Give investors a reason to choose your place
Investors are weighing the UK more cautiously this year, and the places that win their attention show credibility and competence before anyone asks. Local Power, Global Reach is a practical toolkit for UK places on organising for international investment, research and cultural partnerships.
Real estate investors are more cautious about the UK
of delegates polled at the Real Estate Capital & Investment Decisions Forum, a gathering of real estate investors and their advisers in London on 29 September 2026, said they felt less confident about the UK's prospects than a year earlier. A further 35% felt about the same.
Speakers pointed to planning and rising costs. Interest rates and national policy sit outside a place's control. What a place controls is how it shows up: a clear account of what it offers, institutions that speak with one voice, choices about where to spend its time, and a team that follows through once an investor gets in touch.
Those are the five parts of international readiness the toolkit covers.
Five parts of international readiness, with tools for each
Say what your place offers
A quick test of whether your pitch could belong to any other place, and how to back each claim with evidence an outsider would accept.
Act as one place
How councils, combined authorities, universities and business bodies agree one front door and back each other's asks.
Choose where to spend your time
A way of sorting overseas relationships by what they are worth, so you have a reason to say no.
Keep in touch between the big events
How places a step ahead turn a trade show or mission into relationships that last the year.
Look after partners once they arrive
A model for splitting the work of winning partners from the work of keeping them.
UK and international case studies
Frameworks, checklists and examples of how places have organised for international engagement, drawn from research for the Commission on Devolution and Diplomacy.
The toolkit builds on the Commission's main report, From the Local to Global: A New Framework for Devolution and Diplomacy (City-REDI, University of Birmingham, 2026), which makes the case for a national framework for how UK cities and regions engage internationally.
Written by Sam Markey (Recurve), Jack Shaw (City-REDI, University of Birmingham) and Alex Favier (Invest in UK University R&D).
Get the toolkit the day it's published
Leave your details and we'll email you the link on publication. If you left your details at the end of the readiness check, you're already on the list.
- Free to download
- Written for economic development, investment and international teams in councils, combined authorities, universities, growth companies and cultural bodies
- One email on publication. Anything more only if you tick the box
Work through it with your partners
The toolkit is free. Some places want help putting it to work across several institutions at once. Recurve offers two ways in.
A 30-minute conversation
Thirty minutes with Sam Markey, co-author of the toolkit, no deck. Bring your place's question, and a partner from another institution if you can.
- Before an investor visit or overseas mission
- When partners read the place differently and you want an outside view
- To explore the value of a Review
International Readiness Review
For places that want an outside view of how they come across to investors and partners, and an agreed set of next steps.
- Up to ten people across your council, combined authority, university and growth partners take the readiness check
- We show where your institutions see the place differently, and where an investor would notice
- A facilitated half-day session with your partners, led by Sam Markey
- A short write-up with the actions to take in the next 90 days
Price agreed up front after a first conversation.
Before you sign up
When will the toolkit be published?
Autumn 2026. Join the waitlist and you'll get the link by email on the day it goes live.
Who is it for?
Anyone working on how a UK place engages internationally: economic development and inward investment teams in local and combined authorities, universities, growth companies and investment agencies, and cultural, sporting and visitor economy bodies.
Does it cost anything?
The toolkit and the readiness check are free. The International Readiness Review is a paid, fixed-price engagement for places that want support applying it.
What happens to my answers in the readiness check?
Your answers stay in your browser unless you choose to leave your details. See our privacy notice.
I'm an investor or adviser. Is there a version for me?
Yes. The investor's-eye version asks how UK places outside London come across from your side of the table. Respondents see what we find first.
Local Power, Global Reach: Internationalisation Toolkit (Commission on Devolution and Diplomacy), by Sam Markey, Jack Shaw and Alex Favier. The Commission's research was supported by the Invest in UK University R&D Midlands Campaign. The Commission's main report is From the Local to Global: A New Framework for Devolution and Diplomacy by Jack Shaw, Dr Chloe Billings, Patrick Diamond, Charlotte Hoole, Fumi Kitagawa and Andrew Stevens (City-REDI, University of Birmingham, 2026).