Developing a qualitative insights toolkit 

Qualitative insight focuses on peoples’ experiences, opinions, and motivations answering the “how?” and “why?”, rather than “how many?” (Wirral Qualitative Toolkit). These insights are gathered through conversations, focus groups, and observations, offering a rich perspective that complements quantitative data. 

During the Covid-19 pandemic, decision-makers in Wirral Council saw the value of community insight in shaping evidence-based responses.  In 2022, the council established the Qualitative Insight Team to embed this approach into the Council’s decision-making, strategy development and service improvements. 

The team recognised that Community, Voluntary and Faith (CVF) organisations were already having valuable conversations with residents about health and wellbeing. However, this valuable information was not always captured or shared in a way that could influence wider policy and planning. The toolkit was therefore designed to: 

• support organisations to develop skills in collecting and presenting insights

• enable organisations to evidence their community impact more effectively

• help Council teams include more local insights within their evidence base

Content was developed by the team drawing on expertise from local government, academia and CVF orgainsations. 

The toolkit is structured around five accessible sections: https://www.wirralhealthwellbeingknowledgehub.co.uk/local-voice/qualitative-insight-toolkit/ 

1. Planning your approach 

2. Gathering qualitative insight 

3. Bringing your findings together 

4. Presenting and sharing your findings 

5. Reflecting on your work 

It also contains practical resources to support ethical research such as privacy notices, consent forms, and guidance around secure data handling.  

Alongside the toolkit the team has delivered training sessions to help partners engage with its contents. The training has focused on:   

• the art of asking questions for impactful case studies 

• evidence Your Community Impact: Focus Groups – planning to reporting 

• responsible storytelling – ethics and consent 

• bringing your findings together – all things analysis 

• reflecting on your work – building lessons learned into future work 

Each sessions attracted around 20 attendees and was well received.  

Since the launch of the toolkit, it has been accessed online by more than 550 individuals in its first year.  One local Community Interest Company reported using the planning and gathering sections daily. By presenting residents insights in a video, they were able to secure 5 years of additional funding to support their community work. 

Building on the success of the toolkit the team are now developing a Qualitative Insight Repository to enable local CVF organisations and council colleagues to share findings. This will raise the profile of the work happening across Wirral, encourage collaboration and provide a valuable evidence base to inform Wirral’s Health and Wellbeing Strategy and the Wirral Plan. 

To view the toolkit, go to: Qualitative Insight Toolkit 

For more information, please contact the Qualitative Insight Team, Public Health, Wirral Council: qualitativeinsightteam@wirral.gov.uk  

This learning story was prepared with support from NIHR RSS Specialist Centre for Public Health delivered by Newcastle University and Partners. With thanks to Wirral Council for providing the content.