Some of my findings – in the form of words, photos and cartoons – are available at https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/outreach#. I find that cartoons can be particularly effective, indeed much better than words, in capturing the sentiment and narrative in the room. For example, consider this one on what the local community saw as their key challenges and frustrations, taken from my visit to South Wales. Or this one, on the role of charities in the community from my visit to Leicester. 7  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  7  Or this one, on housing and other issues facing young people from my recent visit to Blackpool. These pictorial narratives provide a simple visual summary which, unlike the written word, can be digested by anyone in less than a minute. They are also a very useful cross-check on my own understanding and a check on my own cognitive biases. Often, I find that the message my non-economist scribe, David, takes from these meetings is different than my own. 14  In these situations, I take David’s reading of the room as  probably the truer reflection of what citizens have really said. I call these visits my Townhall Tours, though this is a rubbish description as I have yet to visit a town hall. I am told that anthropologists would call what I am doing “deep hanging out”, after anthropologist Clifford Geertz. 15  Deep hanging out sounds more appealing than visiting town halls.
Last year alone, the Bank’s Agents met with over 8,000 companies. Recently, we extended the Agents’ reach to include charities, community groups, trades unions and wider civil society. On the engagement ladder, these are examples of the Bank “involving” and “collaborating” with citizens, on a practical day-to-day basis across all parts of the UK. Last year, I extended my own regional programme, with a separate set of visits designed to engage with, and listen to, some of the quieter voices in society, voices otherwise drowned-out in the media cacophony – the voice of charities, community and voluntary groups, local councils, trade unions. And I have sought out those voices in parts of the country that may not otherwise always get a hearing – the under-performing parts of thriving cities as well as communities, towns and cities which are struggling. This regional focus on engaging with the less well-performing parts of the UK is in line with another of the RSA’s recommendations. 11 12 13  Details available at https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/2018/february/boe-and-ft-school-blog-competition See https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/2018/february/department-of-education-consultation-response?sf84498143=1 England, Hebden, Henderson and Pattie (2015). 6  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  6  These visits use approaches to collecting intelligence which are, for me, new – listening methods more familiar from anthropology and sociology than economics and statistics. They involve open, unframed discussions of the issues that matter most to people in their everyday lives, their lived experiences in their local communities, with me as a fly (not bluebottle) on the wall.