Summit Workshop Innovation: "Slow motion crisis team"
From Future of Local Services to the Public
SUmmit workshop - syndicate innovation group
Emergent opportunity area: New ways to work and share
Contents |
Innovation Concept: Slow motion crisis team
Introduction: Group to consider collaboration between local authorities and also with other sectors. What are the mechanics involved, how do we work together to innovate and share cross-cutting ideas. Are local authorities working in isolation?
Issue of collaboration a major topic for 10 years, for example the development of ‘Beacon Councils’. This only valuable up to a point. Need to put practitioners together on the ground and consider how we create and sustain these networks and make the most of the innovative thinking which arises. How do we get off the ground is the initial hurdle as is finding ways to create a collaboration which is self sustaining.
IDA perspective is based on social networking models. Can be good but those using these can often be very specialist and so it does not engender a systemic process for all. Does the model hold to all?
Employment legislative frameworks are constraining compared to a situation when there is a catastrophe where communities just get on with it. There is a range of things that might work but we have to think about what we are trying to achieve by coming together.
Is there enough cash for people to want to ‘play’?
Does it stimulate responses? Small amount of money available in relation to the effort involved. Some might involve communicating across Local Government with police, education, health but communities are very local.
LSPs - what is the role they have to play / how effective are they? Are they a solution looking for a problem?
Collaboration can work but the rule book must be thrown away. Eg IBM and Lockheed Martin who hothouse people outside the rules of the organisation and also allow them to fail in their innovation.
Forms of the approach described have been carried out with LSPs in some authorities. Time limited and focussed on local networks which were solution focussed. Involved small community groups.
When we are in a crisis we work at our best. Emergency planning thrown aside (during flooding) people instinctively worked together well and beyond their remit. People trying to be very helpful, I was struck by inventiveness of this, there was no falling back to the rule book.
Why don’t we work like this?
The rules. People’s discretionary attitudes, everyone bought in to the effort needed.
(IDA comment) – crisis management, create a space where rules don’t apply so trying to mainstream this is maybe the wrong approach, as you have to validate the responses. (What is the effect of attempting to ‘mainstream’ the response to a crisis?)
There is a point where you can plan to institutionalise responses. Systems thinking, exposing system to itself, rules reinforcing learned behaviour and people saying that things don’t have to work like this. Sometimes the system didn’t deliver and this bought innovation to the fore.
I remember trying to manage community workers who were promising things and working in their own way. There are difficulties involved in trying to control mavericks.
The employment of staff and the system of rewards and incentives are out of date. Human Resources bureaucracy. We could break through this by having a creative, responsive system.
What are the barriers in our world to this?
Central management targets and silos…
Accountability – how are politicians enabled to allow to create a space for innovation and how are they allowed to spend public money? Create spaces where these are dealt with.
Depends on how it is presented, beyond some of this within collaboration e.g. Google. ‘Pilot’ of things.
I don’t see what we are describing is organisational behaviour which when you become successful you become more conservative as the focus is on conserving what you’ve gained rather than trying to innovate.
Level-off of innovation because of this. There are few examples of ever continuing improvement. This is an organisational issue which is not particular to local authorities. Structure and regulation become more important than the innovation.
Policy capacity huge, large amount of money to spend but collective capacity of thinking about the possibilities seems to be limited. How to you get collaboration? Do we create an organisation?
Each council is very isolated, very separate councils in the NE, a lot of defensiveness around innovation.
Comparisons with private sector - companies have research a development units but local authorities do not have dedicated staff to find innovative responses for the community. Compared with information technology where there are always new models in production so that the company remains competitive in the market-place.
Is innovation in local authorities underplayed?
Does it need to be celebrated or have a dedicated department and will this department lose contact with the realities of delivering to the public?
Cross-service work required. Issues require a dedicated project manager who is allowed to recruit from a worldwide group of staff and also be allowed to take chances. Social care moved from empowered with a dedicated team with a budget. Research and Development departments needed and ‘innovation leads’. Why can’t we do this? Innovation is happening, but the sense of this happening is not obvious.
‘Whitehall aren’t aware of innovation because they would probably kill it’
‘Holes’ – innovative things, what is different about a crisis, depends upon the problem that you have to solve.
Issues arising in the future – good at terrorism and the Olympics but not at the others on the horizon. How can the sector deal with designing the next innovation?
Problem exists but there is an issue of political problems. Politicians not going to be win votes by solutions geared to solve problems a long time in the future.
Why do we guard our innovation? Local authorities are different and so solutions need to be made to fit the particular context, or is this just something that we tell ourselves and is this which makes us guard our innovation?
The way in which the issue / question is framed is important e.g. ‘think of a way that older people will be given a great day out this summer’. We don’t reward to make things happen. There is a ‘fairness’ culture rather than a culture of reward for those who innovate. Being frightened of moving out of the systems which have been put in place.
Targeting multi-agency work for family support – some families in particular targeted. Local authority sorted out this family and the social worker said that we bought them an alarm clock and this revolutionised their lives. Why didn’t we think of that! You needed to be close enough to find the solution and you did need multi-agency working to get to this point. We need to create the space for this type of innovation.
Create department of people freed-up and able to innovate? Issues of problem families, where is the solution?
Long-term behaviour changes, tackling alcohol issues we haven’t yet developed the solutions, because we think about it from professionalized point of view and we need to talk to those who do not have a professional view on the situation. Sometimes we need to draw them out and get them to think of the solutions.
Those young people leave local government because we put them in a little box and don’t allow them to work on broader issues.
Is this change happening?
We need to move away from local bureaucracy, this way of thinking is breaking down and we are not narrowed by professional figures.
Idea equivalent to that of a teaching hospital – getting different professionals and a new kind of person who can mix ideas together and find innovative solutions.
Collaborations organic but, do we need to invest in this idea regionally, is it like the process of peer review?
How does it deal with the problem of a focus on target-setting?
More a problem under CPA but under LAAs quality of life issues which are longer term and this shift is fundamental. It is difficult to accept that quick-wins are harder to find, but it is about improving quality of life over a period of time.
Public takes this for granted, and they assume that things should be done. If it is done there is no recognition for what has been put in place as the public assumes that it needs to happen anyway.
Non-professionals working across boundaries. The users of services, those involved in accountancy are not being exposed to the ‘real’ deprived communities. Recruitment and rewards should be based on different principles. Systems should be cast aside (job evaluations? – ‘don’t go there!’)
(IDA view) – what you are doing is developing the sort of people who don’t play by the rule by instinct. but does this deliver to local people? Or does it change cultures and bring energy? Teaching partnership made up of various professionals.
Focus on delivery. Play to the strengths of the individuals. Completer finishers e.g. the police, not innovative but if you give them a job they go and get it done.
For example, Police constable suggesting that those he arrests he then puts in touch with the community groups can help and then he will stop seeing these people again. Let’s play to the strengths of the people involved.
One reason that this working is difficult is because we employ people differently. Singles status between services – should we remove?
Bringing people together, to tackle specific issues maybe we don’t need to local people together.
Long terms structural challenges – are they important e.g. migration, climate change etc..?
We are going to have to think about these things because it is going to get wetter, it goes back to planning, it goes back to region. Never going to secure the appetite for those that think about infrastructure planning.
Like the notion of creating spaces and allowing people to work together over a common task is where we have not been good. Does the LGA do this?
IDA have been invaluable in order to broker the system and to extend this but how do we mine it? Issue is looking at the comparative framework from the services; it boils down to people knowing each other in the end.
Let people share and customise the model provided.
Doesn’t have to work inside the local authority but there can be transfer between the local authority and the voluntary sector. Managerialism should be avoided. People to be allowed to create
Outputs?
Creating conditions for success. We need to do it without terms of reference and forms as this stifles people, too much reporting back and bureaucracy.
Should be focused on specific issues, i.e. social care / health / difficult social issues, using teaching hospital model. Should deal with the fragmented public service which is used in this country. Visit from Ukrainian mayors who couldn’t understand the way the LA was fragmented by various groups and service providers ‘they said how the hell does anything happen!’
Small, fun and local… if you need a quick win.
Any way to tackle rewards issues?
Pick brightest and best without upsetting people.
Will this be rejected by existing systems?
Yes, there always is this kind of reaction, ‘but I call it a pilot’.
Reactions, we don’t expect you to write anything down, or to report back often. They have to talk and they are not allowed paper and pens or post-it notes…
Incentives for different behaviours, people need to set new rules and this should be incentives. Also maybe include sanctions?
Challenge central government?
Vertical network as well as lateral one? Looking at the problem and working out what each of the layers of governance are doing with it. From central government downward. You’d want to be exemplified from CAAs and targeting.
Recognise that innovation is ahead of demand, so you need room to experiment. Empowered staff for empowered communities. Do communities want to be empowered?
How will this make a difference to people on the ground?
Given outcome up front and task is to innovate around achieving this task (IDA). Family breakdown is the result 100 year legacy, this an experiment to see if we can make changes in some small way.
Different to teaching hospitals as it involves not only professionals but users of the service. Also important is the speed of the solution, something about speed, innovation and outcome. Not just about having good ideas but actually delivering an outcome.
Flooding – ‘dedicated emergency centres all flooded in hours so city hall was made the emergency centre and the staff sorted this out together within hours and in a couple of days the staff had everything set up, registration, serving hot food…Each time I came to visit the emergency centre became more elaborate, I said, just keep going, you don’t need me, I’m not here to change anything.’
‘Then you weren’t thinking about money or resources. But if it kept going you would be told that the money for the food had finished and the army wanted their beds back…’
Normally you have your budget given up front…
Want to take what we can do in a crisis and apply it to a situation where there is a crisis looming. If you were given an outcome to the group and a timescale – who would we have around that table, some of the ideas would be around legislation, education, it wouldn’t necessarily be the same groups of people.
Cutting through the crap and just achieving the solution… (sex education and supply of contraception e.g. condoms in taxis, morning after-pill with sale of alcopops provided as examples)
Dragon's Den
PITCH
Slow motion crisis. 3 things to achive. Capture energy and flexability when an emergency was managed, enable people to abandon the rule book, suitable for long term big issues….
Local, regional or national, be different by different rules.
Clear outcome upfront
No previous experience necessary
No risk logs, plans or beaurocracyothing in writing!
Demonstrable.
Money, for trailing solutions, and location for collaboration, and to present results £50,000
RESPONSE
What is team going to do rather than sit in a hotel. Example of outcomes?
Alcohol for example and admissions to A and E of woman. Give a clear issue upfront, then gather together a group of people who are not necessarily professionals in the field to look at ideas which are clear and demonstrable to find the solution. Reach creativity outside of the rules.
Spending high on these issues already and the premise is that this is not working, so why should we provide money for people to think about this further?
It may be working but it may not be sufficiently aliened with what other service providers are spending on the issue. Not asking necessarily for more money but to use it more effectively
How will squad be taken seriously, and build relationships?
Free of targets – how managed with the targets that are provided by LAAs?
Not one set team, but taking a group of people for a particular issue and embed the way of working within the culture and develop the relationships which are encouraged by this type of working. Differing approach to invocation.
Money
Can be done cheaper. Willing to fund a team but not any hotels! I’ll give £25,000 I’ll give you £50,000 but I’ll expect you to be able to pay that back.
