This White Paper builds on an earlier report produced in 2012, based on the exploration of the employment deal in four councils. The backdrop to the research today has many features in common with situation in 2012. A combination of social and economic forces of unending cuts, an ageing workforce, the looming social care funding ‘crisis’, and now the recent ‘Brexit’ vote all signal further difficult years ahead for councils. In this current climate, employers are more than ever reliant on a high performing workforce. It is crucial as an employer to understand the workplace dynamics shaping engagement and to identify what supports  sustainability in challenging times. We hope to address these pressing questions through this research, by capturing and synthesising the multiple voices involved in the transformation of local government. As individual service users we are also stakeholders. This is our attempt to positively insert ourselves into the dialogue from a research-based perspective.