About the programme
The Senior Policy Fellowships programme is designed for cross-functional teams in government working on complex policy or delivery challenges. This programme will help team members apply systems approaches to understand the complexity of their challenges, and access engineering expertise from the Academy's Fellowship. Through the programme, teams will build the capacity to work across organisational boundaries in conditions of uncertainty to develop insights to policy development and delivery.
Who is the programme for?
We welcome applicants from a range of backgrounds for example economics, politics, sociology, health, planning, digital, science or engineering. Your team does not need to work on an engineering challenge to attend this programme, but needs to be:
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An established policy or delivery team with a range of role levels.
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A team of four to six participants
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A team from a UK-based Civil Service or public sector organisation. This includes Central Government, devolved administrations, mayoral strategic authorities, and local authorities.
Programme benefits and outcomes
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Introduction to Systems Approaches: The Systems 101 workshop supports teams to apply systems thinking tools and approaches for problem framing and to identify high impact policy actions.
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Expert calls: Participants will have one-to-one calls with relevant experts to challenge their thinking and to discuss practical options for policy development.
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Systems coaching: Support for a shared understanding of the policy or delivery challenge. This involves using a systems lens to better understand the wider context, key actors, and interdependencies.
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Support from the Policy Advisory team: Upon completion, your team will produce a set of findings and learning points that can inform the team's ongoing policy work after the Fellowship.
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Collaboration: Build the capacity to work across government silos in conditions of uncertainty.
Programme format and timeline
From onboarding, the programme will run approximately 3 months provided alignment of diaries. Kick off workshops will run for 1 to 2 weeks with the initial session taking place at Prince Phillip House, London.
8 to 10 expert calls that provide access to relevant external perspectives, evidence and challenge to support your team's understanding of the policy issue.
Your team will prepare a final presentation setting out key findings, learning points and proposed next steps. Representatives from the Academy Advisory Team, participating experts and the team’s organisation will be invited to provide feedback and support the team to consider how the learning can inform future policy work.
After the programme, teams join the Policy Fellowships Alumni community, gaining continued access to peers, experts and learning opportunities. The community includes more than 100 policymakers and public service leaders, who go on to be leaders in government and help strengthen links between government and the technical community
Case study
The Clean Power 2030 Unit at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero took part in a pilot Team Policy Fellowship to explore challenges around decarbonising the electricity system and delivering the Clean Power 2030 mission.
Four policymakers from the Unit took part, bringing expertise in social research, delivery, stakeholder engagement, communications and strategic technical advice.
The programme helped the team define the scope of its policy challenge and build a shared understanding of the issue, while also exploring questions relevant to individual roles. Through systems thinking and expert insight, the team tested assumptions, identified key dependencies and considered where further evidence or collaboration could support delivery.
Systems 101 workshop
Alumni sharing their experience to policymakers
Application and cost
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Please contact the Policy Fellowships team to apply for this programme. We will then send the application form directly to you or your team.
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Applicants may be invited to a scoping call to discuss their work in more detail.
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The cost of the programme is £10,000 for teams up to 6 people. Payment should be processed upon acceptance onto the programme.
Application guidelines
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The policy challenge should be complex, live and suitable for exploration through a systems thinking approach.
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The Academy will assess whether it has the appropriate resources and expertise to support the team, informed by scoping calls and internal review.
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