Parish Online Wellbeing, a new coaching service for clerks and councillors was launched in May 2026. It allows clerks to access a free one-to-one session with our wellbeing and business psychologist, Sarah. It’s already helped many councils where staff or councillors are struggling with isolation, civility and respect issues or coping with workload. Due to the successful launch, we’ve committed to a series of free group coaching sessions starting in September 2026.
Why Wellbeing?
Parish Online has been providing technology services for over 18 years, giving councils confidence in using digital mapping, GOV.UK website and email systems, and cloud computing. However, we know through conversation with our customers that many clerks struggle with the high expectations and stresses of clerking life.
So, through our Community Interest Company, we’ve reserved a pot of money to invest in free wellbeing coaching to any council, whether they’re our customer or not.
Improving wellbeing, as a broad term, is critical to ensuring we have a country where town, parish and community councils meet codes of conduct and the high professional standards the public expect to see.
Why Parish Online?
As a not-for-profit social enterprise, we think differently about how we run our company. Yes, we want to make profit, but we then want to use that profit for the good of the sector. We feel that committing funds to free coaching provides a “ying” to the “yang” of IT and computing, which can often be a daunting endeavour (even though we make it easy!).
As with our investment in the GOV.UK transition, we’re not placing a limit on the service, so we’ll run it as long as we can. The subtext here is the more councils that use Parish Online services, the greater the impact we’ll be able to have.
What we’re offering
Free one-to-one session for clerks
Any staff member within a local council in England or Wales can use our online form to book a session with Sarah. This is a free, confidential, one hour Teams session where Sarah will propose some techniques and ideas for coping. But it’s also a two-way conversation. She loves to search for the root cause of issues and try to create actionable plans to make a positive difference.
To book a session, go to our wellbeing booking form.
Monthly group coaching
Based on feedback from the initial sessions, starting in September 2026, we’re going to be running free lunchtime webinars that anyone can join. In these sessions Sarah will cover broader techniques covering behaviour, expectations, conflict and how to proactively raise standards within a council.
There’s no attendee limit on the sessions, we just ask that wherever possible you register with a GOV.UK email address so we can validate your position within a council. But don’t worry, we don’t single anyone out, and chat messages can be posted anonymously. We also won’t be recording the sessions, so it really is a safe space to learn and grow together.
To join any of the sessions, use the links below:
- Tuesday 22nd September 2026 – 12-1pm – Parish Online Wellbeing: General Session
- Tuesday 6th October 2026 – 12-1pm – Parish Online Wellbeing: Stress Less
- Tuesday 3rd November 2026 – 12-1pm – Parish Online Wellbeing: Beating Burnout
- Tuesday 1st December 2026 – 12-1pm – Parish Online Wellbeing: Bounce back (improve your resilience)
About Sarah
Sarah is our new wellbeing specialist and business psychologist who will be leading these sessions. She has over 20 years of experience helping people through challenges helping create healthier and more productive workplaces. She looks forward to seeing you on the one-to-one and group sessions.