The handbook’s website has an AI assistant, Eddie, which can be accessed by clicking on “Talk to AI” in the lower right hand side of the screen.

Eddie is a RAG-based AI agent with the entire book’s contents sitting behind enquiries and reasoning.

F𝘰𝘳 𝘦𝘹𝘢𝘮𝘱𝘭𝘦, 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘢𝘴𝘬𝘦𝘥 “𝘛𝘦𝘭𝘭 𝘮𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬 𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘭𝘶𝘥𝘦𝘴 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘨𝘰𝘰𝘥 𝘱𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘱𝘳𝘪𝘴𝘦 𝘴𝘶𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵, 𝘪𝘯 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘶𝘭𝘢𝘳 𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘸𝘵𝘩 𝘣𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘴”

The response is:-

“The handbook covers growth business support as part of a place-based economic development strategy—it’s not a standalone chapter, but woven through the framework on how you diagnose what your local economy needs, prioritise interventions, and build a pipeline of investable opportunities. You’ll also find practical guidance on cluster and sector approaches, inclusive growth trade-offs, and how to design partnerships that actually work. What you need is the strategy-to-delivery adviser route: that’s where we translate ambition into a workable plan, navigate the politics and funding constraints, and build the delivery capacity to make it stick. But before I hand you over, one last thing: are you starting from scratch (no support exists yet), or are you trying to improve or redesign something that’s already running but not delivering? That’ll shape which part of the handbook and which workbooks I point you to first.”

Question? go and ask Eddie at www.lredhandbook.com

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