Dr Carla Groom

Dr Carla Groom is a Deputy Director leading an unusual team known as Human-Centred Design Science at the Department for Work & Pensions (DWP). She has a PhD in social psychology and nearly two decades of policy and analytical experience in Whitehall. Since 2015 she and her band of maverick social scientists have been looking at how to improve collective decision-making processes within the government. With a remit to work across the whole of DWP, from policy to operations to corporate services, they have tackled some of the most complex and stubborn problems in government as well as systematically learning from the process and sharing these findings. They’ve identified novel ways to blend approaches from design, systems thinking, social science and philosophy. Their most recent publication, the Public Design Evidence Review, is a landmark assessment of the value of design approaches in government, featuring eight reports from academic and practitioner sources, that was endorsed and published on behalf of the whole government by the Cabinet Office and Policy Profession. Supported by technical analysis and context-specific examples, it may be the biggest exploration of practical enablers and obstacles to good collaboration ever published by the UK Government.