What happens when research is designed and carried out with people it's about, and not just on them? Carrie Wilson is joined by Dr Nikki Luke from the Rees Centre, University of Oxford, to explore practical ways to blend admin data, mixed methods, and lived experience, without losing the human story.

We dig into examples of good co-production in research such as the Oxford research project led by Nikki measuring success as defined by care leavers, design choices that reduce harm, and how commissioners can fund inclusion well.

Listen in for concrete steps you can take this month to make your research more relational, inclusive, and trauma-informed.

What we cover

• Why trauma-informed and co-produced research reduces harm and increases impact.
• How to blend data, mixed methods, and lived experience without losing the human story.
• Practical design approaches — co-analysis, reflective supervision, consent as a process, and wellbeing budgets.
• Learning from major studies such as “Measuring Success for Care Leavers.”
• Building a healthy and ethical data culture through the co-produced collection and analysis.

Subscribe to Trauma Informed Conversations for more honest discussions about trauma, recovery, and building systems rooted in care and humanity.

About the Series

The Care-Experienced People Mini-Series is part of Trauma-Informed Conversations - a podcast created by Trauma-Informed Consultancy Services (TICS) to explore what it really means to build systems and relationships grounded in care, connection, and humanity.

Hosted by Carrie Wilson, this special series invites care-experienced people, researchers, and practitioners from around the world to lead open, relational conversations about trauma, healing, and change - asking what it looks like when we do it together.

Each episode brings lived experience and professional insight into dialogue, offering space for reflection, courage, and system learning.

Series Theme

Exploring trauma and healing both within the care system and the spaces that surround it - led by care-experienced voices, grounded in reflection, connection, and change.

Why It Matters

Care-experienced people have lived at the heart of the systems professionals are trying to make trauma-informed. Their insights, research, and leadership are not just valuable - they are essential to understanding what trauma-informed practice truly looks like. These conversations highlight the power of language, relationship, and collective healing - showing that change begins not with policy, but with how we connect, listen, and build together

Episode 1: The Trauma of the Care System – Healing Within Traumatised Institutions

In this opening episode, Carrie Wilson is joined by Dr Lisa Cherry and Ian Thomas to explore what it really means to do trauma-informed work when the system itself is traumatised.

Together they unpack how institutional harm becomes embedded in culture - through silence, language, and power - and the human cost of working and living inside systems that were never designed for healing.

This honest, hopeful conversation invites listeners to reflect on what happens when trauma in the system goes unnamed, how professionals can care for themselves and others without becoming numb, and what it might look like to build care rooted in belonging, authenticity, and compassion.

Guests

Dr Lisa Cherry
Founder of Trauma-Informed Consultancy Services (TICS), author, researcher, and international speaker specialising in trauma, resilience, and recovery. Having stepped down as Director in July 2025, Lisa continues to influence practice and system-level change through writing, research, and training focused on relational leadership and cultures of safety.

Ian Thomas
A social-work leader and practitioner-scholar completing a PhD on healing and trauma. Ian brings decades of frontline and leadership experience across children’s services and the justice system, exploring how authentic, relational approaches can transform traumatised systems from within.

Host
Carrie Wilson – Collaboration & Innovation Lead at TICS, and well as a care-experienced researcher and practitioner whose work focuses on building trauma-informed systems rooted in care, connection, and humanity. Carrie’s work sits where practice, research, and lived experience meet, creating spaces for honest reflection on how we understand trauma and build systems that can truly heal.

Key Themes

• What “trauma-informed” means when the system itself is traumatised
• Institutional trauma: silence, control, and the erosion of safety
• The impact on professionals and those receiving care
• Authenticity, vulnerability, and the power of relational leadership
• Re-imagining care systems built on belonging rather than compliance

Subscribe to Trauma Informed Conversations for more honest discussions about trauma, recovery, and building systems rooted in care and humanity.

In this opening episode, Jessica Parker — Director of Trauma Informed Consultancy Services (TICS) is joined by her colleague Carrie Wilson to share the story behind the new podcast and the TICS model of practice.

Following the energy and emotion of the recent TICS Conference, delegates told us they wanted more: more time to pause, to process, and to stay connected. Trauma Informed Conversations was created as a space to do exactly that.

Jessica and Carrie reflect on what makes the TICS model unique — its roots in compassion, connection, and sustainable systems change — and why ongoing reflection is vital to truly embody trauma-informed practice. Together they explore how this podcast will continue the dialogue that began at the conference, offering an honest, human space for learning that feels calm, grounded, and real.

If you’ve ever left training or an event thinking, “I need time to keep thinking about this,” this episode is for you. Welcome to the conversation.

Subscribe to Trauma Informed Conversations for more honest discussions about trauma, recovery, and building systems rooted in care and humanity.