Note from Collaborative Leadership in Place Cell 1
Summary
Collaborative leadership is fundamental to place-based working: ‘If you want to go fast go alone, if you want to go far go together.’
At the heart of this is relationship building, for its own sake, in advance of a specific need.
It helps to be enthusiastic, open and honest, to build trust with other people.
It is possible to work as a systems leader or steward, and create spaces for people to come together, so that they learn to respect each other as valued contributors to a shared cause.
Where beneficiaries, not organisations, are the primary focus, more will be achieved.
The Covid-19 crisis, while terrible in its impact, has nevertheless created favourable conditions for collaboration. One challenge will be to sustain this as the crisis recedes, and another will be to find ways of establishing and embedding a collaborative system that can survive departure of key individuals.
Aims of the cell
Steve Wyler, co-convenor of the Better Way, introduced the cell. Our Call to Action for a Better Way explained that ‘Our systems and leadership styles often force organisations to compete against each other rather than collaborating to achieve the changes people need.’ This cell is for those who are working in places to put the Better Way principles into action and want to learn from each other about how best to abandon organisational silos and become systems leaders, and develop common causes and shared outcomes, within and across sectors.
The cell is a working group which will meet several times, to explore these questions in some depth, to help its members share their insights and experience, and develop strategies which we can turn into a document to share across our network and beyond.
2. Opening Presentations
We started the meeting with two presentations:
Cate Newnes-Smith from Surrey Youth Focus described how she has built relationships over several years with people from the statutory sector, and as a consequence was asked to play a part in the appointment of the council Chief Executive Joanna Killian, who then brought in Dave Hill as Social Services Director, and this created an opportunity for a new way of doing things. Cate explained that she makes a point of building relationships before she needs them, inviting people for a coffee, asking them what they need, and listening.
Through the Better Way, Cate heard about Toby Lowe’s work on Human Learning Systems, and realised that she and others like her were carrying out the role of a ‘systems steward’. Surrey Youth Focus now has one foot in the third sector camp, and one in the public sector camp, and know both well, and a lot of its work is bringing people together, getting people talking, making things happen – on many levels both strategic and tactical. This has resulted, for example, in the Time for Kids initiative, which is being rolled out to all practitioners across Surrey, encouraging them to focus on positive relationships with children. This initiative started with a small group convened by Cate, which began by building trust.
Cate distinguished between strong and weak collaboration. In a strong collaboration all the partners embark, as it were, on a boat with everyone agreeing the direction together, and they stand together at the helm making adjustments as needed. This is very different from the much weaker (but very common) forms of collaboration, where the invitation is ‘come on to our boat, and we will steer it, and will allow you to express an opinion every now and again’. Cate reminded us of the useful phrase: ‘If you want to go fast go alone, if you want to go far go together.’
Avril McIntyre, from Community Resources, in Barking and Dagenham explained that seven years ago there was a new Council Leader and a new Chief Executive, both with a vision to do something different. Many in the voluntary sector had become used to campaigning against the statutory agencies, but Avril and some others realised there was an opportunity to work with the Council and help shape direction. Last year the contract for voluntary sector infrastructure came up to for tender. Avril and eight other charity leaders took the opportunity to come together, with the ambition to act as door openers rather than gatekeepers, and to work together to share power and change the dynamic across the social sector. They established the Barking and Dagenham Collective.
This is not a traditional CVS, but rather aims to grow the social sector through partnerships and collaboration. For example the council was developing an adult care strategy and wanted to consult with the voluntary sector. The Collective said no, let’s not do that, instead let’s all get in a room together and re-imagine what adult social care could look like locally.
When Covid-19 hit it was horrific, but it also accelerated collaboration, connection and relationship. Because trust had already been established, the Council was more easily able to accept that often the voluntary sector was better placed to take action in the emergency, and a connected borough-wide response quickly took shape. Where things didn’t go well, it was always possible to pick up the phone and get it sorted. This felt to Avril like a very different way of operating, compared to the past. Avril shared some examples:
The foodbanks hadn’t talked to each other for twenty years but now a WhatsApp group was formed, with 17 foodbanks working together. The Council quadrupled referrals to foodbanks, but rather than simply offloading a problem, is now working with the foodbanks to develop a food strategy for the borough.
Children’s social care wanted to produce a directory of voluntary services, and asked for voluntary sector representation on a Council panel. The Collective said no, we won’t do that, but instead we will put you all together, in a room, with the voluntary agencies who are working with the children and young people who are being exploited.
The thing to do, explained Avril, is to create an environment where people are talking together, and building relationships, and are willing to hear one another – then something changes.
3. Discussion
Participants broke into smaller groups to discuss the questions, ‘What are we learning about working across sectors in a place?’ Feedback from the breakout sessions, and the subsequent discussion facilitated by Caroline Slocock, Better Way co-convenor, included the following points:
Relationships are centrally important. Where people had put in the time previously to build local relationships this has proved valuable in the crisis. Conversely, some large agencies, for example in the housing sector, struggled to respond where they didn’t have the local connections.
It helps to be enthusiastic, open and honest, to build trust with other people.
Collaboration can be highly dependent on a few individuals in leading roles. When they move on, the collaborative efforts are put at risk. So, what can be done to maintain a collaborative culture and practice – a system - which is less dependent on a few key individuals?
Relationships with the private sector can be very valuable in a place but are often neglected. A presumption of moral superiority in the charity sector (often unwarranted) is a big obstacle.
There are often power imbalances. Smaller local agencies, especially BAME and women’s organisations, are still having bad experiences at the hands of larger ones. With funding pressures post-Covid, many smaller organisations, closest to the ground and to the people they serve, will be especially at risk. We need to build partnerships where there is much more mutual recognition and respect for the value generated by small as well as large organisations.
It is important that the voices of people are heard and acted upon. Creating a good place is not just about a physical space but about our place in society, and collaborations need to ensure that those who are not currently heard can express their views of what the place and space means for them so that the place works for them.
The common cause produced by crisis has enabled rapid change, sharing information for example, or new ways of working with people. But there is now a risk that momentum in favour of collaboration will be lost as the crisis recedes.
Good collaboration and strong partnerships require clear purpose, a shared vision, where beneficiaries are the focus, not organisations.
However, this focus can be difficult to maintain. When leaders become once-removed from beneficiaries, their attention and energy can too often switch to organisational management. They are constantly tempted to act in ways designed to secure the future of their organisation, and for example bid for work that others could deliver better. Organisational leaders need to be explicit that they will not compete with others ‘just because they can’.
4. Topics for further meetings of the group
The following were suggested (at the meeting and subsequently) as topics for the group to address in future meetings:
How do we establish a system based on relationship and trust that will continue even when people move on?
Public engagement in systems change (e.g. in citizens assemblies or in other ways).
Members of the group are invited to provide blogs, video clips, on building relationships and on building collaborative systems, and also to suggest others to join the group.
5. Next meetings
Thursday 15th July, 3.00pm-4.30pm
Thursday 9th September, 3.00pm-4.30pm