We are thrilled to announce that we have expanded our offer into housing services, and welcome Deborah Wickham, our new Associate Principal Consultant in Housing, Homelessness, Compliance and Local Government!
Deborah has been at the helm of major cultural and process changes across several local authorities across England, since her career began as a Housing Options Officer almost 20 years ago. Deborah moved from the South-East of Ireland to Windsor to live 21 years ago and currently enjoys the rural life in the Cotswolds. She quickly moved up the ranks and was a senior instigator in merging libraries and resident services (the first of its kind including over 100 staff and 150 volunteers across 14 locations) and developing a fresh new CRM approximately 7 years ago. She has a vast and almost encyclopaedic knowledge of many statutory and legislative matters around housing.
Deborah has successfully developed and delivered on projects that have invested in service redesign, culture change and major transformation in the Housing Sector and has held interim positions as Strategic Director for Housing Services, and Interim Chief Housing Officer for as many as 14,000 homes and remains critical friend to many Senior Leadership colleagues, even advising on potential Corporate Negligence. She remains an advocate for Domestic Abuse services, LGBT+ groups and in her spare time is fanatical with Clay Shooting and throwing pottery.
Deborah moved into the consultancy world in 2017 and has continued to provide a real, true desire to get things right for the resident, whilst understanding how councils work internally and politically. She is known for her integrity and her accountability in decision-making and is not afraid to be bold. She is honest, super charged with energy and fully gets to grips with her assignments quickly. She is also known for her ability to repair relationships between Councils and MHCLG/DLUHC, with external stakeholders and motivating staff to deliver change and resetting that fire back in their bellies.
“We are delighted to welcome Deborah to the team at Trueman Change! Housing is a core area for change for many of our clients, and given the highly political and high profile nature of the work, increased demands and recent legislative change, it was absolutely crucial we had the right Principal Consultant on board to give sound advice and support. We’re thrilled to have Deborah on board and she is already hitting the ground running supporting one of our clients in delivery of changes as a result of the legislation changes.” Lucy Trueman, Founder and Managing Director, Trueman Change.
Deborah is available to support Local Authorities and Housing Associations solving problems such as:
- Reviewing housing models (for example bringing ALMOs back in house)
- Reducing the use of temporary accommodation
- Revising and redrafting the Allocations Policy or Housing Strategy
- Supporting change as a result of Social Housing (Regulations) Act 2023 and new Consumer Standards
Book a confidential call with us if you wish to understand more about how we can help you with your Housing Services.
