What was the challenge?

Winchester City Council commissioned Temple to develop a Community Resilience and Wellbeing Strategy (CRWS). This will be used to support the council’s long-term objective of enhancing community health and cohesion in the face of unforeseen challenges such as COVID-19 and the cost-of-living crisis. This strategy aims to empower the community by integrating evidence-based research and a bottom-up approach to planning.

What was our solution?

Temple’s role involved the application of Asset-Based Community Development to a multi-method research approach, combining quantitative analysis and qualitative stakeholder engagement to map community vulnerabilities and strengths. Identifying community assets alongside areas of weakness is a key objective in enabling the effective distribution of council resources.

Quantitative Analysis:

Initial data analysis was conducted to identify socio-economic and environmental vulnerabilities across the Winchester district. This occurred at multiple scales – from LSOA to district and regional level – using comparative insights to shape and target the engagement strategy.

A digital survey was also undertaken, which quantified resident wellbeing, with inspiration from the WELLBY methodology, uncovering relationships between different resident characteristics and self-rated resident scores.

Stakeholder Engagement:

A community panel was established, prioritising underrepresented voices and geographies to guide early development of the strategy and to ensure ongoing community participation.

The feedback from 12 community engagement events, such as street surveys, school collaborations and focus groups, was also incorporated at this stage. Targeted outreach to community-led events, then facilitated the semi-structured interviewing of diverse groups to gain localised insight. This involved collaboration with multiple charities and voluntary organisations, including a Wellbeing Café, community centres and food banks.

How did we add value?

Temple was able to:

• Offer a blended research approach to ensure a robust and localised strategy that aligns with the council’s goals, such as the 2020-2025 plan and the ‘Living Well’ priority
• Create a framework specific to Winchester’s context whilst ensuring compatibility with existing policies and planning initiatives
• Integrate underrepresented voices into the planning and decision-making process, ensuring the strategy resonates with all community members
• Deliver a strategy with built-in monitoring capabilities, enabling continuous assessment and adaptation over time.

The findings and recommendations were presented to key council officers and members in Spring 2025, forming a critical step toward realising Winchester’s vision for community resilience and wellbeing by 2030.