Case Study

The United Kingdom’s ‘What Works’ Centres

‘What Works’ Centres

In the United Kingdom, What Works centres form a bridge between evidence and practice. The What Works Network was established in 2013 to improve the way government and other public sector organisations create, share and use high-quality evidence in decision-making. Since then, it has grown to encompass 9 What Works Centres and 3 affiliate organisations, focused on the areas of health and social care, educational achievement, crime reduction, child and family wellbeing, local economic development, quality of life for older people, homelessness, and youth employment.

What Works Centres are different from standard research institutes:

  • What Works Centres are primarily designed to inform policy and decision-making with evidence-based insights, rather than advancing theoretical knowledge or conducting specialised academic research that might not be immediately directed towards practical policy solutions.

  • What Works Centres actively collaborate with practitioners in the public sector (such as local governments, schools, healthcare providers) to ensure that their findings are translated into practice. They aim to bridge the gap between research and implementation.

  • The findings from What Works Centres are designed to be accessible and actionable for policymakers, practitioners, and the public. They produce toolkits, guidelines, and reports that are user-friendly and aimed at informing decisions on a practical level.

The What Works Centres help to ensure that robust evidence shapes government decision-making, by:

  • collating existing evidence on the effectiveness of programmes and practices

  • producing high-quality synthesis reports and systematic reviews in areas where they do not currently exist

  • assessing the effectiveness of policies and practices against an agreed set of outcomes

  • filling gaps in the evidence base by commissioning new trials and evaluations

  • sharing findings in an accessible way

  • supporting practitioners, commissioners and policymakers to use these findings to inform their decisions

In the past ten years, What Works Centres have collectively designed and delivered over 500 trials and evaluations. The evidence from these trials has fed directly into the policy cycle, with government departments scaling up funding and delivery for programmes that achieve meaningful outcomes.

A dedicated What Works for Wellbeing centre operated from 2014-2024 and improved access to wellbeing evidence. The What Works for Wellbeing Centre made significant contributions to advancing wellbeing evidence in public policy, informing frameworks like the UK’s National Wellbeing Framework. While the Centre's work has been globally recognised, a lack of stable, long-term funding from a lead government department or foundation meant that the Centre had to close in 2024, reflecting the challenges in securing investment for holistic wellbeing initiatives in current government systems.