Newcastle University and North East ICS
Helping NHS teams drive digital innovation by turning a decade of digital transformation research into a practical playbook for front-line NHS teams.
Story Fox | Playbook & Research Translation
Project Snapshot
Challenge:
The NHS is under pressure to drive digital innovation — but “more technology” isn’t always the answer. How do you translate 10 years of research on sustainable, equitable digital transformation into something front-line teams can actually use?
Solution:
Facilitated discovery sessions with the research team, ICS, and end users, then built a practical, visually engaging playbook that bridges the gap between theory and front-line decision-making
Results:
Nearly 500 accesses across NHSE, with follow-on research now underway
Problem
The NHS is under mounting pressure. More patients, more complex needs, and stretched resources. Digital innovation is often framed as the solution. But throwing more technology at a problem doesn’t always improve care. Sometimes it makes things worse: adding complexity for front-line staff, creating inequities in access, or embedding the wrong workflows into systems that then become difficult to change.
Researchers at Newcastle University Business School had spent a decade studying what makes digital transformation in health and care work. They’d produced a substantial body of evidence on how to drive innovation sustainably and equitably, supporting technology adoption and how to make sure it delivers real value to patients and staff.
Working in partnership with the North East Integrated Care System, the team needed to turn that research into something front-line and operational NHS staff could use. Not another academic paper. Not another strategy document. A practical, hands-on resource that could guide decisions in the rooms where digital transformation happens.
Solution
We started by facilitating discovery sessions with the research team, the ICS, and end users — NHS staff who would use the toolkit in their day-to-day work. The goal was to understand what the gap between theory and practice looked like, and where a playbook could do the most work.
Front-line and operational staff didn’t need a summary of the research. They needed a framework for asking the right questions at the right moments in a digital transformation project. When to pause and check for equity implications. How to identify whether a proposed technology would reduce workload or just shift it. What to measure to know whether innovation was delivering value, not just activity.
From there, we wrote copy that was clear and directly actionable, avoiding the academic framing that would have put front-line readers off. We developed a visual style that made the playbook feel engaging and navigable rather than dense and referential — important for a document that needed to be picked up quickly by busy NHS staff. And we delivered it in two complementary formats: a print version for teams who prefer to work with physical documents in meetings, and an interactive PDF with clickable navigation for digital-first users.
The result is a playbook that works as a tool, not a report. Staff can dip into it at specific points in a project, find the relevant guidance, and act on it, without having to read the whole thing to get value.
Results
The Enhancing Digital Value playbook is reaching front-line and operational teams who are making digital transformation decisions day to day.
- Enhancing Digital Value playbook accessed nearly 500 times
- Condensed 10 years of digital transformation research into practical, actionable insights for front-line and operational staff
- Has since generated additional research building on the playbook’s framework
- Delivered as both a print version and an interactive PDF, designed to work for diverse stakeholders across the NHS
Why this matters for your work
If your research is aimed at a professional audience working under pressure — NHS staff, teachers, social workers, public sector leaders — the format matters as much as the content. People in those roles don’t have time to read reports. They need tools that answer their questions in the moment they’re asking them. Turning research into a playbook, not a summary, is the difference between a resource that sits on a shelf and one that shapes decisions.
Recent Projects
Need to turn your research into a tool front-line professionals will use?
We help research teams translate evidence bases into playbooks, toolkits, and practical resources designed for the realities of professional practice.