Wendy Weal

Wendy is the founder and Managing Director of Interface Enterprises. She is passionate about improving outcomes for children and families and has extensive experience of working across local and national government at a senior and strategic level. Her career has focused particularly on whole-family working, early intervention, integrated services and supporting systems and workforces to turn policy and reform into effective practice.

Wendy has worked on a range of national government initiatives and advised government departments on policy development and effective practice. She has an established track record of working with local authorities, health partners and the voluntary and community sector on system transformation, governance, service design, implementation, workforce development, evaluation and outcomes.

More recently, Wendy has worked extensively with local authorities and their partners on the development and implementation of Family Hubs and Best Start in Life arrangements and on preparing for and implementing the Families First reforms. Her work includes strategic needs assessment, service and system design, leadership development, workforce development and evaluation. She particularly enjoys working with senior leaders and partnerships to challenge thinking, understand what is happening across a system and translate national policy into practical and sustainable local delivery.

Wendy has also led and contributed to national research and evaluation, including Interface’s work with the Local Government Association on Achieving the Best Start in Life. This has strengthened her continuing interest in what enables local systems to move successfully from strategy to implementation, including collaborative leadership, integrated working, effective use of data and evidence, workforce development and a clear focus on outcomes for children and families.

Before establishing Interface, Wendy was Deputy Delivery Manager of the Family Delivery Team within the Families at Risk Division at the Department for Education. In this national role, she supported local authorities and their partners to establish and develop intensive family support services, parenting support and wider reforms around integrated services and whole-family working.

She was also responsible for work supporting wider reforms for families with complex needs. This included the development of guidance and approaches to strengthen local working between drug and alcohol treatment services, Safeguarding Boards, children and family services, offender management, mental health services and young carers. She became a national adviser to other government departments, including the Ministry of Justice, Home Office and Communities and Local Government.

Prior to this, Wendy worked with the national Youth Taskforce, supporting the expansion of youth offending teams into police custody suites, Operation Stay Safe and the development of Targeted Youth Support across the country.

Wendy began her career in housing, progressing to the management of a large housing service encompassing neighbourhood management, anti-social behaviour and tenant participation. It was here that her focus on whole-family working began. She was instrumental in establishing one of the earliest Family Intervention Projects, working with partners to secure funding and develop and sustain the approach.

Since establishing Interface, Wendy has continued to combine this national policy experience with direct work alongside local systems. She brings a strong understanding of the realities of implementation and particularly enjoys strategic challenge, evaluation, leadership development, coaching and developing approaches that strengthen relationship-based and whole-family practice.

Wendy has written articles and contributed to publications including Public Servant, The Guardian and Local Government Chronicle and has regularly presented at conferences on whole-family working and support for children and families.

Professional qualifications

Wendy is a qualified and experienced executive coach with an ILM Level 7 Certificate in Executive Coaching and Mentoring. She also holds a Diploma in Psychotherapeutic Counselling and is an accredited NLP Practitioner and Coach.

She is a qualified assessor and holds a Level 4 qualification in the Internal Quality Assurance of Assessment Processes and Practice, as well as a professional qualification from the Chartered Institute of Housing.