Jo's research is primarily focused within the context of inter-agency collaboration. In particular how partnerships intentionally or not manage to create moments of change that affect the movement and direction of those collaborations. This includes some degree of exploration of the behaviours and language that can assist or hinder the achievement of such moments.
In order to examine this area Jo's methodological approach is through discourse analysis, exploring the way in which the socially produced ideas and objects that constitute "reality" are actually created and maintained. The theoretical framework within which Jo is considering her area of interest is one that draws on the importance of the social context of the discourse that supports it, defined by Hardy and Phillips (2002) as interpretative structuralism.
Jo's research data will be drawn from her working environment where she has responsibility for developing ways that statutory agencies providing services to vulnerable children and their families might best integrate their approaches to achieve better outcomes for those children.
