No, Minister! Don’t over-strategise. Start by Starting.
BRIEFING NOTE #10
This is a series of briefing notes to yet another new housing minister. Here are some dangers to avoid, some well-trodden paths to be bypassed, and some barriers to thinking that need to be overcome (if we are serious about bringing about change)….and, oh yes, here are some thoughts on how to deliver this change! Please stick around long enough to make it happen.
In our traditional top-down world, the instinct is to ‘get an expert’ and ‘develop a strategy’. This tradition starts with a protracted brief-making exercise, follows with a lengthy commissioning process, continues with a prolonged study period and ends with a big comprehensive report. The report becomes the truth until the next report comes along, but the likelihood is that the report is out of date the day it is completed. And so, it goes. We do not need a new big cumbersome and protracted change management strategy or more complex policies to make change happen.
Old thinking will not solve the problems that the system itself has created. That is what all previous housing ministers found, too late. The new government needs to take a completely different approach. It needs to stop listening to the big developers, and instead get a small group of people around the table to give their best shot at defining the new NEIGHBOURHOOD ENABLING MODEL as the best way of tackling the housing crisis. Have a draft out in a month; tweak it and evolve it within six months.
System change, however local can be difficult. The management of change across complex, multi-layered systems can be extremely challenging. Making sense of this complexity requires an in-depth understanding of the mechanics and routes of change. According to the Innovation Unit, an independent, not-for-profit social enterprise based in the United Kingdom,
‘This means that we need to design and facilitate change processes that build coalitions for change, create shared purpose and make systems work better for everyone, converting potentially controversial policy problems into projects of collaborative innovation.’
Transformation requires strong leadership partnerships, but these are draining but, governance that supports the right behaviours can sustain change projects through tough moments.
Learning by doing, also called experiential learning, is an established approach in economic theory by which transformational change, such as increased productivity in the building industry, for example, is achieved through practice, self-perfection and continuous minor innovations. This approach is distinctly different from theory-based approaches, which pose hypotheses and seek to prove them. It’s a far more straightforward and practical idea, but an incredibly complex process that’s different for every situation. To understand how new ways will work, we need to try new things. We need insights from observers and onlookers and ideas from talking things through. We need rapid and continuous feedback; we need to learn from our environment and context. This learning-by-doing approach needs, however, a well-structured framework to be effective. For example, projects require a conducive, enabling environment, where essential barriers are fluid, in order to get off the ground.
At the level of cities and neighbourhoods, system change necessarily happens with the public, in public. It brings challenges but has transformative potential. The NEIGHBOURHOOD ENABLING MODEL and its approach to creating open, responsive and collaborative environments is critical. They are set up as continuous learning mechanisms. So, in urban transformation, new things can be tried by people and, as they gain acceptance, they can be instilled as the new normal. People just need the freedom to try. Any new system must, therefore, allow and nurture this freedom.