life of the Project officer for Herefordshire Engagement Project 2022
Hi! I’m Kristine, I’m the Project Officer for the HEP 2022. As project lead my days are really diverse but here’s some of the things I get up to day-to-day.
In the morning I go through my emails and deal with any urgent matters. I will then spend a few hours working on the research design, developing our strategy, and managing any changes to the project timeline.
The project consists of a series of focus groups being held throughout 2022 with different participant groups. The design also includes surveys to make sure we represent as many voices in the community as at all possible. This is important, because WMWA and Herefordshire Council really want to focus on diversity as a key priority for the overall project and outcomes.
Our aim for this project is to have 120 participants in the focus groups across 6 months and to have several hundreds more answer the surveys. It takes a lot of planning and organising (and reorganising) to manage this much data. Over the next few months I will begin compiling everything that we are learning into what will become the final report. This will be quite substantial and include so many great voices of Herefordshire.
In the afternoons I typically have meetings with other team collaborators. The project is creative and collaborative which I really enjoy. I work closely with the Social Marketing Officer & Communications Manager to make sure we are creating as much awareness about the project as possible and create strategies for communication and outreach.
I also work with the Training & Participation officer who helps with the running of the groups and the Marginalised Communities Support & Advocacy Worker to make sure we are representing the diversity of county residents. We want to hear from everyone! I’m not the “techiest” person so luckily I can call on our Data & Admin Manager to help me out with some of that!
At the end of the day I like to go over any outstanding tasks and create a to-do list for the next day. This helps me stay on top of the project and the hundreds of participants involved. A lot of work also goes into looking after the participants to make sure everybody feels supported and comfortable. This is one of the most important tasks for me, because without them and their voices – we wouldn’t be able to carry out this work.
Get involved!
Complete our survey today and add your voice to the conversation https://n1o2g1kc736.typeform.com/to/X75UfKH5
There is also the opportunity to join in one of our focus groups, register your interest at the end of the survey!