PAUL STEPCZAK
Working alongside communities since 2005
Helping organisations work with people, not on them.
Community participation • Co-design • Co-production
Why this matters to me
I want to see communities and people with lived experience having an equal voice in the decisions that affect them.Too often, people are consulted after the important decisions have already been made. I help organisations create the conditions for people to contribute earlier, shape what happens and share ownership of the work.What I’ve learned
My approach has grown from more than 20 years of working in and alongside communities.It’s been shaped by practice, reflection and lived experience - learning what helps people participate meaningfully, what gets in the way and why trust matters more than any engagement method.How I can help
I turn that learning into practical training, facilitated workshops and keynote talks.I help organisations strengthen community participation, co-design and co-production - so they can work with people, not on them.
20+ years’ practice • Nearly 90 co-design events • TEDx speaker • 2025 collaboration award
How I can help · In practice · Who I work with · Frameworks · Book · Contact
How I can help
I help organisations involve people more meaningfully in the decisions, services and ideas that affect them.
Community engagement
I can help you strengthen how your organisation works with communities - reviewing your current approach, developing an engagement strategy and using tried-and-tested methods to build relationships, involve different voices and turn what you hear into action.
Co-design & co-production
I can help you understand the fundamentals of co-production and put them into practice - involving people earlier, sharing influence and creating the conditions for communities and organisations to design together.
Training, workshops & facilitation
I can help you build the skills and confidence of your team to work more effectively with communities - through practical training in community engagement approaches and methodologies, or by developing your team's facilitation skills so they can create better conversations with communities.
Facilitate co-design events & community idea days
I can help you bring communities, services and organisations together around a shared challenge - uncovering strengths, exploring the problem, generating ideas and developing practical ways forward.
Keynote talks
Grounded, practical talks about community participation, co-design and working with people, not on them.
Previous keynotes include:
"Coproducing Socially Inclusive Communities" at the European Social Network Conference in Antwerp
"The Power of Community Engagement in Times of Instability: Building Trust" for TPAS Wales in CardiffWatch my TEDx talk: 8 Steps for Co-designing with Communities
Why work with me
Community participation isn't something I've learned from a textbook. I've spent more than 20 years doing it.
I've worked inside communities, alongside public services and with organisations trying to involve people differently.That means I bring together lived experience, community development practice and practical co-design - helping organisations turn participation from something they do into something that changes how they work.
20+ years community development and participation experience
10+ years consultancy experience. Supporting public services and voluntary sector organisations with community engagement, participation and co-design.
Qualified service design practitioner with the Service Design Network
Co-design in practice. 100+ events facilitating real challenges with communities and organisations
Practitioner, not just adviser. My methods have been shaped through doing the work, testing what works and learning from what doesn't
Read my thinking
I publish The Participation Paper monthly where I share practical ideas, frameworks and lessons about community participation, co-design and co-production.Read The Participation Paper
Work in practice
I’m more facilitator than presenter.Whether I’m running a workshop, delivering training or giving a keynote, I try to create the conditions for people to participate, contribute and learn from one another.
Participation, not presentation
I prefer questions and dialogue to simply giving people answers. The knowledge in a room rarely sits with one person, so I create opportunities for people to share experience, challenge thinking and learn from each other.Learning by doing
I use activities, practical exercises and real challenges to help people explore ideas and put learning into practice. Where appropriate, I use games and playful approaches to make sessions engaging, upbeat and memorable without losing sight of what we're there to achieve.Grounded in community practice
My approach comes from more than 20 years of working alongside communities. That means paying attention to relationships, different perspectives and lived experience, and creating spaces where people can work things through together rather than simply being talked at.Co-design in action
One example of this approach are the social hackathons, community ideas days and co-design workshops I deliver alongside my colleague Martin Downes of Prelude Solutions.These bring communities, organisations and services together around a shared challenge. Participants explore existing strengths, build a shared understanding of the challenge, generate and test ideas, develop prototypes and agree what should happen next.Each event also produces a comprehensive report, capturing the strengths, insights and ideas generated throughout the process. This creates a clear record of the co-design journey that can support funding applications, campaigns and future decision-making.Alongside practical ideas, the process can generate something equally valuable - new relationships, shared understanding and grounded insight that can help shape what happens next.Together we have delvered:
100+ events across community and public-service settings on countless social challenges such as food poverty, pollution, social value, and placemaking.Involved over 4,000 participants working on live issues that genuinely matter to the people involved and the wider society.Awards and recognition.
Winners of the 2025 Industry to Industry Award for collaboration by the Institute for Collaborative Working.
Featured by the International Association for Community Development (IACD) as an example of community-led co-design and democratic innovation.
Highlighted by Welsh Government as an example of good practice in deliberative engagement in its 2025 Deliberative Engagement Review.
See the work in action
Photos from talks, workshops and co-design events.
Who I work with
I work with organisations that want people to have a more meaningful role in shaping what happens.That includes public services, third sector organisations, social enterprises and partnerships working with communities.
Public services & partnerships
When you need communities and people with lived experience to help shape services, priorities or decisions.Voluntary sector & social enterprises
When you want to strengthen participation, co-design something new or rethink how you work with the people you support.Communities & cross-sector groups
When different people and organisations need to come together around a shared challenge and find a way forward.
Got something you're trying to work through?
You don't need to know exactly what you need yet.If you're trying to involve communities or people with lived experience more meaningfully, improve the way participation happens, or bring people together around a challenge, let's have a conversation.Email me: [email protected]
Connect with me on LinkedIn
Frameworks for better participation
Practical frameworks shaped through more than 20 years of community work, co-design and facilitation.
Building Stronger Communities
Strong communities don’t come from a single approach. They emerge when people, community strengths and shared decision-making come together - supported by the conditions that make collective action possible.Ask: are we strengthening the conditions for communities to act together?
The Impact Iceberg
Outputs are visible. Impact isn’t. Trust, relationships and ownership sit beneath the surface - and that’s often where lasting change begins.Ask: what’s changing, and for whom?
When Community Engagement Hits a Brick Wall
When engagement stalls, changing the method may not solve the problem. First examine the conditions around trust, relevance, relationships, capacity and motivation.Ask: What's really stopping people from taking part?
The Community Memory Cycle
Every experience of engagement shapes what people expect next. What happens this time can strengthen trust - or reinforce scepticism next time.Ask: What will people remember about this experience?
Becoming More Co-productive
Co-production isn't something a project either passes or fails. It's a direction of travel shaped by co-design, co-delivery, co-ownership, equity and reciprocity over time.Ask: What would make this project more co-productive?
Social Asset Roles
People bring more than skills or job titles. Some are better at creating movements while others mainatin momentumAsk: who are these within your community? Obtain their trust to develope quicker
The Shared Responsibility Model
Lasting change rarely sits with one actor. Institutions, communities and individuals each bring different strengths - the best possibility comes when they work together.Ask: Whose responsibility are we currently overlooking?
Growing a Community Movement
Community movements aren't built through one engagement exercise. They grow through shared purpose, continuous learning, widening participation and increasing community ownership.Ask: Are we building participation - or the conditions for something to grow?
I'm writing a book about community participation.
Twenty years of lessons from working with communities and organisations - about trust, relationships, power and what happens when we genuinely work with people rather than simply involving them.It's practical, grounded in experience and currently being written.
Want to follow its progress?
I’ll occasionally share practical ideas, new frameworks, lessons from my work and updates from the book.No noise. Just useful things when I have something worth sharing.
By signing up, you’ll receive occasional emails from me about community participation, practical frameworks, my writing and relevant updates. Unsubscribe at any time. I won’t sell your details or share them with other organisations for their marketing.
Privacy noticeWhen you sign up for updates, I collect your email address so I can occasionally send you practical ideas, frameworks, lessons from my work and updates relating to my book on community participation.I use your information on the basis of your consent. You can withdraw that consent at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in any email.Your email address is stored and processed using Kit, the email service I use to manage this mailing list. I will not sell your information or share it with other organisations for their own marketing.I will keep your email address while you remain subscribed. If you unsubscribe, I will stop using it to send you book updates, although limited information may be retained where necessary to record your opt-out.You have rights over your personal information, including the right to access it, correct it, ask for it to be deleted and withdraw your consent.The data controller is Paul Stepczak Community Consulting. If you have any questions about how your information is used, you can contact me at [email protected].You also have the right to raise a concern with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).
Gallery
Talks, workshops and events in action.
