This article presents various forms of activities performed by locally based social welfare research and development (R&D) units in Sweden. The authors argue that these units are vital actors in the field of encouraging and strengthening evidence-based social work practice. They are close to social services organisations and have the ability to use flexible methods in order to bridge the gap between research and practice in a local context. The theoretical framework for the article is the organisational excellence model -an archetype for how research can be used in practice.

Ever increasing demands are being made on welfare organizations to display efficiency. Evaluation workshops constitute a form of learning for the purposes of building up competence to conduct evaluations within welfare organizations, with the support of research and development units. In workshops of this kind, welfare work professionals meet in order to conduct evaluations together with researchers/professional evaluators.This article presents experiences from 10 such evaluation workshops conducted in western Sweden.The workshops were perceived very positively by the participants. While the evaluations are being conducted, the participants also develop a more general competence in this field.The evaluations conducted at the workshops are primarily internal, but with external support, with all the limitations this involves in relation to the possibilities for critical scrutiny. Evaluation workshops have a beneficial effect on the learning of evaluation methods by directly combining learning and conducting evaluation. The workshops may also serve to build capacity in the organizations for evaluative work.

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The article describes and analyses some preliminary working methods for user involvement in child welfare. The models are based on the results of a national project in Sweden where children and young people have been involved as informants. How experiences and viewpoints from children and young people can be a source of knowledge in child welfare organisations is one of the main questions. The performance and the results of the project are analysed in relation to a theoretical macro-oriented model created to illustrate the need for different kinds of knowledge in supporting the implementation of an evidence-based practice.